This incident made me think about several elements of my research question of how to develop a writing process that engages

my students as growing writers. First, how can I balance the necessity of grading with my desire for my students to see writing as an ongoing process that demands constant growth and improvement? As I mentioned in my Working Theory of Practice, Ive noticed in the past that receiving a grade seems to decrease student motivation to improve their writing, even if they know they can receive a new grade if they revise. To combat this on individual writing assignments, I have decided to withhold a grade until the final draft. Unfortunately, though, I still need to give grades, and I worry that this necessity will disengage students on a larger scale from the writing process. A grade is a label. If a student feels like he has been labeled a B-level writer, will he still be motivated to grow and improve? Will he feel like it is impossible to do A-level writing if he feels like he tried as hard as he could the first time? These questions are all heightened by some specific details about Terrence. He failed the first marking period, which my CM taught most of, because he did not turn in most of his assignments and failed most of his quizzes. I heard from another teacher that Terrence had an IEP, so I looked into it. Terrence does indeed have an IEP, but it doesnt provide much information other than that his reading and writing are at around a seventh grade level. This marking period, Terrence has done much better. He has turned in most assignments, and there have been fewer quizzes. He was proud of his work on the Emily Dickinson Visual Representation Assignment and was thrilled that I hung it up in the classroom. Terrence worked diligently on his poetry portfolio and met with me several times about his poems. I always gave him some specific areas to work on. Once he asked me if his poem was good enough, as he alluded to in the conversation Ive described. I told him that I liked it, but that there was always room for improvement; writing is never good enough. In grading Terrence, I have to think about the message that I am sending him regarding his effort and the quality of his work, especially within the context of the rest of his experience in my class. Ultimately, I gave Terrence a B because I knew that he had worked hard on the poems. He made an earnest attempt to implement the writers tools that we had worked on, and he had met with me several times and eagerly engaged in the writing process. I thought that Terrence would be pleased with a B, but I also hoped that he would feel motivated to continue to strive for an A. As I have thought about these elements of this encounter, then, it seems like this artifact leads me to an important part of my central question: How can I use grades as a way to motivate students, rather than discourage them? This seems especially important for students like Terrence, whose reading and writing skills are well below grade level and could easily be discouraged by grades. I hope that I can address some of these concerns through a well-structured process through which students can receive an abundance of feedback before receiving a grade. I will continue to think about whether/how I can use detailed rubrics to make the grading process more constructive. I have some hesitations about using rubrics because I think that they can lend an illusion of objectivity to a process that is ultimately

subjective. I wonder, however, if I can devise a way to use them that allows me to deal flexibly with each student according to his/her needs.