We four GSIs graded the midterm of 130+ students. In some ways, I think we did the whole thing backwards. But I learned a lot and I don't think any of my students suffered a too-low grade.
The exam was 4 out of 6 short answer questions = 5 points each. And 2 out of 3 exam questions = 40 points each essay. We met and graded some short answer questions together. Then met again to grade essays. We took piles home to finish and later retrieved our section's exams to review, record the grades and return to students.
Things I'd do differently
--When preparing the final questions with the professor, develop the rubric for each question together.
----the very rough rubric we did prepare was extremely useful to me. I referred to it nearly each time I picked up a new exam. I found that I could be fair this way.
--Consider if questions can be rewritten to clarify and save students time. (We had one question that really only needed the students to list for types of immigrants. We didn't expect them to describe them as well. A better-written question could have saved many students valuable time.
--Add a note in the essay questions that says students will be penalized for inserting errors. We had a handful of students that answered an essay mostly correctly, but then added information that was incorrect as they tried to write a longer-than-necessary essay response.
--Assign an essay question to each GSI, or at least encourage reading in batches. While I enjoyed reading many of each of the 4 potential essays, I found that the grading process was more efficient and fair when I read, say 10 essays in a row on question 1, etc.
--Encourage GSIs to review the very lowest graded exams in their own section to make sure that grades were fair and not too harsh.
--Create a review of the exam that can be delivered by each of the GSIs that would include a student sample for each answer.
I have become quite protective of my students... and I want this feeling to lead to a more even grading process. I think it already is.
This sounds very familiar! I wish that we would have sat down with our professor after having read the sample papers and talked through what he was looking for, rather than doing it mostly between the GSIs. Since the professor was the one who came up with the term paper guidelines, it would have made me feel more confident in our rubric to have more of his input. Great that you guys did that.
ReplyDeleteI also totally understand being protective of your students! A couple of the students who had come to my discussion section did not turn in excellent papers and I found myself wanting to see material in their papers that really just wasn't there. I had to really try hard to be as fair as possible with those students who I knew better. At the same time, I still did feel uncomfortable giving a low grade to someone based on their paper when I had seen them discuss this material well in class...
Will your students have a final exam that you can try some of your suggestions out on?