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First, Ivory, I thought you worked in a low income school based on your reports of the quality of your school Second, I wasn't aware that teachers gave grades, I always thought that students EARNED grades.
I think schools that have too many 4.0's graduating are suffering from grade inflation and not enough challenging material. I would think the total OPPOSITE that if a school reports too many students with A average that the school isn't working hard enough and I would be very hesitant to send my child there.
I switched schools this year. I was in a low quality school. I'm now in a high quality school. The difference is amazing.
I agree on grade inflation. IMO, too many A's is grade inflation.
I always felt there should be an objective standard to get a certain grade. If everyone can earn an A, fine, everyone gets an A (I have never had a class like that).
It's interesting to see the curves in my various classes. I had one class that didn't have a single A last semester and one that had 7. Same tests and same material. Just different mixes of kids. I had one class that fell into a normal bell curve. 1 or 2 A's, maybe an E, mostly high C's and B's and a couple of D's. Some of my other classes looked like a bathtub curve lots of A's and lots of E's. One extreme or the other. When you put all of my classes together, I ended up with a B curve but a significant percentage of A's.
Wouldn't a better school prepare a student for a better school? Lets say you want to go to Harvard I would asume that to get there the students would have some what more of a stringent educational process prior to entering those hallowed halls. What say ye to that?
I switched schools this year. I was in a low quality school. I'm now in a high quality school. The difference is amazing.
I agree on grade inflation. IMO, too many A's is grade inflation.
Isn't it possible to have a class where everyone succeeds and earns an A? If you have 20 or 30 students and all of them completed the work within the class, at home, or wherever, and scored at the top on the tests, wouldn't those students be allowed an A? or does a bell curve always enter into the equation? Lets take Calculus. If 100% of the students in a Calculus class completed 100% of the work and tested at 100% would they not all earn an A? I am not talking about grade inflation here, just the accomplishment and abilities of a class that did acceptionally well. What do you think?
Isn't it possible to have a class where everyone succeeds and earns an A? If you have 20 or 30 students and all of them completed the work within the class, at home, or wherever, and scored at the top on the tests, wouldn't those students be allowed an A? or does a bell curve always enter into the equation? Lets take Calculus. If 100% of the students in a Calculus class completed 100% of the work and tested at 100% would they not all earn an A? I am not talking about grade inflation here, just the accomplishment and abilities of a class that did acceptionally well. What do you think?
That's the question. If an A means the same thing no matter what district you're in, then I'd have a lot of A's. If an A is harder to get in a better school, then I'd still expect a bell curve. The question is what should an A mean in a good school compared to a not so good school.
IMO, if I had a class where everyone got an A, I'd be wondering what was wrong. If everyone can get one, isn't an A meaningless? What should an A mean? Should it mean you know X amount of material or should it mean you're in the top X percent of students in your class? Should all schools grade the same? Does the college comparison apply here? Should an A at MIT mean the same thing as an A at the local community college? Should an A at a good high school be the same thing as an A in a bad high school?
Wouldn't a better school prepare a student for a better school? Lets say you want to go to Harvard I would asume that to get there the students would have some what more of a stringent educational process prior to entering those hallowed halls. What say ye to that?
If you're holding the students to a higher standard, you'd be seeing bell curve results. I hold my students to a higher standard in this school than I did the last school I taught in. If I'd held those students to my standard this year, 1) most of them would have refused to do the work and 2) most of them would have failed. While I gave few A's last year, the students who earned them could have compared with the students I gave A's to this year. I didn't ask them too because I was too busy trying to get their classmates to pass.
Should all A's be created equal. I've always thought that a 4.0 from a good school meant you learned more than a 4.0 from a lousy school. IMO, an A should be harder to get in the better school. You may or may not give more of them, depending on how high the students are willing to jump but I'd expect something that resembles a bell curve just because people behavior tends to fall into one.
Isn't it possible to have a class where everyone succeeds and earns an A? If you have 20 or 30 students and all of them completed the work within the class, at home, or wherever, and scored at the top on the tests, wouldn't those students be allowed an A? or does a bell curve always enter into the equation? Lets take Calculus. If 100% of the students in a Calculus class completed 100% of the work and tested at 100% would they not all earn an A? I am not talking about grade inflation here, just the accomplishment and abilities of a class that did acceptionally well. What do you think?
If everyone gets 100% on everything the material isn't challenging enough. Colleges look at these things too. If they have 40 kids that graduate as "valedictorian" colleges are going to know that the school wasn't challenging and they are not going to admit these kids. Their standardized tests will also attest to this because it won't be consistent with their GPA. You are going to end up with a lot of 4.0's scoring 26 on an ACT, for example.
the curriculum should adapt to meet the needs of the students. the teachers should run program.
I'm not sure what you mean. The curriculum is not alive, so it doesn't do any adjusting. It gets adjusted - by the teacher.
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Isn't it possible to have a class where everyone succeeds and earns an A? If you have 20 or 30 students and all of them completed the work within the class, at home, or wherever, and scored at the top on the tests, wouldn't those students be allowed an A? or does a bell curve always enter into the equation? Lets take Calculus. If 100% of the students in a Calculus class completed 100% of the work and tested at 100% would they not all earn an A? I am not talking about grade inflation here, just the accomplishment and abilities of a class that did acceptionally well. What do you think
It's possible, but very unlikely, that this could happen with a small group (8-10, not 20-30) of very motivated, advanced students taking an advanced class. Almost always, if most kids get A's, the class is too easy.
I'm not sure what you mean. The curriculum is not alive, so it doesn't do any adjusting. It gets adjusted - by the teacher.
i mean that the teacher should do nothing other than what they are instructed to do. go through the teachers edition of the text book, lecture the same lecture as every other teacher teaching the same subject, etc.
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Second, I wasn't aware that teachers gave grades, I always thought that students EARNED grades. 
lots of A's and lots of E's. One extreme or the other. When you put all of my classes together, I ended up with a B curve but a significant percentage of A's.
