Mastery: Accountability Possibility

It does not mean that students get an A on a test. It means that students will demonstrate mastery in their writing (except, perhaps the lexical morphemes which have more to do with reading): they'll use the words, punctuation, syntax and morphemes properly in all written work after having had the opportunity to learn or relearn and practice.

I have suggested that we hold students accountable by considering an error involving a "mastered" skill or bit-o-knowledge, whether it result from a failure to learn or a failure to care, a "fatal flaw." Teachers would not accept work with one or more fatal flaws for assessment, and students would be required to fix the flaws before resubmitting the assignment.

I propose that there are many ways to do this or something like it to ensure that students understand that we believe that they are capable of mastering these few things they've had an opportunity to learn and that they must demonstrate their mastery in their writing.

As a starting point, please consider the following (you can modify or replace or ... the whole or its parts as your professional judgment and art dictate):

- for many assignments have a dual due date: the first is the "real" one; the second is the "late" one for students whose work on the real due date still has fatal flaws.

- on the due date, give students 10 minutes to scan their own and each others work for fatal flaws.

- collect only the papers that do not have fatal flaws - you probably will give "full credit" for these when you assess them; or collect them all to check and record who did the assignment and return the ones with fatal flaws.

- provide "remedial assignments" for students who need them (I'll be building libraries of these for their use)and ask them to rewrite the paragraphs that contain fatal flaws (I tried having students rewrite whole assignments. It didn't work. They just didn't do it because the requirement was excessive).

- have them submit the revisions, the original assignment and the "remedial assignments" on the "late" due date (I usually make the late date 2 days after the "real" one.)

- at your discretion, ding the late assignments points or grade(s) when you assess them (Note: I put off assessing the work turned in on the real due date until I get whatever work comes in on the late date - it's is easier for me to see all the work together).

My students have only succeeded in achieving mastery when I have used a recursive pattern in my lessons (three cycles of teach-practice-assess spread over 10 or more weeks with a variety of activities used for practice and brief reviews over a whole term for the more problematic skills/bits-o-knowledge) and when I layer one "learning" over others (a pattern of new, new, review; new, new, review; etc. with the review being comprehensive has worked best for my students).

You, of course, will be free to use your professional judgment to determine how you will help your students achieve mastery. After all, I'm not Anthony Alvarado.