Milton, Ohmer, Howard R. Polio and James A. Eison. _Making Sense of
College Grades._ San Francisco: Jossey Bass, 1986.
(This is a nation-wide survey of students, legislators, teachers,
administrators, parents, and people in business (employers) on their
attitudes and beliefs about grades.)
Milton, Ohmer. _Alternatives to the Traditional: How Professors Teach and
How Students Learn._ San Francisco: Jossey Bass, 1972.
(Makes two points that have stayed with me. One, academics will study
just about anything, but are most reluctant to study their own teaching
and methods of evaluation--those are considered almost personal and no
one's business [though maybe less true now in our field than it was in
'72]. In college degrees are given in fields, but there's no guidance
for most college teachers in how to teach nor how to evaluate and grade.
Most are left to their owndevices.)
Kirschenbaum, Howard, Simon Sidney, and Rodney Napier. _Wad-Ja-Get? The
Grading Game in American Education._ New York: Hart Publishing, 1971.
(This is a neat little book. It surveys the prior 50 or so years of
findings on grading by telling a story about a researcher on grading and
assessment who consults with a local elementary school. It's all
documented, of course. For example, there's a scene where math teachers
inthe school, who are feeling smug because they think only English
teachers have trouble with grading because English is subjective and math
is objective all grade the same test and each give different grades.
Turns out some give partial credit for going so far correctly on a
problem, others deducted pionts if a problem wasn't solved corrrectly.
In the 'story' students petition for --Eric's dream-- non-graded courses.)
Nick Carbone, Writing Instructor
Marlboro College
Marlboro, VT 05344
nickc@marlboro.edu