K-12 Grading System (Tips On Helping Your Kids Cope Up With K-12)

Two years after it was implemented, my stand on K-12 is still the same (please read the first article I wrote about K-12: What You Should Know About K-12 Program). But that won’t stop me from writing about K-12 and help other moms understand the new system. You may want to read K-12 Grading System to better understand the meaning of A, P, AP, D and B. From that post, I only mentioned the meaning and the equivalent grade. Due to lack of resources, I have no idea how their grades are computed. Lucky for me, during our PTA meeting, the teachers explained the grading system used in K-12.

There’s a new assessment and rating system implemented last June 8 for K-12. I can’t remember last year’s assessment and rating system, so I can’t say the difference. All I can remember is, same as last year, it is divided into four areas:

• Knowledge
• Process/ Skills
• Understanding
• Product

Here is the definition of the said 4 areas (and percentage) from DepEd:

1. Knowledge (15%)– the substantive content of the curriculum, the facts and information that the students acquires.
2. Process (25%)– skills or cognitive operations that the student performs on facts and information for the purpose of constructing meanings or understandings
3. Understandings (30%)– enduring big ideas, principles and generalizations inherent to the discipline, which may be assessed using the facets of understanding or other indicators of understanding which may be specific to discipline
4. Products/ Performances ( (30%)– real- life application of understanding as evidenced by the student’s performance of authentic tasks

I will try explain each of the said areas (and what kind of exams/ quizzes are given to each area) later by giving examples, let me first discuss how grades are computed using the new assessment and rating system:

Based on the scores above, here’s how the grade is computed:

Q means quizzes while PT is Periodical Test. Knowledge, Process and Understanding are assessed using these two measures. In a given quiz or periodical exams, there will be types of questions that corresponds to each area of assessment.

HOW? HOW?  Here’s an infographic using Magellan as a topic:

See how each question differs from one another? Each is designed for a specific kind of assessment. DepEd mentioned how each area should answer specific questions when assessed.

Knowledge: What do we (teachers) want students to know? How do we want them to express or provide evidence of what they know? Hence the questions regarding facts. This area is assessed using multiple choice, true/false, matching type that targets the knowledge (or mastery) of the students to the subject matter.

Process/ Skills: What do we want students to do with what they know? How do we want them to provide evidence of what they can do with what they want? Usually the questions involve here is organizing events, making timeline or organizing ideas.

Understanding: What do we want students to understand? How do we want them to provide evidence of their understanding? Assessment of this area are focused on asking the students what they think, their opinion and how they interpret the lesson.

Product: What products or performances do we want students to produce as evidence of their learning and understanding? How do we want them to provide evidence that they can use or transfer their learning to real life- situations?

HOW DO WE HELP OUR KIDS COPE UP WITH K-12?

Exam week is around the corner and I am sure most moms are worried on how to review their kids given the new assessment and rating system. Here are my suggestions:

• Discuss the lessons with your kids then ask him questions.
• Ask questions such as WHY and HOW, do not just focus on what, when and where questions.
• Encourage them to participate in class (TIP! TIP! As long as the student participates in oral recitation, the teacher will give him grade, it doesn’t matter if the answer is right or wrong)
• Encourage them to check their books and notebooks as soon as they got home. Home works are important and it’s the same with oral participation, the answer won’t matter, as long as the student did her homework.
• When reviewing, always include the lessons you did from your last session.
• Lastly, give your kids ample time to play, in a way a “rest” time for their mind and yours too!

K-12 is not an easy subject, so let us help one another in understanding this new system. If you can add anything from the tips I mentioned, I would really really appreciate it if you can comment it 🙂 Also, if you think there is error in my info, please do tell me and if you need to ask more, don’t be shy 🙂