Many new
homeschoolers want to know how they should decide on what grades to
award their children. There are many different schools of
thought on this subject. While there is certainly a place in
a school setting for grading, is there a place for grading in a
home setting? In a school setting, how else would one teacher
for every 20 or so children be able to assess what their students
do and do not understand? In homeschooling, you have 24/7 contact with your child,
and no one knows better than you how your child is
progressing. Some
parents choose to stick to a more traditional approach to
grading. Some
parents believe that homeschooling is about knowledge and not about
a letter grade and do not grade their students at all and
concentrate more on making sure their child knows the material
thoroughly. Whatever your school of thought is on this
subject, there is no right or wrong answer to this question.
It is simply a matter of opinion.
The following information is for those who choose to
award grades:
What kind of grades
should you award?
Some
parents choose to grade simply by using a pass/fail system.
Some parents choose to award letter grades such as those awarded in
a school system. Usually a letter grade is awarded on the
following scale or something similar:
A 90 -
100
B 80 - 89
C 70 -79
D 60 - 69
F 59 or below
How do you get these
grades?
You can
determine grades by effort, written seat work, tests, worksheets,
projects, oral recitation, time spent, or any combination of these
as you see fitting.
How do you
find a letter/number grade average?
Simply divide the number of problems correct by the total number of
problems. For example, if the page has 14 problems and your child
got 12 correct, divide 12 by 14 to get .857 or
86%.
You would get a final grade using the same method. Simply add
together all of your grades from tests, worksheets, and projects
and divide by the total number possible. This will give you
the final grade.
That's
all there is to it! I hope this info helps!