I'm coming to think more and more that it matters more how much
students feel involved in defining what the exam questions are than
whatever whim leads me or an associate instructor to this or that
grade. As Stuart Henry found in his 1984 book on disciplinary
behavior across formally hierarchical and non-hierarchical
organizations, the style of responding to conflict over how to grade
which I believe matters most can vary independently of the terms of
the grading policy one first lays out. l&p hal
[Martin Taylor 931013 17:50]
Not contributing to theory, though I find this discussion interesting, but
providing a datum.
At the start of my third-year metallurgy class, the instructor gave us
the exam questions for the end of the year, and told us that everyone
would get an A, and now let's get on with learning some metallurgy. A
few classes later, he told us that he had been told he couldn't do that,
and so he was going to have to grade the exams, but the questions would
remain as he had said. There were three, from which two had to be answered.
I remember one: "Discuss the metallurgy of steel."
What I also remember is that I learned more in that class than in any other
I can remember from that era, and that almost all the class got an A anyway,
on merit. I even remember something about the metallurgy of steel.
Martin