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ROLE On: The Love of Learning

Feb 28, 2011 » by Michael Barata

Mark Barnes, who is being featured in our “ROLE On” series, is back with another update about his Results-Only Learning Environment. Today, he points out the children are becoming more focused on achievement from learning not from grading.

As the year races forward, my students and their parents have completely embraced the Results Only Learning Environment. All activities are completed, and I absolutely never hear “How much is this worth?” or “What’s my grade?” We work in a project-based classroom, in which students collaborate often and have three to four weeks to produce the desired result, in most cases.

They’ve grown accustomed to my persistent feedback; in fact, many are now asking for more of it. When I point out something that is done incorrectly, supplying specific details on how to improve an activity, students are quick to return to it and make changes. Best of all, they then send me messages on our Classroom Website or e-mail me, telling me that they have made changes and then asking that I review the work and supply new feedback.

They aren’t looking for points or a letter grade, which is one of the most thrilling parts this change for me. They do want validation, but they only want it in the form of a comment that says that they have completed the task properly – a clear indication that they’ve learned something new.

I steer clear of too many “Good job” comments, as I’ve coached students on intrinsic motivation. I’m happy to give positive feedback, but it comes in statements like, “I like the way you’ve proofread and fixed the mechanical errors,” or “You’ve really shown me your understanding of new vocabulary by highlighting properly-used new words in your diary project.” The real reward for all of us is that my students are beginning to expand their own learning, without any goading from me and without promise of a high grade or, worse, a poor grade, if they fail to do something the way I want it done.

Students often return to old projects and continue to work on them, even when we move to a new grading period. When they see a blank next to an activity on our online grade program, not a zero, students complete it. (One student recently took a web-based diagnostic from home on a snow day, without instruction from me, because he wanted to see how he would fare.) He is typical of most of my students, who complete class activities because they want to learn, not because they want a grade.

This love of learning is a product of the Results Only Learning Environment.

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  • Lily

    How wonderful, Mark! Congratulations for your persistence and guidance to all involved. What do your co-workers and administrators think of what you’re accomplishing? Do you have their support? Or better yet, their desire to emulate your model? Go ROLE!

  • Annelise

    I love this! I think of all the times I worked to fulfill the grade expectation instead of focusing on the learning. We are so intrinsically motivated, yet the systems we create take away that motivation. Exciting to hear that someone is trying something different!

  • Sandy’Ci Moua

    You all are awesome and doing groundbreaking work! :)

  • JACH

    I recently read “Punished by Rewards” by Alfie Kohn. In the last chapters I found something that might be useful in your ROLE project. It offered several advices to help teachers and students to step apart from As and Fs and step into learning, and one of the advices was like this:

    If you can’t avoid scores, then have only two: A and I (for In process).

    This made a lot of sense to me: if the ultimate purpose of teching is that the student learns something, then grades are not that bad at all IF they are used to achieve that goal (this would be the opposite of what happens in most schools today, where grades are not the means to an end but the end on theirselves)

    Other of the advices was: use comments instead of grades.

    I hope you find this useful.