Side note before I get started: ever tried to find a picture of cooperative learning online where students aren’t obviously posed, pointing at something and smiling ear to ear?
I couldn’t relate the history of cooperative learning as I never studied its origins, but the basic premise — that students can learn as much from each other as the teacher — has been around for decades. Of course what they learn isn’t necessarily the same thing, mere content or skills development. Today’s blog isn’t about the merits of cooperative learning (or lack thereof), it’s merely about how to assess it fairly.
There are lots of potential downfalls to group work, the most obvious being some members of the group do not (perhaps cannot) do their fair share. Whether the work is being done in class or at least partially outside of class for a larger project, there’s no way the teacher can really know who is doing what. Here are the basic options I’ve looked at, and the ultimate solution that I’ve gone with:
A single group grade — The group finishes its work, the teacher grades it and everyone gets the same grade. Pretty straightforward and fair regarding the output. This is how it works in life, at least to some extent. The boss creates a committee to create a report or an advertising campaign or sales pitch, and it typically gets evaluated not based on anything other than the results. Granted, that analogy isn’t perfect as there is usually a hierarchy involved that does not typically exist in classroom group work. The problems with this approach are that it does nothing to prevent the slackers from making the best, most responsible students carry the burden. It’s a huge problem in college prep or on level classes, but still an issue in honors and Advanced Placement. I was never the hardest worker in high school, but I was unwilling to let my group’s work be awful and typically had to take on much more responsibility while others coasted. It wasn’t and isn’t fair.
No grade — Well, that’s simple enough. Class, do this work because you’ll learn something from it and it will help you better understand the material and develop your skills. When you take that looming assessment in a week or so, you’ll be well prepared for it if you take this assignment seriously. Based on my experience, if I tell students in advance that something isn’t going to be graded, the quality of work is — at best — barely passable. Educational reformers will suggest that a teacher in this situation has to do more to sell the students to buy into intrinsic motivation. I imagine that is possible, but I don’t see it being likely unless every teacher bought in simultaneously — not just to comply with edicts from above, but because they were sold on it being possible. And it still would have enormous obstacles including things outside the control of an individual teacher and entire school community, like how college admissions work. Although I don’t always count group work for a grade, I do not announce this in advance of the work. Students sometimes grumble because they “did all that work for nothing,” but I think they understand that that’s not true and also understand that had they known it wasn’t going to count, they would have phoned it in.
Peer evaluations — Students grade each other anonymously. This can be the entire grade or more likely factored into the grade the teacher distributes. I tried this briefly, but found students would typically overestimate the quality of work each group member did or be vindictive towards one person with some level of anonymity to protect them. Although there are numerous articles out there about teaching students to do fair assessments of each other’s work, and rubrics for it, I think students take rubrics about as seriously as most teachers do (a subject for another blog). “Everyone gets an A” is not all that helpful when the work itself is not up to par.
Teacher as investigator – Make the students list everything they did and then have the teacher be a forensics expert, analyzing the work and concocting some formula by which they can fairly grade each individual’s performance. This approach is time-consuming and rather arbitrary as the teacher is not privy to each conversation and can’t witness what work was actually done by whom. When students say they all worked on an assignment equally, is it true, or is there peer pressure involved?
The Geri Hastings Method – More than a decade ago I met master teacher Geri Hastings at an Advanced Placement US History workshop that she ran. She is a teacher and supervisor from Maryland and shared a bevy of great pedagogical ideas, none better than her means of group grading. Ms. Hastings suggested that students would provide a detailed list of each group member’s participation. They would collaborate on making the list and each sign off, agreeing to the credits. A premium gets placed on specificity so as to avoid problems later. The total number of points from the grade is multiplied by the number of students in the group. The group is given the number and asked to divide the points amongst themselves. (Disclaimer: there may be an innovation or two of my own in here that didn’t come from her, but honestly I can’t recall. For now I’ll give her credit for the whole thing.)
It’s not a perfect system and there are occasional bumps in the road, but here’s why it works: once students understand the system and that they will be held accountable by each other, the slacking largely disappears. The teacher returns their work with specific feedback so that the students know where they lost points. If it’s in an area that Person X was solely responsible for, it makes sense that they might not get an equal share in the total number of points. (This also serves to encourage students to get work done in a timely manner and have someone else “approve” their contribution, which shields them somewhat from punitive grading).
At least 90 percent of the time (probably more), students distribute the points equally. I’m sure that in some of those cases, individual students are less than thrilled with the outcome as they believe they did more work than others, or that their work wasn’t the reason that some points were taken away. But the onus is on them to self-advocate. We talk about this multiple times throughout the year, including the notion that no one wants to be perceived as a jerk or grade grubber… but also that what’s fair is fair. I’ve overheard students pointing to the group credits sheet and the teacher’s remarks in making their cases on multiple occasions. Most of the time that results in a small tweaking of the scores (I get 92, you get 88) that really make little difference in the overall grades, but leaves students feeling relatively satisfied that justice was served. In those situations where a student allows peer pressure to override their objections, that’s ultimately on them. As I said, not a perfect system, but since I’ve implemented it, I have had so many fewer issues, and student surveys have indicated a high level of satisfaction with the approach.
But what happens if three students gang up on the fourth and rob them of deserved points? Ms. Hastings provided for an opportunity for a student to write a dissenting opinion from the group grade, due in writing the next day. This approach gives students a chance to cool off, reflect about the outcome, and considering whether it’s worth making a stink out of a couple of points. (Yes, part of this is mere convenience for the teacher not having to deal with conflict between students.) Students who genuinely feel they were cheated by their group cannot argue about the overall group grade, just the distribution. I get maybe three of these a year. Frequently (shh, don’t tell anyone), I quietly award the student a few extra points based on their description of what occurred. Maybe once every five years I have to meet with the entire group to hash out what occurred as it might seem like a case of ganging up for the purposes of self-advancement. But occasionally I meet with the complainant and explain: No, you didn’t make a convincing case. Your group took these points away because the part of the project you did wasn’t very good, and that was your fault, not theirs. Next time, do your part early enough to show it to someone else and have them review your work. Had you done that, then it would have been their fault too.
There is no perfect solution, but I’ve found the Hastings Method™ by far the best approach. (It’s not actually trademarked, but it should be!)
Fenster on Education 