Introducing Ungrading to Students

Strategies for the first weeks of class

In my last post, I wrote about how I’m framing ungrading on my syllabus. As we prepare for the start of the semester next week at UM, I’m now thinking about how I’ll introduce my grading system to students at more length during class time. 

The first priority is, of course, simply making sure students understand how the system works and what will be expected of them. But I also want to build trust and generate buy-in—and for me, that means helping students understand why I have chosen to throw out traditional grading and take an approach that might feel, to them, unnecessarily complicated.  

In some ways, alternative grading can be a hard sell for students and teachers alike. It took me—as a dedicated teacher with a PhD in English and a working knowledge of relevant educational research—quite a while to fully understand the drawbacks of traditional grading and the need for new models. How much can I reasonably expect to accomplish with students who haven’t thought deeply about how we grade, and may not really care, in only one hour? On the other hand, I find that some of my students, who have suffered much more at the hands of traditional grading than I did, intuitively understand the meaninglessness of grades, which tends to smooth the way quite a bit. 

I’ve experimented with a few different ways of introducing ungrading to students and have also collected some strategies from others’ blog posts and articles. Here are some things to try:

Surface student impressions of and experiences with grades

In an FAQ about ungrading, Jesse Stommel writes, 

[Ungrading] starts with teachers just talking to students about grades. None of the techniques described here are necessary beyond that one. Demystifying grades (and the culture around them) helps give students a sense of ownership over their own education.

Following Jesse’s lead, many ungraders choose to begin conversations about the course grading system simply by asking students to share thoughts and feelings about grades. This might be a kind of free-association exercise, like the one briefly mentioned by art historians Lauren DiSalvo and Nancy Ross in a recent article or discussed at more length by Joy Kirr in the 2020 volume Ungrading. In the past, I’ve used polling software to capture these free-associations in a word-cloud, creating an image that can be quite powerful:

A word cloud from my Fall 2023 class

I find that just giving voice to these typically unspoken thoughts and feelings seems to open the floodgates for students. I sometimes follow up by asking them to share particularly memorable experiences with grades, first with each other and then with me. Most, but not all, of the experiences they relate are negative. “Good” experiences often involve students getting high grades for low effort. Every time I do this, I hear one or two anecdotes that are appalling even to me. Grades are, of course, a powerful force in students’ lives, and I think they’re eager to share their stories. 

Discuss the relationship between grades and learning

These conversations often lead naturally into reflection on the meaning of grades and whether or not they are connected to student learning. Many people who write about their experiences with ungrading have shared questions they ask students on this topic. Here are a few to consider:

• Why do we grade? What are the purposes or functions of grades? 

• What do grades mean? What does an A mean? 

• Who are grades for? What do grades do for you? For your teachers? For your parents? For your future employers? 

• What is the difference between feedback and grades?

• What are the risks and benefits of grades? 

• What would happen if we didn’t grade? 

You might also, like Jason Hendrickson, ask students to agree or disagree with a proposition such as “Students would learn more if we did away with grades.”

I opt simply to ask, “What is the relationship between grades and learning?,” and I get a wide range of responses. Last time I taught, one student immediately answered, “There is none.” Others felt differently, arguing that their grades were important representations of the effort they put into learning. Wherever students land, I think it’s important to raise this question as a foundation for understanding new approaches. Students may not yet see where you’re coming from—but at least they see that you’ve thought about it and have their best interests at heart. 

Another way I’ve tried to illuminate this topic for students is presenting them with exams grades and final averages of hypothetical students, like this one:

Student 1

• 90

• 95

• 0

• 85

• 95

Final average: 73

Or this one:

Student 2

• 65

• 65

• 75

• 80

• 95

Final Average: 76

The cases of both these students clearly illustrate the disjunction between grades and learning. Student 1 achieves a grade of C, even though they apparently knew the material well, just because they missed an exam. Student 2 achieves a grade of C, even though they nearly aced a cumulative final, just because they just didn’t learn fast enough. 

