Ungrading: Why Rating Students Undermines Learning (and What to Do Instead)

Author(s): Blum, S. D.
Date: 2020
Publication: West Virginia University Press
Citation: Blum, S. D. (2020). Ungrading Why Rating Students Undermines Learning (and What to Do Instead). West Virginia University Press. https://wvupressonline.com/node/844.
Section on webpage: Ungrading
Tenets: Promoting reflexivity. Treating students as agentic co-educators. Building equity, trust, mutual respect, and support. Promoting cooperative learning.
Annotation: The moment is right for critical reflection on what has been assumed to be a core part of schooling. In Ungrading, fifteen educators write about their diverse experiences going gradeless. Some contributors are new to the practice and some have been engaging in it for decades. Some are in humanities and social sciences, some in STEM fields. Some are in higher education, but some are the K–12 pioneers who led the way. Based on rigorous and replicated research, this is the first book to show why and how faculty who wish to focus on learning, rather than sorting or judging, might proceed. It includes honest reflection on what makes ungrading challenging, and testimonials about what makes it transformative.

 

When Grading Less Is More

Author(s): Flaherty, C.
Date: 2019
Publication: Inside Higher Ed
Citation: Flaherty, C. (2019). When Grading Less Is More. Inside Higher Ed. https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2019/04/02/professors-reflections-their-experiences-ungrading-spark-renewed-interest-student.
Section on webpage: Ungrading
Tenets: Promoting reflexivity. Treating students as agentic co-educators. Building equity, trust, mutual respect, and support. Using technology intentionally to build communities and enhance learning.
Annotation: In this article, the author has compiled several professors’ reflections on implementing ungrading in their higher education classrooms. As these professors note, using this policy greatly improved learning and the students’ experiences as a whole. The downside to this, as noted by one professor, is the possibility for grade inflation. Though, as mentioned, this can easily be combatted through a variety of measures. Overall, this method – a blend of traditional grading and ungrading – has proven to be effective in the learning environment.

 

Academe Has a Lot to Learn About How Inclusive Teaching Affects Instructors

Author(s): Pittman, C. & Tobin, T. J.
Date: 2022
Publication: The Chronicle of Higher Education
Citation: Pittman, C., & Tobin, T. J. (2022). Academe Has a Lot to Learn About How Inclusive Teaching Affects Instructors. The Chronicle of Higher Education. https://www.chronicle.com/article/academe-has-a-lot-to-learn-about-how-inclusive-teaching-affects-instructors?utm_source=Iterable&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=campaign_3666147_nl_Academe-Today_date_20220208&cid=at&source=ams&sourceid=
Section on webpage: Ungrading
Tenets: Treating students as agentic co-educators. Building equity, trust, mutual respect, and support.
Annotation: This article examines the ways in which instructors without institutional or cultural authority are impacted by inclusive teaching practices. The article highlights how instructors without institutional or cultural authority may face additional resistence and incivility from students when implementing inclusive teaching practices. The article then goes on to recommend ways in which the benefits of inclusive teaching can be balanced with the inequalities faced by some instructors.

 

Toward an Ethic of Care and Inclusivity in Emergency E-Learning

Author(s): Hutchison, E.
Date: 2020
Publication: PS: Political Science & Politics
Citation: Hutchison, E. (2020). Toward an Ethic of Care and Inclusivity in Emergency E-Learning. PS: Political Science & Politics, 17–19. https://doi.org/10.1017/s1049096520001602.
Section on webpage: General Teaching and Course Development
Tenets: Building equity, trust, mutual respect, and support. Examining how gender, intersecting with other social categories, structures our lives, learning, and knowledge production, access to resources and information. Uncovering the causes of inequality and leveraging resources toward undoing power structures. Honoring diversity and lived experiences through intersectional approaches. Using technology intentionally to build communities and enhance learning.
Annotation: In this article, the author shares tools for making the online classroom more inclusive and engaging for students. The strategies focus on utilizing new advancements in higher education pedagogy and fostering a collaborative environment between students.

 

Care and Culturally Responsive Pedagogy in Online Settings

Author(s): Kyei-Blankson, L. Blankson, J. & Ntuli, E.
Date: 2019
Publication: IGI Global
Citation: Kyei-Blankson, L., Blankson, J., & Ntuli, E. (2019). Care and Culturally Responsive Pedagogy in Online Settings. IGI Global. https://www.igi-global.com/book/care-culturally-responsive-pedagogy-online/210215.
Section on webpage: General Teaching and Course Development
Tenets: Building equity, trust, mutual respect, and support. Examining how gender, intersecting with other social categories, structures our lives, learning, and knowledge production, access to resources and information. Uncovering the causes of inequality and leveraging resources toward undoing power structures. Cultivating self-care and boundaries. Humanizing online teaching/learning. Creating cultures of care in online classrooms. Using technology intentionally to build communities and enhance learning.
Annotation: As enrollment numbers continue to grow for online education classes, it is imperative instructors be prepared to teach students from diverse groups. Students who engage in learning in classrooms where their backgrounds are recognized and the instruction is welcoming and all-inclusive perform better. Individuals who teach in online settings must endeavor to create caring and culturally appropriate environments to encourage learning among all students irrespective of their demographic composition. Care and Culturally Responsive Pedagogy in Online Settings is a collection of innovative research on the incorporation of culturally sensitive teaching practices in online classrooms, and how these methods have had an impact on student learning. While highlighting topics including faculty teaching, restorative justice, and nontraditional students, this book is ideally designed for instructors, researchers, instructional designers, administrators, policymakers, and students seeking current research on online educators incorporating care and culturally responsive pedagogy into practice.

