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Email TopicRenaissance does not recommend giving grades for reading practice; however, many high schools choose to do so. If you must give grades, we encourage you to follow these guidelines:
- Do base a student's grade on the amount of progress made toward personalized goals. Don't give the highest grades to the highest point or badge earners, which would unfairly penalize struggling readers.
- Don't grade students unless you are actively monitoring their work. Students who are scoring low on quizzes or accumulating few points may be having trouble finding appropriate books, or they may be trying to read books that are too hard. Intervene first, and be sure students know what to do to be successful before evaluating their efforts.
- Do build your library and quiz collection before instituting a grading policy. Don't inadvertently turn students off to reading by forcing them to read books they aren't interested in simply to earn a grade.
- Do make your library accessible so that students have ample opportunity to find books quickly and easily.
- If a number of teachers are using Accelerated Reader, do decide on a grading formula together.
One way to give a grade is to weight different aspects of reading practice and look at a student's progress toward goals. Mrs. Jones, for example, is using the goal model for grades 3-5 and has decided that meeting an average-percent-correct goal is 50 percent of a grade. Meeting a point goal is 25 percent. Other goals she has set - choosing books within the ZPD and maintaining a log - are also worth 25 percent. One of her students, Rebecca, has an average percent correct of 92.9. She has reached 86.3 percent of her point goal. Mrs. Jones has observed that Rebecca achieved the other classroom goals at a 100 percent level. She then calculates Rebecca's grade in this way:
Average percent correct: 92.9 × .50 = 46.4
Points: 86.3 × .25 = 21.6
Other: 100 × .25 = 25
Total (AR grade): 93.0