A growing number of Iowa schools are striving to improve communication of student learning by implementing standards-based or standards- referenced grading. Building upon the challenges identified by the earliest adopting secondary schools (Peters & Buckmiller, 2014), one recently published study suggests there may be a “second wave” of Iowa high schools considering standards-based grading (Townsley, Buckmiller, & Cooper, 2019).

A number of articles document effective secondary school implementation of standards- based grading within disciplines such as music (Duker, Gawboy, Hughes, & Shaffer, 2015; St. Pierre & Wuttke, 2017), English/Language Arts (Miller, 2013), science (Noschese, 2011; Wilcox, 2011), and family/consumer sciences (Shippy, Washer, & Perrin, 2013). Secondary math teachers using standards-based grading in their classrooms would similarly be well served to understand the experiences of their content colleagues who have gone before them.

The purpose of this paper is to suggest several common pitfalls to avoid when implementing standards-based grading in a secondary math classroom.

This article was published in the 2019-20 issue of the Iowa Council of Teachers of Mathematics Journal. For the full article, click here to view a PDF, beginning on page 11.

Townsley, M. (2020). Standards-based grading implementation pitfalls to avoid in secondary math. Iowa Council of Teachers of Mathematics Journal, 43, 11-15.