 

How to Engage Students in a Hybrid Classroom

Author(s): McMurtrie, B.
Date: 2020
Publication: The Chronicle of Higher Education
Citation: McMurtrie, B. (2020). How to Engage Students in a Hybrid Classroom. The Chronicle of Higher Education. https://www.chronicle.com/article/How-to-Engage-Students-in-a/249143?utm_source=at&utm_medium=en&utm_source=Iterable&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=campaign_1354380&cid=at&source=ams&sourceId=5192809.
Section on webpage: General Teaching and Course Development
Tenets: Treating students as agentic co-educators. Building equity, trust, mutual respect, and support. Promoting cooperative learning. Humanizing online teaching/learning. Using technology intentionally to build communities and enhance learning.
Annotation:

 

Teaching with Tenderness: toward an Embodied Practice

Author(s): Thompson, B. W.
Date: 2017
Publication: University of Illinois Press
Citation: Thompson, B. W. (2017). Teaching with Tenderness: toward an Embodied Practice. University of Illinois Press. https://www.press.uillinois.edu/books/catalog/45hss6kk9780252041167.html.
Section on webpage: General Teaching and Course Development
Tenets: Building equity, trust, mutual respect, and support. Cultivating self-care and boundaries. Humanizing online teaching/learning. Creating cultures of care in online classrooms. Examining (dis)embodiment in virtual teaching/learning.
Annotation: Teaching with Tenderness follows in the tradition of bell hooks’s Teaching to Transgress and Paulo Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed, inviting us to draw upon contemplative practices (yoga, meditation, free writing, mindfulness, ritual) to keep our hearts open as we reckon with multiple injustices. Teaching with tenderness makes room for emotion, offers a witness for experiences people have buried, welcomes silence, breath and movement, and sees justice as key to our survival. It allows us to rethink our relationship to grading, office hours, desks, and faculty meetings, sees paradox as a constant companion, moves us beyond binaries; and praises self and community care. Tenderness examines contemporary challenges to teaching about race, gender, class, nationality, sexuality, religion, and other hierarchies. It examines the ethical, emotional, political, and spiritual challenges of teaching power-laden, charged issues and the consequences of shifting power relations in the classroom and in the community. Attention to current contributions in the areas of contemplative practices, trauma theory, multiracial feminist pedagogy, and activism enable us to envision steps toward a pedagogy of liberation. The book encourages active engagement and makes room for self-reflective learning, teaching, and scholarship.

 

7 Ways to Do Formative Assessments in Your Virtual Classroom

Author(s): Fleming, N.
Date: 2020
Publication: Edutopia
Citation: Fleming, N. (2020). 7 Ways to Do Formative Assessments in Your Virtual Classroom. Edutopia. https://www.edutopia.org/article/7-ways-do-formative-assessments-your-virtual-classroom.
Section on webpage: Grading
Tenets: Building equity, trust, mutual respect, and support. Presenting knowledge as constructed. Examining how gender, intersecting with other social categories, structures our lives, learning, and knowledge production, access to resources and information. Uncovering the causes of inequality and leveraging resources toward undoing power structures. Honoring diversity and lived experiences through intersectional approaches.
Annotation: In this article, the author gives several ideas for teaching online and building an environment that promoted equity, trust, support, while also Promoting cooperative learning. These resources include, “dipsticks, digital journals and one pagers, elevator pitches and tweets, square, triangle, and circle, make art your assessment, peer to peer evaluations, and virtual exit tickets.”

 

Quality Education is Accessible

Author(s): TheDOITCenter
Date: 4/6/2017
Publication: YouTube
Citation: TheDOITCenter. (2017, April 6). Quality Education is Accessible [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q4_LKVTaXpo&feature=youtu.be.
Section on webpage: Accessibility and Universal Design
Tenets: Connecting to the personal and to communities outside of academia. Building equity, trust, mutual respect, and support. Examining how gender, intersecting with other social categories, structures our lives, learning, and knowledge production, access to resources and information. Uncovering the causes of inequality and leveraging resources toward undoing power structures. Honoring diversity and lived experiences through intersectional approaches.
Annotation: