bootism-shoe-religion

What a complex question that educators face on a daily basis. We had a chance to grade some papers in class. There was quite a range of grades given to the same writing samples. Teachers are individuals like everybody else. We have our own idiosyncrasies about writing. Some of my classmates focused on mechanics, some focused on ideas/content, and some focused on organization. I think the most important aspect of writing is ideas. I think that this might be due to the fact that I have worked with students with disabilities and they have problems with all parts of writing. The hardest part for these students is to get ideas on paper. The other stuff can be worked on later.
I didn’t realize how subjective grading writing is. An essay can be graded in so many different ways. It all depends on who is doing the grading. Also another factor is it the first essay or the hundredth essay that they are grading. This can change between essays. There should be consistency in grading. Teachers should look for the same things on every paper. A test for teachers is to grade all papers without any names on them. Then grade them with names on them. If the same paper does not get the same grade then you can tell that you are being biased based on the student, and not on the writing. I think that teachers should do this every so often to become more aware of how slack that they are getting in your grading. An idea to stay away from subjectivity is to use rubrics. The rubrics give teachers a standard to go by. There is less chance of grading more heavily on one thing more than another. By giving each section total points the teacher and students know ahead of time what is expected of them. There is an awesome sight that designs rubrics of all kinds. I spent sometime designing a few rubrics for fun. The website is http://rubistar.4teachers.org/index.php
Grading one of my worst fears as a teacher. I feel that I’m inadequate in assessing students properly. Grading can be so subjective in any subject not only in writing. I worry about are my students learning what they need to learn to go on. I know that I will be effective teachers, but grading scares me. I think once i’m in the classroom and grading routinely then I may feel more comfortable.