Deadlines: Assigned, Extended, or Flexible?
In my shift to standards-based grading, I knew I needed to address deadlines for assignments. For the majority of my career, I have accepted work beyond its due date without penalty: If it is worth my time assigning, it is worth my students’ time to complete. If I assign a summative task to assess learning, being late does not assess my students’ demonstration of the learning target. I know there is the argument that we are teaching “responsibility” by keeping hard deadlines, but I need to teach and assess my students on their learning in English Language Arts. I can address professionalism through conversation (with students, parents, counselors, or case managers); my school does not have a way to separately assess professionalism and responsibility as some schools do. THIS YEAR: DEADLINES AND REVISIONS This year, now that my workshop procedure is in full swing, I thought I’d relax my deadlines a bit: I’d give a deadline, but I wanted students to know if they needed more tim...