The ideas that Dr. Tae discusses in this video are ones that, if they were to be used, could revolutionize education and schooling in not only our nation, but worldwide. The idea that a grade cannot and should not be placed on the process of learning is one of these ideas. Dr. Tae showed the viewers that letter grades cannot be successfully placed on the trick he was trying to do. In actuality, the "grading process" was as simple as: "Did you complete the trick? If so you have learned it, if not, try again." This could change how students are educated quite drastically, where they received no grades. Instead they either learn something, or they do not learn something. This process can be most definitely applied to my own personal experience with regards to writing. This is because learning how to write effective college-level papers was something that I initially found very challenging. I had bad thesis statements, little to no support of my ideas, even a lot of run-on sentences, and the list goes on and on.
At first I found myself to be very discouraged; I even found myself thinking that I would never be able to get the hang of writing these types of papers. But I stuck with it, though, much like Dr. Tae kept trying to land his trick. Some attempts were better than others and the later papers were showing a little bit of progression, but I had not yet really landed my trick. After many attempts, however, I finally found myself "getting it all" and found that I was actually making it harder than it needed to be. With respect to skating, I was trying to land an amazingly hard trick when all I really was trying to do was a much simpler one. Finally, with regards as to who I believe the intended audience of Dr. Tae's presentation is, I feel that the message was trying to be given to anyone who wanted to learn something from now to basically forever. I think that all students, in any sense of the word, and educators alike could benefit very much if these ideas were implemented.
-Matthew S.
Word Count: 365
I agree with you, when it comes to schools teaching methods it’s almost kind of ridiculous. Students shouldn’t be graded by an a-f scale, instead I believe students should be graded on how hard they try. If a student is trying their hardest, meeting with the teacher and doing all their work and understands what it is their learning then they should be passed. Just like when you start training at a new job. They don’t grade you they just say know whether you know enough to work there or not. And yea at the beginning of class I would get so discouraged and stressed out by the thought of writing, I felt like I didn’t know enough. But by the end of the semester when we started getting more and more writing assignments it felt like I didn’t have to try as hard. I knew what to do and practice made it easier. I also think if they quit grading people and used that method it would help students out a lot and people would become more successful and less stressed out.
ReplyDeleteJessica E
WC-183
Matthew,
ReplyDeleteI have to say that I agree with you 100% on the grading system. It’s really hard to tell how much students take in and learn by giving them homework and tests. As being a former student I also feel that the grades sometimes make me feel worse about the work that I did. Everyone has that moment where they feel good about a paper they write and you expect that “A” to be on your paper when you get it back, but instead you get a “B”. That can really be depressing sometimes. Especially taking in the fact that what one person thinks about your test will differ from someone else’s thoughts. So It’s a little upsetting realizing that your grade falls in the hand of one person and is based on what they believe is “A” work and not based on what your actual “A” work is.