Grading on a Curve

As educators and instructors, grading individual work is a very common task that we participate in daily. However, it’s not a common thing for us to ask for grades for our work and performance, as I will be doing in the next few paragraphs. For many of us, we tend to be our own worst critics, and I certainly fall into that category, but I also want to make sure I’m fair to myself. With that being said, the assessment score that I will be supporting is 90-100. The overall reason for assessing this score is the criteria for grading set forth by the course instructor. As I continue my educational journey, I look forward to continually improving my overall contributions to my learning community and my self-assessment of that input.

Reflection and Feedback to Improve

When it comes to working in and contributing to a learning community, what you get back is just as important, if not more important, than what you put in. I felt that the most impactful contribution and entity that worked the most was the group’s reflections and feedback on each other’s work. “The value of receiving and providing effective feedback cannot be overstated in a world whereby progress is driven by continuous learning” (Ryan, 2023, para. 1). Having the opportunity to view others’ work and reflect on things to incorporate or remove from your work, really helps you laser in on what you want to achieve and/or say through your projects. In 5315, I was able to use some of my experience as a military instructor to help some of my classmates with their course literature review, as well as their research plans.  A great example of reflection and feedback in our learning community would be the submission of our research plan to our group chat so that we could all get a glimpse into some fresh learning and design ideas. This was a huge help and gave me a lot of confidence as well as great ideas that I could include in my strategies and plans going forward.  I appreciated the critiques and advice I received from classmates like Whitney Davis and Joseph Perrone, as those things went a long way in my development throughout the course. Another extremely beneficial collaboration tool was the class discussion board. I can’t say enough about just how helpful the discussion board was, especially when it came to getting different outlooks as it pertained to the assignment topics. The discussions covered a lot of course material, so when classmates like Veronica Mata and Rebecca Chang would give responses, the incite would always lend itself directly to things that could be utilized in my development in the course.  I routinely collaborated with Shaquitta Lewis, Angela Speck, Benjamin Portillo, and Steven Munoz. Throughout the course, all my classmates I collaborated with provided priceless reflection and feedback that helped me grow in my learning journey.

Changing What Needs Changing

Working in a learning community can prove to be quite challenging, especially when it comes to collaboration, timing, and communication. “Creative collaboration is a critical component to project-based learning and design thinking. But it’s not as simple as assigning members to teams and then walking away. Collaboration is hard work because it’s deeply relational and all relationships have challenges” (Spencer, 2024, para 1). With everyone having different circumstances going on in their lives, communication, even with all the different options, can be challenging to maintain consistency. For me, with working full-time and being an instructor in the military, I have struggled with my timing regarding group collaboration. This is an issue that many of my classmates have voiced that they struggle with as well. In the future, I think that some of my community learning team members can greatly improve on this issue by better scheduling to make up for the day-to-day challenges all our personal lives present.

My Contributions

As a member of the learning community for this course, as well as my other courses, I pride myself on offering helpful ideas and feedback that my team members can effectively utilize for their educational growth. “To create an environment where people feel their contributions are valued, encourage full authentic selves by establishing psychological safety, create a welcoming environment, give people independence in their job, recognize mistakes as learning opportunities and create a supportive culture” (Redziniak, 2021, para. 6). Whenever a classmate shared their work, I always tried to encourage and thank them for sharing their work, while making sure that I gave them some ideas that they could reflect on even if they ultimately chose to go in a different direction. With my learning, I focused on expanding my learning ideology. Talking to classmates and studying the impact of a growth mindset has allowed me to alter my vision of learner, educator, and leader for the better. Learning collaboratively is not something that comes naturally to me, but I’m truly better because of it and eagerly look forward to further progression.

Reference

Redziniak, Sms. E. (2021, May 19). The benefits of encouraging contribution among team members. Air Force Life Cycle Management Center. https://www.aflcmc.af.mil/News/Article-Display/Article/2622129/the-benefits-of-encouraging-contribution-among-team-members/

Ryan, B. (2023, August 14). Why is constructive feedback important? Thirst. https://thirst.io/blog/why-is-constructive-feedback-important/

Spencer, J. (2024, October 17). The five biggest pitfalls of collaborative grouping (and how to avoid them). John Spencer. https://spencereducation.com/group-collaboration-next-level/