I’ll chime into this conversation. I teach an intro level Environmental Geology class (250 students) and have about 75-80% attendance on most days. The students are motivated to stay because they know that their peer evaluation grade is a significant
portion of their grade (usually about 20-30%). I stress that in order to be a good team member, students need to attend class regularly, update their teammates if they won’t be there, and most importantly actively contribute to all application exercises. They
want to be sure that their peer evaluations are good and so they show up. I also keep an attendance record on their folders that they update. I tell them that this is mainly for them, so that they have an idea of which of their team members are attending and
which aren’t. I end up using these records too though, especially for student athletes and fraternity members who will sometimes have to prove to an advisor that they were in class.
I also assign team points to application activities. In the beginning of a module, these are usually mostly participation points, then they become a mix of participation and correct/incorrect. I use participation points when I intentionally want
to start a discussion and use actual grades when we’ve already used a skill and I want to see what they’ve learned. I try to get a discussion going with the full class about the application exercise. This works pretty well until the new-ness of TBL wears off
and they realize that they may be in a small group, but they’re still in a huge, anonymous course. Once discussion really falters (about half way through the semester), I start giving extra credit points to teams who volunteer to share their application exercise
discussion/thoughts with the full class. Then, all kinds of teams are ready to talk.
All team members automatically get all the team grades regardless of whether they were there or not. If they miss more than a couple of classes, the peer evaluation grade generally ensures that they will not get an A in the course (and also their
individual grades tend to be lower).
Basically, I use grades as motivators intermittently and when it’s most necessary.
Beth
I would be very interested to hear from others who teach Intro Level Undergraduate Courses on this topic. I find myself going back and forth between grading/not-grading and credit for attendance. If
I grade the application activities, then I lean toward give the grade to the team and allow peer evaluations (and application grades) to incentivize attendance. But if I don't grade, then I tend to lean toward participation grades and zeros for no-attendance
and peer evals for unprepared/non-contributors.
I would prefer not to grade nor take attendance for applications. An internalized motivation for the love of learning would be wonderful, but in an intro level class I find some incentive is necessary
(at least for a portion of the students)
Michael
James "Michael" Latham, Ph.D.
Professor of Economics
Business & Computer Systems
Collin College
SCC J228
Dear TBLers
So, this is an interesting reflection perhaps on student maturity.
I'm so excited that students are so engaged they stay for applications even though there are no grades. However, in a first year classroom teaching a general education requirement if there is no grade attached to applications I would have few if any folks
staying.
Manda
Further information about the UBC Mailing Lists service can be found on the UBC IT website.
Further information about the UBC Mailing Lists service can be found on the UBC IT website.