Descriptive grading is a type of grading in which opinions about children’s knowledge or products are expressed in sentences. This opinion highlights what individual children know or have mastered, what they have not mastered, and what they should do to improve. In descriptive grading, the pupil’s work is assessed in terms of learning objectives.
In their descriptive grades, physical education (PE) teachers write down everything that they have taught and reviewed with their pupils during their PE classes. To make the grading easier and to produce a descriptive grade, teachers require readily available descriptive criteria for the topics defined in the curriculum. Detailed descriptive criteria also enable teachers to observe their pupils with greater precision.
The theoretical part of the master’s thesis defines the concepts of testing and grading, descriptive grading (including its advantages and disadvantages), and the concept of descriptive grades. Special attention is directed to grading in PE classes, in which the focus is on what is being graded in this subject and how, and recommendations are presented for planning grading and fair grading. The PE curriculum is presented, including learning objectives, materials covered in class, and learning standards. In addition, the purpose of and procedure for defining and producing descriptive criteria are presented.
In order to make possible more accurate grading and better achievement in PE classes, descriptive criteria for curriculum topics covered during the first three years of primary school were produced as part of a survey. Based on feedback received from teachers that tried these criteria out in practice, the descriptive criteria were further improved.
An additional goal was to establish the problems that teachers encounter in descriptive grading in PE, how they compose their descriptive criteria, and whether they found the descriptive criteria designed as part of this master’s thesis helpful in describing their pupils’ achievements.
The results showed that the problems teachers encounter include unclear and insufficiently detailed grading criteria, one-size-fits-all grading and copying standards from the curriculum, and the time spent grading. Another problem that stands out from the teachers’ replies is a lack of professional skills or unfamiliarity with the techniques related to individual sports topics.
All of the respondents expressed a positive opinion toward the descriptive criteria produced. The criteria should provide a clear definition of what is being graded and what the teachers should pay attention to. Writing down performance errors should also contribute to more accurate grading. Some teachers think the criteria developed may be helpful not only for grading, but also for teaching and demonstrating individual topics, whereas others believe they are too broad and that certain elements should be joined together. They agree that descriptive grades produced using such criteria would definitely be more informative. Some respondents expressed the need for a manual that presents all of the techniques for individual sports topics, the grading criteria, and performance errors in one place.
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