making the grade

Making the GradeGrading Practices for

Students with Disabilities

By

Cathy Sartain Industries

cathysartainindustries@comcast.net

Why Worry About Grading?

• LRE

• Standards based curriculum and state assessment

• District grading policies

• Litigation

What Makes Grading Hard?

lack of regulatory guidancelack of regulatory guidance

“faulty” thinking

Doesn’t Federal Law Tell Us Everything We Need To Know?

IDEA: is silent with respect to grading issues

Section 504: prohibits discrimination in grading procedures

What is Some of the Faulty Thinking?

I can’t fail a special education student

I give all my Life Skills students an 85

• The report card grade does not really mean anything

The grade on the report card can’t be less than the IEP mastery level

I teach a lot in my classroom, but I can only grade the things that are on the IEP

I don’t do the grades for my sped students in my classroom, the sped teacher does

I really want to do things correctly…

what guidance is there so

I don’t make mistakes?

May I use a different grading system?

Only if the IEP team adopts an alternate system based on specific disability related needs

Don’t take it upon yourself to make changes outside of

an IEP Team meeting!

My student is receiving

accommodations in my classroom, do I modify the grade?

Do not reduce a grade merely because the student receives accommodations, or is in special education

Since my classroomis inclusive, I

arbitrarily weight my sped students’ grades,

this is OK, right? Of course not!!!!

But, what if we take out the word

arbitrary?

It Depends!

A district may use a weighting system in which [each] course is analyzed separately and assigned a degree of difficulty based on methods of instruction and material covered(North East ISD, TX. 1995)

Most of my students are in general education,

can I identify as a goal, that they will make a

passing grade? Definitely not!

The mastery criteria is tied only to the skill specified in the goal

Are good grades on my sped students’ report cards proof that the district is providing FAPE?

• Persuasive, but not definitive

If I send out IEP Progress Reports,

must I also send out Report Cards?

IDEA requires that the IEP describes how progress toward annual goal will be measured, and

When the periodic reports on progress will be provided to the parents

So, we must look to Section 504 for

guidance!Section 504 tells us that:

We can’t discriminate

We must document in IEP if ARDC determines alternate grading method

Grading must be meaningful and useful

Can the grade be based solely on

effort?State law (TEC 28.0216): requires a teacher to assign a grade that reflects

the student’s mastery of an assignment, AND

may not require a teacher to assign a minimum grade without regard to the student’s quality of work (not on effort alone)

May allow reasonable opportunity to make up or redo assignments and tests failed

If the IEP Team recommends a grading accommodation, will

that affect the graduation option?

No, graduation options are determined by rigor of content and grading is about mastery of content

Is it OK to identify if a sped student is

working on a modified curriculum on his report card?

Report cards are intended as a communication to parents and asterisks or other symbols or codes may be used to indicate a modification or exception to the generally applicable grading scale.

Well then, can we identify if a student is taking sped classes on

their transcript? We can not use a notation for the

purpose of identifying a course for students with disabilities

A transcript is generally expected to be shared with others than just the parent

In other words:

Grading practices need to be fair and equitable

Practices can’t be discriminatory or exclusionary

Grades need to be meaningful and useful

What does that look like?

Consistent framework for making decisions on determining grades for report card

Decisions are documented in IEP

Grades are true reflection of student’s progress

What should we base our decisions

on? District policies

Impact of disability on grading policies and procedures

Place of instruction

Curriculum expectations

What are my grading options?

District policies

District policies with accommodations

Alternate grading system

How is this documented in the ARD paperwork?

Depends on the district’s IEP paperwork

Most often is addressed in the accommodations portion of the paperwork

May also be addressed in the deliberations (minutes)

But this sounds like it could look

differently for each student?

You got it! Must be:Specific to the studentSpecific to the content areaSpecific to the impact of the student’s disability on the grading policies and procedures

Discussed, decided and documented in the IEP meeting

What tools can help make this happen?

Guidance for IEP Team decision making and documentation

Guidance for IEP Team selection of grading accommodation

Guidance for IEP Team development of alternate grading systems

Training, training, and training!

Sample ARD Decision-Making GuideFor

Determining Grades

If the instruction is: Then the grading may be:

Curriculum Expectations

Accoms/Mods

Instruct.Setting

State Assessment

Grading Options ARDDocumentation

TEKS with orwithout

Generaland/or Special

STAARSTAAR LSTAAR ASTAAR Alt

1.District policies2.DP with accommodations

TEKSModified

Content mods with Or w/oaccoms

Generaland/or Special

STAAR ASTAAR Alt

1.District policies2.DP with accoms3.Alternate grading

TEKSAlternate

Content Mods(academic & functional)

Generaland/or Special

STAAR Alt 2.DP with accoms3.Alternate grading

DistrictDistrictSpecificSpecific

This is a guidance document. The ARD Committee makes all IEP Decisions based on individual student need.

SampleGuidance on Selection of Grading Accommodations

Rationalfor Accommodation

Type ofaccommodation

ARD Documentation

• Deficits in long-term retrieval

• Deficits in acquiring basic knowledge

• Deficits in attention and concentration

• Deficits in ability to complete tasks

Assessments

Will take benchmark but will not count as grade

Additional points will be given for corrections on test items

Drop lowest test grade

Assignments

Minimum of ___ daily grades

Grades determined from work completed in class

No grade penalty for classroom notebook check

Sample Grading Rubric for Student on Alternate Curriculum in General Education

for Social Skills Development

Criterion 4 3 2 1

TransitionsAppropriately moves between activities with no assistance

Appropriately moves between activities with limited assistance

Inconsistently moves between activities with assistance

Refuses to move between activities with assistance

ParticipationStays in work area, on task and participates in all activities

Mostly stays in work area, on task and participates in all activities

Seldom stays in work area, on task and participates in all activities

Refuses to stay in work area, on task and participate in all activities

CommunicationVerbalizes in appropriate manner to express needs and thoughts

With guidance, verbalizes in appropriate manner to express needs and thoughts

Rarely verbalizes in appropriate manner to express needs and thoughts

Inappropriately verbalizes to express needs and thoughts

Total

Comments: Raw Score: ________X/12 Converted Score: ________%