Effects of a student's prior academic performance on the grades assigned to math papers by sixth grade teachers

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to determine if a teacher's knowledge of a sixth grade student's prior academic performance affects the teacher's grading of the student's work on math papers. This study attempted to isolate the singular characteristic of a teacher's prior knowledge of a student's academic performance as a possible source for grading discrepancies.Four math papers were developed following the guidelines from the Indiana Statewide Test of Educational Progress (ISTEP) in mathematics for sixth grade. Four selected report cards representing high academic performance and four representing low academic performance were attached to the four student papers along with the appropriate answer keys. One-third of the instruments had high academic performance attachments, one-third had low academic performance attachments, and one-third had no academic performance attachments. The instruments were randomly assigned to experienced teachers for grading.The analysis of the data indicated that the mean number grades for high academic performance papers when compared to the control group differed significantly at the .05 level of confidence. The mean of the letter and number grade scores assigned to low academic performance papers compared to the control group did not differ significantly.Based on the findings of this study, conclusions were drawn. Among the conclusions reported were:1. Teachers' grades on the same math papers were remarkably varied.2. Number grades assigned to the same math papers differed significantly for high academic performance.3. The range for letter and number grades for each paper was extremely broad over all independent variables.4. The scoring discrepancies for letter and number grades created a question regarding grading validity.