I think students find it easy to relate to these examples. They can almost all recall a time when their grades were in danger due to a difficult life circumstance or a time when they learned a lot and felt like their grades didn’t reflect that learning. 

If you’re able to do so, it can also be effective to return to the conversation about grades and learning at the end of the semester, as Jessica Zeller has done. What I find most interesting about Jessica’s conversation with students is that 1) she shares the way her own beliefs about grades have evolved over time and 2) she helps students see how their own beliefs about grading may influence the grades they assign themselves for the course. Powerful stuff!

Share the research

If you have more time to spend on this topic with students, or if you have students who are particularly persuaded by evidence-based arguments, you might even want to share some research or readings on grades, as Heather Leslie and Cate Denial have done. Both Heather and Cate asked students to take a look at Alfie Kohn’s “The Case Against Grades,” a text I too have found useful for sparking beginning-of-semester conversations. There’s also a short video in which Alfie Kohn outlines “Why Grades Shouldn’t Exist,” if you prefer to assign other kinds of media:

If you’re looking for something slightly less polemical, Grading for Growth has good explanations of research on alternative grading and traditional grading alike:

Four key research results

Traditional grades are (still) not mathematically valid

The point that traditional grades aren’t “mathematically valid” may be especially appealing to those of you who teach more quantitative subjects. If you’re working with advanced students who can handle a (pretty accessible) scholarly article, I might also recommend Kimberly Tanner and Jeffrey Schinske’s “Teaching More by Grading Less (or Differently).” 

Additionally, excerpts from larger works, like my colleague Josh Eyler’s Failing Our Future (out next week!) or Jack Schneider and Ethan Hutt’s Off the Mark may be good introductions to the problems with traditional grades. 

Talk about learning in other contexts

Maybe you’re not comfortable discussing all the ins-and-outs of grades with students, or you simply don’t want to draw unnecessary attention to grades when, ideally, students should forget all about them. Many instructors choose to begin a conversation about grades by first asking students about how they learn outside the classroom. 

Apologies for this in advance: I know I have read or heard about someone employing the strategy I’m about to describe, but I don’t remember at all who it was. If it was you, please let me know so I can credit you!

[Edit: I found the source! See this blog post by Robert Talbert at Grading for Growth.]

One thing you might do is ask students to identify something they’re good at outside of school: a sport, a musical instrument, a hobby, etc. Then ask them to reflect on how they got good at it. Students will probably identify things like practice, coaching and feedback, or trial and error. No one (I hope) will say, “I got good at this because I received grades on my performance.” You can then use their experiences to show that learning can happen, and perhaps even happens more effectively, without grades and explain how the grading system of the course is designed to replicate the learning processes they described. 

There are other approaches as well. In Ungrading, Clarissa Sorensen-Unruh narrates how she showed students the importance of self-assessment in the professional world and then illustrated how her grading system would help students develop those skills. I like this approach not only because it connects the classroom with the “real world” but also because it clearly and concretely highlights the benefits of alternative grading for students.

Solicit student thoughts and questions about ungrading

Finally, of course, you’ll want to explain the grading system and give students a chance to ask questions. There will probably be a lot of questions.

I think it’s useful, too, to have students share initial feelings and concerns about the grading system before the end of the discussion. For example, Joy Kirr asks students to indicate, as they’re leaving the class, whether they’re at the level of Green (good), Yellow (okay), or Pink (panicky) about the grading system. I can also imagine having an anonymous Google form where students could record their thoughts. Usually, some students are enthusiastic and others have (valid) concerns. Offering students a chance to share these concerns can give you better insight into their frame of mind, and responding to the concerns in future classes helps build goodwill. 

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There are about a million ways to introduce ungrading to students—these are just a few ideas. What readings or activities do you do in the first weeks of class to help students understand your grading system? I’d love to hear from others in the comments.