by Kay Fielding

Created on: October 03, 2009

Staying on top of grading is something that takes a concerted effort to do. There are several ways you can do this, and the most important way is to simplify your grading processes.

For Social Studies and Math:

1. Have students keep a grade sheet at their desk.

2. Give daily assignments that students do that count with a check in the grade book or on their grade sheet that is kept on their desk. This way, they get credit for doing the work but you don't have to grade the entire assignment.

a. Most of the time, you can just go around and check and see the one or two problems that students are struggling with, and check those.

b. Doing the work teaches students how to do it. They ask their friends, ask the teacher, or understand and then have practice doing the work.

c. Be sure that you keep the grade sheets in class. For some reason, students that cannot keep track of their homework are the same students that lose the grade sheets. Punishing them doesn't seem to change their slick hands. And if they are failing your class because they have lost their grade sheet, they will become disruptive instead of working with you to get a grade.

3. Have students grade each others papers while you go over the answers. Some students are lazy graders, so you will have to check to see if they are doing it correctly.

a. Have student graders put their names on the bottom of the papers: Graded By _____

b. Tell students that, if you make an error in grading, you will lose the points since I am giving you the answers and you need to pay attention.

c. If necessary, you can go over the answers on the board. Students tend to pay attention because they don't want to get a worse grade than they already did.

i. Remind students each time that it is their responsibility to make sure the graded student has answered correctly.

ii. If you will actually take points off a few students' papers right in the beginning, then they will really pay attention from that point forward.

4. Give a weekly test or larger assignment that will assess whether or not the student understood the assignments given during the week.

a. In this area, I prefer to test and re-teach. So I give students a chance to save their grade by going back over the test and answering the questions correctly.

i. Give them one period to complete it;

ii. Do not allow them to talk to classmates since it is a test correction (this will make them do their own work and learn what they missed).

iii. Tell them that they can determine

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