For most children they can tell the difference between letters as symbols early on. However, until they begin to see letters as a score or mark, letters are just symbols that they must learn to identify and write in various ways. At this point, letters begin to take on more significance than simply being letters. They take on added meaning as a form of judgment for young children; therefore 'A' can signify approval, 'B' can signify that there is a very close margin for success or failure, and 'C' can begin to be viewed as an indicator of disappointment no matter what the expectations are.
The letters of the alphabet begin to take on an order of relatedness or hierarchy. In the beginning of this development period the child may not immediately identify with each letter; however, their identification with each letter continues to develop as they mature and after enough time the letters begin to represent more than just the work the child has accomplished and more so represents who they are in relation to peers (as well as to the child too).
As this identification develops over time, there becomes very few instances in which children can identify with letters alone as a means of evaluating themselves.
Until one day, you will see how all the letters are now assigned to you and represent who you are.
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It is commonly believed by many that grades are nothing but a measurement tool, used to demonstrate student progress in an educational setting, give students feedback on their work and create structures to help understand how well a student learns and at what level of learning they operate. There seems to be a sense of this as being true when we look at these grades on paper. When we look at a letter grade or a number, it is a seemingly objective and clear way to visually represent something that has occurred.
Unfortunately in most cases, grades will not remain as something that is solely objective.
A 92 will not be seen as a data point but rather it will be viewed as an almost. A 78 will not be seen as a data point representing a specific date in time but rather it feels incomplete. Even though there is an understanding of what a grade represents from a logical standpoint, there is an emotional component that allows the grade to expand past those limits as well.
As a result, grades can be seen as something that an individual has to carry with them.
As students continue to internalize this numbering system in their own lives over time, it becomes increasingly difficult for them to separate who they are from those numbers. In conversations, you will hear many students make statements as if they are "bad at math" or "not a science person" or that they are "an A student." The numbers that they have created as part of their identity are now more than just a statement of performance; they are now part of the identity that has been developed based upon their past accomplishments.
Once an individual has developed their identity based on a grade, it is no longer objectively measured but instead is now defined through and reflects who that individual views themselves.
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The Quiet Currency of Self-Worth
Grades, or report cards, have the ability to not only measure student performance but also organize and rank student performance in such a way that their performance is visible to multiple people, and can be easily compared.
With comparison, we begin to see an evolution occur.
Grades become the currency for daily life in school with each student knowing where they rank against one another; they know who has top grades, who is having difficulty, who has “natural talent,” or who is struggling to get caught up.
Over time, this evolution creates a system of standards for students.
A good grade equates to success. If you receive a low grade you have to try to catch up with the rest of the class, e.g., “I received a ‘B’ in my English class and I need to improve my grade or I will fall behind.”
Learning begins to take a different shape in a competitive and comparative classroom, where it is based less on your internal desire to learn, and more on your placement against the other students in the classroom, e.g., “I understand the material,” versus “I am going to out-earn my classmate.”
Learning as Performance
At some point, before anyone had a chance to voice their concerns, learners began to feel as though they were carrying out a performance when they were actually learning.
Assignments start out being viewed as an opportunity for exploration, and the first question a learner asks as they approach an assignment is to consider what will get them the most significant marks instead of considering what they could discover in the work. They have learned how to structure their responses in line with the marking scheme, how to add the keywords that may assist them in attaining a good mark and how to predict what the examiner will want from their assignment.
This isn't laziness; students are adaptive.
Students are very good at perceiving others and recognizing where the marks are earned and where they are lost. They weigh creativity against marking, they manage their curiosity within set boundaries, and they avoid risk taking that could cost them marks.
As learning moves from a place of new discovery or questioning to one of producing 'correct' responses, learning has developed from a creative process that expands our minds and encourages more thought to an evaluative process that produces only the most suitable response to the requirements.
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The Pressure We Stop Questioning
If a system is ever-going, what makes it powerful is that it feels ordinary; it has become second nature to rest within this structure of learning, with numbing effects of perceived pressures (deadlines, expectations, comparisons) integrating themselves into an existence that appears as if it is just part of the process of school.
The numbing of pressure contributes to the development of how students perceive themselves and their capabilities and the impact that continual measurements of performance affect how students will perform. Students feel so much out of awareness for all forms of evaluation they can experience even in the process of learning when developing understanding of information.
Through a commonality within peer conversations. Students who consider themselves as intelligent and successful experience that same level of pressure to continue performing at their previous rate of performance. Students who suffer due to perceived limitations created by grades are consistently wondering how to exceed those same limitations. Both experiences impact significantly how students view the meaning behind grades and will likely many times last beyond a single grade.
What Grades Cannot Measure
Numerous aspects of learning cannot always be expressed numerically or lettered. For instance, curiosity will not always yield prompt results; creativity may or may not meet the criteria of structured grading; the development of many traits can occur at different rates than would be evident from using a single marker of assessment; other aspects of schooling that will enhance development (e.g., developing confidence and resilience; ability to ask questions; ability to think through solutions) cannot easily be measured.
Because of the difficulties in measuring many aspects of development, educators often overlook them.
Therefore, a student's level of curiosity may not show up as such when evaluating the quality of their work on a time-limited exam, or a student's level of improvement may be understated if they were evaluated only on the grades they received early in their learning. Also, a student who thinks in an alternate manner may receive lower-quality grades (compared to another student who thinks as expected) even if the quality of their reasoning is superior.
While grades are certainly not without merit, they do lack the ability to produce a complete picture of a student's development.
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Intelligence or Interpretation?
The belief that grading systems indicate intelligence has been persistent. The assumption that higher grades mean higher intelligence and lower grades mean lower intelligence, are two highly inaccurate ways of describing intelligence.
However, intelligence is a much more complicated concept than grades can encompass.
Grades measure the performance of students in a particular context. They indicate the student's level of understanding, interpretation, and responding to the requirements of the system. The use of grades fails to account for an individual’s thought process, their ability to relate various pieces of knowledge together, or how they might use their knowledge outside of that context.
In this regard, grades are not a direct indication of intelligence; rather, they are an interpretation of performance.
All interpretations are necessarily based upon the framework under which they were created.
Rethinking What Success Looks Like
Ambition and hard work are good things; wanting to do well, wanting to achieve goals, and wanting to have a deep understanding of what you're doing all represent very positive things, and grades can provide a structure and motivation to do your best when used appropriately.
Where the trouble lies is when grades become the sole measure used to evaluate success in learning.
When a person's success as a learner is defined purely by what is represented by letters and numbers, the definition of learning becomes very narrow. Exploration, questioning, and continuing to develop as a learner are not the primary focuses; rather, they become secondary in a system that provides a fast and visible indication of value but not always an accurate indication.
The question may not be if grades should exist, but how much we place on them as a way to determine who we are and who others are.
Worth Cannot Be Alphabetized
Eventually, one must distinguish between an identity and a performance.
Your grades represent one point of view at a particular time in your life or under certain circumstances or related to one type of task — and do not encompass all that you know, can do or will ever accomplish!
This distinction may be difficult to maintain when we are often taught to evaluate ourselves and others based on the assigned letter and number grades.
Thus, leaving us with the question: Why are grades used as a measure of success in school, and how might our beliefs about grade measurements change us?
