Tips for Teachers - How to Increase Your Class Average

Some teachers rely on class averages to show how good of a teacher they truly are. But sometimes there are those classes that don't pay attention, don't do their homework, and the class average on each test is equivalent to D-. How should you go about increasing your class average by not using cheap tricks like a 'curve'?

From a students' point-of-view, there's many things a teacher can do to improve their class average. I have been helped many times by teachers to increase my average without using a 'curve' on tests and such. For anyone who doesn't know what a 'curve' is, it's when a teacher raises the scores of the students' tests to raise a class average. There are a few types of 'curves', but my tips help teacher increase their class average by actually educating them, not by giving away free points on tests and quizzes.

Extra Credit can be done at home, or in school. Sometimes extra credit is done in class during class, or before/after school. Either way extra credit is helpful since the student usually leans something while they are improving their grade. A group project for extra credit isn't a great idea since one or two people in the group may be doing all the work, leaving the rest of the kids uneducated in the topic. Doing solo work makes the kids actually learn something. However, if it's a paper, look out for plagiarism.

Study sessions immediately prior to tests and quizzes help immensely. Having the important information that is going to be contained within the test or quiz refreshed in my memory has helped on large scales. I recently had a math final I was very unsure of, so I went to a study session the teacher held the hour prior to the final itself. I passed with flying colors and never looked back. Study sessions do not mean a student shouldn't study. But for information that has accidentally been forgotten and needs to be refreshed, these sessions help. Studying is still the number one priority.

Dropping the lowest quiz grade is somewhat cheap, but there's reasoning behind it. Everyone has a bad day/night/week. Stuff happens in life that cannot be controlled, and when that stuff happens, someone is bound to get a lower than average grade. Dropping the lowest quiz grade will improve the classes average, and it's fair in general.

Talk to your students. Tell you students that if they have a problem they can contact you through your e-mail or office phone number for anything. Like I said before, stuff happens in life that cannot be controlled. The death of a family member wont wait an extra 3 days so that Jimmy can take his test without any grief. If someone dies and a student needs to go to a wake, a funeral, or just needs time to grieve, give them the time. To ensure that students aren't making stuff up, require a doctor's note or some other minor form of proof that isn't too over-the-edge, but is within bounds of obtaining. If it's a funeral and it's obvious that the student is upset, let it slip and give them the time required to return to a normal state of mind.

Of course this is from a students' point-of-view. I know all of these elements have personally helped me in some sort of way. Students sometimes forget that teachers have feelings, and vice versa. We all need to realize that we're all humans, and we all have feelings and emotions that need to be taken care of. But just because a student has feelings doesn't mean that they should get a free ticket to passing a course in any way. But in certain circumstances, leeway should be given.

Questions/comments? E-mail me at chem1calburn@yahoo.com or simply message me via Associated Content.