According to accreditation and professional bodies, evaluation and grading are a high priority in counselor education. Specifications grading, an evaluative tool, can be used to increase grading rigor. This article describes the components of specifications grading and applies the framework of specifications grading to a counseling theories course.

Adaptations of and variations on the grade contract system are described with emphasis on individualized instruction, fair evaluation, and learner-oriented classes. The method used is described, and results are assessed. (Author/RM)

This document presents contract grading as a system of evaluation for speech communication courses at the high school or college level. Contract grading can provide the means to reduce the element of threat that impedes effective interpersonal communication between teacher and student. Contract grading is a business like arrangement whereby the…

A system designed to provide workable mathematics enrichment to gifted students in a standard mathematics classroom is presented. Mathematical contracts are the main feature of this successfully used program. (MP)

Describes an approach to evaluating creative writing in which the teacher acts as an editor and grades according to contracts set up during conferences. (MKM)

This journal is devoted to the art of teaching in the field of speech communication. Articles collected in this issue address topics in the development of the basic speech communication course and include the following titles: "Concept Speech Assignment,""The Circle Game: A Teaching Device for the Concept of Ethos,""To Hear Ourselves As Others…

Studied contract grading, which emphasizes greater investment of time and effort by student and instructor, but provides benefits to students difficult to develop through conventional methods. Desirable student outcomes are examined and a sample contract is included. (Author/JAC)

Subjects were classified as external or internal. About half of the externals (internals) were given a traditional method of instruction. The remaining subjects were involved in a contract grading plan. Using an achievement posttest, a strong disordinal interaction was found, with internals performing better under the contract grading plan and…

Proposes offering college students an optional performance contract that requires full class participation and resubmission of incorrect test items to alleviate mathematics anxiety. A comparison of students opting or not opting for the contract indicated that contracted students outperformed their counterparts in the latter stages of the course.…

The methods used to assign grades to students have long been of concern to teachers. Traditional approaches to solving the difficulties have centered on norm-referenced and criterion-referenced evaluations. A promising alternative arises when criterion-referenced evaluation is linked with contract grading. A student may contract with a teacher to…

The effect of ninth-grade general mathematics students signing contracts for achievement grades on their mathematics achievement and on their attitudes toward mathematics was investigated. Four classes were used in the study; each of two teachers taught one experimental and one control class. The Test of Mathematical Skills and Concepts and The…

This paper examines the subject of "contract teaching", particularly as it relates to the field of instruction for physical education majors. Essentially, contracting for grades includes, "...an agreement between a teacher and a student at the beginning of a course as to the grade the student expects to receive and the amount and quality of work…

A study focused on teachers' developing knowledge about their work, particularly the thinking of eight elementary school teachers from a racially mixed San Francisco Bay Area school district about the use of literature contracts in the classroom. The study examined ways in which teachers' prior beliefs influence their use of a new teaching…

Presenting models based on the philosophies of Carl Rogers, John Dewey, Erich Fromm, and Jean-Paul Sartre, this paper proposes a philosophical approach to education and concludes with pragmatic suggestions concerning teaching based on a fully-functioning-person model. The fully-functioning person is characterized as being open to experience,…