New Page on my Blog - Proficiency-Based Grading

There is a new page on my blog - Proficiency-Based Grading. It is now listed at the top in the navigation bar. I hope that you will find the information useful.

Proficiency-Based Grading 

Performance vs. Proficiency

I am now in week 8 of school - I cannot believe that I have been with students for almost two months! One of my goals for this year has been to fully implement a proficiency-based grading system. While I have dabbled with the concept in the past few years, this year I wish to fully commit to it.

However, when discussing proficiency-based grading with others, I have come to realize that there are lots of different views about this, of which many are incorrect. Much of this comes down to one's understanding of performance vs. proficiency. I will admit that I did not learn about this concept until a few years ago, and now having an understanding of it has completely transformed the way I view grading. 

So allow me this excursus to distinguish between the two in a language classroom - none of the following information is mine but comes from years of learning about the topic from Martina Bex, Elicia Cardenas, and many others:

Performance

• “spit back what you know," rehearsed
• should be formative in nature when employed, informs teacher of where the knowledge gaps are and what gaps need to be filled
• focuses on errors made
• results tend to be quantifiable in nature, follows the "start from 100 and deduct errors" model
• rubric/traditional number grading

Proficiency 

• unrehearsed, real world
• "show me what you CAN do!"
• should be summative in nature
• holistic grading - "where do you fall on the rubric/continuum based on exemplars?"
• rubric (possibly based on ACTFL guidelines)

So when assessing the different modalities of a language classroom, what do formatives vs. summatives, performance vs. proficiency look like?

Reading (When assessing reading, always ask questions in commonly shared classroom language (probably English) and have students respond in that language. See Martina Bex’s blog post - “Reading Activity or Reading Assessment” for explanation).

• Performance
• formative
• answer questions about a KNOWN reading with which students are already familiar. Again, the "spit back what you know" model.
• Proficiency
• summative
• answer questions about a SIGHT reading but based on KNOWN vocabulary and structures. This will inform you as the teacher if/what students have acquired.

Listening

• Performance
• formative
• examples: which picture (A or B) am I describing?; draw what I say from a known story; which character from the story am I describing in the target language?
• Proficiency
• summative
• examples: based on KNOWN vocabulary, draw these unfamiliar sentences which I say; write the correct target language response to what I am saying.

Writing

• Performance
• formative
• example: timed write where students retell a KNOWN story in the target language, write a guided story using known vocabulary; write 4-5 sentences about what you see in the picture.
• Proficiency
• summative
• free write examples: change a detail in the story and write about it; write a sequel/prequel to the story; write about a parallel character; write a story about what you see in the picture.

Speaking

If possible, avoid speaking assessments in the first two years (due to output theory)

Grading rubric examples

• Martina Bex - Comprehensible Classroom
• Scott Benedict - Immediate Immersion

Other blogs on the topic

• Martina Bex
• Eric Richards
• Kawai Resources
• World Language Classroom

Rotating Desks

If you have not gotten a copy of Eric Richards’ book “Grafted Writing,” please do so. In it, he details numerous ways to get students writing in a very guided manner - this is great for beginning writers! One of his ideas is called “Rotating Desks.” At the 2023 CI Summit in Savannah where Eric demonstrated numerous strategies from his book, I took part in this activity, and it is a lot of fun!

Directions (his and my adaptation)

1. Choose a text (or write your own), and use it to create a projectable slide presentation.
2. Remove an element from each slide, such as vocabulary or grammar, to create “blanks.” 
3. Label the blanks with the missing element (“noun,” etc.) so the students will know what they are looking for. Students will be adding their own details based on the "blank" description.
4. After you have created the presentation, you can do the following activity in class. First, have students start with a whiteboard (write their names on their boards) at the top but small OR use a piece of paper.
5. Then project slide one on the board. Students will write down the entire text from the slide and insert the missing elements/new details. Tell them to write small because there are a number of sentences.
6. Students rotate to the next desk, but the paper/whiteboard STAYS. Teacher projects slide two. Students read the previous sentence and then add the content of slide two to the paper/whiteboard.
7. Repeat until slides are done.
8. Students return to their desks and read them.
9. MY ADAPTATION - since I am in a trailer this year and am deskless, students used whiteboards, and the whiteboards "rotated" for each slide.

Here is what I recently did with my Latin 1’s:

1. Puer est in (name of place/ store/ city).
2. Is est (size) puer.
3. Ei nomen est (name).
4. Is (name of female cartoon character/ female singer / female celebrity) videt.
5. (name from #4) est tristis, et habet (name of object / thing/ food).
6. Puer (different object / food/ thing) fert.
7. (name from #4) non puerum amat, sed (name of male cartoon character / male singer / male celebrity).   

Student example (in English):

1) A boy is in Buc-ees.

2) He is a big boy.

3) His name is Oscar.

4) He sees GloRilla.

5) GloRilla is sad and has a CrockPot.

6) The boy brings Takis.

7) GloRilla does not love the boy but Cookie Monster.

Observations

1. I love this activity on SO MANY levels! I do not know where to begin. This activity definitely has a Mad-Libs feel to it. 
2. First, I love the guided output aspect of it. Although I am telling students what to write (and those messages are hopefully 100% comprehensible for them!), there still is a degree of choice for them of what details to add.
3. This is a GREAT example of purposeful communication, because students are playing with the language in adding their own details.
4. This is a written form of TPRS/Storyasking! Instead of asking students to come up with details orally, they write them down instead.
5. Because I am asking them to write down known vocabulary and phrases, students are getting repetitions of understandable language in a context which adds to/modifies/enlarges their brain's mental representation of Latin.
6. When students get a new whiteboard, they must read what has already been written before they can move onto writing the new sentence. What they read should already be 100% comprehensible by this point, because A) the sentence frames are recycling known phrases and words from class but also B) students have already interacted with those sentences by writing them down on the whiteboard.
7. I loved hearing students laugh when they got back their original whiteboard and read what students had added!

Consider adding this to your toolbox of writing activities!