Over the course of the previous school year, I wrote a series of posts about the importance of knowing your grading periods, with the intention of providing you various times during the year to check your progress with your study skills as well as your grades, so you could make adjustments to your study skills as needed and be prepared to do your best while following your school’s grading period schedule. Hopefully, if you followed the advice I gave in those posts, you saw a difference in your progress by the end of the year that you have been able to build on at the beginning of this year, but if you know you could use a refresher, feel there’s more you need to do to make the most of your grading periods, or are new to my site and have missed some or all of last year’s posts, I will both review and add to my advice from last year, so more of you can find ways to make the most of whatever your schedule will bring.
Since I was just starting my site at this time last year, my first grading period post was published about a month later than this one will be. In case it isn’t obvious, I am hoping you will benefit from having more time to review or find out what your school’s schedule of grading periods is, and will therefore be aware of the time you have left and important end-of-grading-period dates well before the end of the grading period. The sooner you make yourself aware of when each grading period closes, the better able you will be to keep track of where you stand in each of your classes, and how much time you will have to make improvements to your grades before they close. Your school’s website and/or grading portal should have this information, and you can certainly ask your teachers as well. Just remember that what you need to know is when grades close, not when you will receive your report card or be able to look up your grades online! Teachers need time to grade your work and post your grades, so grades usually close a few days to a week before you will receive them.
Knowing your school’s grading period schedule also means knowing how many grading periods there are and how your grades will be averaged. Does your school have quarters? Trimesters? Semesters? When are exams? Are they a part of the grading periods, or are they averaged in separately? If they are averaged in separately, what weight are they given? Knowing how your school year is structured will help you figure out what opportunities you will have to improve your grades in future grading periods, so that your year’s average will not be pulled down too much by one low grade.
Since I am posting this earlier than I did last year, and it is therefore a lot less likely that your first grading period has already ended, there is another built-in checkpoint that you still have time to either plan for or learn from before the grading period ends. If you have taken or will soon take any midterm exams, or if your school schedules any sort of midterm progress report for you and/or your parents, so you can see where you stand before a final grade for the grading period is posted, take advantage of the chance that preliminary grade gives you to take the time to think about what you did well and what you can do better from now until the end of the grading period. Are your grades currently where you expected them to be in each subject? If some or all of your grades are not what you were hoping for, look at each of them more closely and ask yourself what could have caused this. Did you do poorly on any tests or assignments? Did you turn all your assignments in? Were they on time? Did you participate in class consistently and come to class prepared to do so?
Whether or not you have any scheduled midterm exams or progress reports, now is a good time to check your online grading portal, and/or ask your teachers where your grades currently stand. Ask yourself all the questions about your grades I posed in the previous paragraph. If you find that there is anything you wish to improve and you are aware of tests or assignments that will occur or be due before grades close, try to find some extra time to study, or to make certain that your final assignments of the grading period are turned in on time and done to the best of your ability. The sooner you take action and start to make improvements where you can, the better. Even when it is too late in this grading period for the differences in your grades to be significant, you should continue to find ways to make improvements, since your final grades in your courses will be averaged ones, and every little bit counts!
Wherever you are in your grading period, the most important thing you should take away from this post is that the more aware you are of your school’s schedule of grading periods, including any midterm or other built-in opportunities you have to check your progress, the better prepared you will be to make the most of the time you have to do your best. Whether you need to build on grades you’re happy with, improve grades you wish were better, or a combination of both, it is important to remember that every grading period provides a fresh start, as well as chances throughout to learn from your mistakes, make adjustments where necessary, and get any help you might need, not just to make your grades for this grading period the best they can be, but also to have something to build on in the new grading period, as well as throughout the year.