Goals of Learning

     As teachers in the accounting field, we have many goals for our students. We want our students to understand the basic accounting skills needed to succeed in the business world. This includes understanding the accounting cycle, knowing how to account for specific types of transactions, and knowing how to use accounting information to make good business decisions. We also want our students to be able to communicate this knowledge to others. To do this, the students must know how to communicate effectively with both the spoken and written word. We want our students to be able to critically evaluate complex situations and to reach a sound understanding and decision. This involves higher level critical-thinking skills.

     In our accounting programs, we include various problems to ensure that the students have been exposed to assignments that reinforce these skills and we evaluate the students to make sure that they have achieved a level of mastery. This normally includes fairly simple accounting problems in the introductory classes to complex cases in the upper level classes. Even at the introductory course level, many of the assignments require the student to interpret some of the accounting information. As the student moves from the introductory to upper level, we tend to rely more on complex cases that require the student to exhibit complex analysis and thinking skills. When we return the graded assignment to the student, we often use valuable classroom time to go over the assignment so that students who did not do well on the assignment will be exposed to the correct thinking process and know the correct answer.

     My belief is that most students will read the instructor's comments and listen to the discussion and then move on to their next assignment. Unless we change the learning process, many students will not absorb the skills that we desire them to possess. Think of each assignment as a test. Think back to your undergraduate days, when a test was returned; you probably reviewed it to be sure the grade was calculated correctly and then forgot about it until the next test on the material. Even if you spent the time examining your mistakes, you did not worry much about the material until you were going to be tested again. Today's students are the same, they do not worry about the materials after the test is completed and the assignment is corrected. Assuming that lower grades mean that the student has a lower level of understanding of the skill, students earning less than the highest marks have a low level of mastery of many essential skills.

     Rational students also may accept a lower grade on some assignments and in some courses knowing that they can get a higher grade with less effort by concentrating on other courses with less difficult assignments. Knowing that they are guaranteed a "C" in accounting but that it would take a massive effort to get a "B", the student may devote more effort to getting a higher grade in an easier class. Again, the student fails to learn the desired skills because he or she does not give the assignment sufficient attention.

     I propose that we change the model we use for undergraduate grading to make the student more responsible for understanding the accounting materials: The student will continue to work the problem until he or he or she reaches the desired level of competence, and therefore, I believe that the student will achieve a higher level of understanding.

Interactive Learning Model

     In graduate school, it is more common for the teacher to work individually with the student to understand an assignment. If the assignments submitted by the graduate student are not of acceptable quality, many teachers will make the student redo the assignments. I propose that we adopt a similar model in our undergraduate classes. This can take different forms for different assignments. For timed tests, I return the graded test to the student and then allow the student to redo the incorrect portions of the test for extra credit. For multiple choice questions, the student has to quote either the text or other source explaining why the correct answer is correct and why the incorrect answers are not correct. I do not care why the student answered the question incorrectly. The student must reference the quote supporting their answer. Making the student formally analyze the question a second time ensures that the student is exposed to the concept again and this increases his or her understanding of the concept. To get the extra credit, the student must demonstrate an acceptable level of understanding.

     Another benefit from this is that I, as teacher, sometimes learn that my questions were not well designed. For example, I once gave a multiple choice question that required the student to explain this journal entry:

Accounts payable	500.00
Inventory		10.00
Cash		490.00

     The problem explained that the entity used a perpetual inventory system. Obviously, the journal entry depicts a company taking a 2% discount (2/10, n/30) while paying their bill. The student said that the transaction reflected a company returning merchandise and paying a bill. Until the student offered that explanation, I would not have interpreted the journal entry that way. I accepted the student's answer as being correct. The student and I would not have analyzed the question without the incentive of extra credit.

     For problems or other mathematical questions, I require the student to identify every formula and number when they submit the corrected test question for extra credit. Again, this requires the student to be exposed to the problem one more time and to think out the process again. For cases and similar critical-thinking problems, I note the areas where the original submission is not complete and return the assignment to the student to redo. This often involves misinterpretation of accounting pronouncements or poor analysis of the problem. The student must work the problem or case until he or she shows an acceptable level of understanding.

     To motivate students to do their best on their initial submission, I lower the grade on corrections. Normally, students can earn one half of what they missed on corrections for tests. For corrections on other assignments, I generally make the highest grade that they can earn one letter grade (minus ten points) on each resubmission. I only do this until the highest grade that can be earned is "B-" (eighty points). Students learn to do their best initially and to thank me for allowing them to resubmit substandard work.

Results

     The question of whether this process works is important. There are several observations that may he or shed light on this question. First, knowing that only good assignments will be accepted motivates the student to do a better job. If there is nothing to be gained by doing a substandard job on an assignment, the student will work hard to make sure that the assignment is above the minimum bar of acceptability. Knowing that you must redo a poor assignment is a powerful motivator for doing the job right the first time. In my Student Evaluations, students often thank me for allowing them the opportunity to resubmit their work for a higher grade. I also think that making the student do the assignment until it is acceptable makes them more knowledgeable on the topic.

     Secondly, the dialogue between student and teacher increases. When students were not required to resubmit returned assignments, they commonly came only to discuss their grade. Now, students come to me to discuss what is missing from their submission and what they have to add to make it complete. This is an improvement; the student is concentrating on making the assignment better, not concentrating on squeezing more points out of the teacher for what they have already done. It establishes a better dialogue or interaction between the student and the teacher.

     Thirdly, it pushes more of the learning process outside of the classroom. Since the student is expected to redo the assignment, I do not usually give the correct answer in class. The student has to research the question and come up with the correct answer.

     Finally, making students reexamine the same problem until they understand the concept increases their critical-thinking skills. They must logically come to the same conclusion that you reached or they must refute your solution and develop an acceptable alternative solution. They cannot submit a poor answer and get by with one low grade.

     There are several dysfunctional consequences to following this recommendation. First, the amount of time that the teacher must spend grading assignments increases significantly with each additional student and assignment. Normally, I have a teaching load of over a hundred students. This number prevents me from following this process for every assignment in every class. For introductory level students, I do this more for writing assignments and homework. For upper level auditing and advanced accounting students, I am able to do this for every assignment.

     Grade inflation is also a problem. Because students are constantly getting extra credit, the grades for the students continues to go up. I tell the students on the first day, if they do every assignment on time and take advantage of every extra credit opportunity, it is hard for me to believe that they cannot get at least a "B-" in my class. This method also serves the "plugger" or marginal student better than the truly good student who does not need extra work to understand the material. The plugger continues to work to raise his or her grade while the better student does the assignment once and moves on to other assignments.

     Finally, not all students can keep up. I often have students drop my classes near the end of the withdrawal period. If I gave them a "C" or "D" on every assignment, they may have stayed in class expecting to "squeak" by. By returning the cases and similar assignments without a grade and requiring them to redo the assignment, they have a zero recorded and a growing pile of work. Realizing that they are falling further behind, they elect to drop the class and try again next semester.

Conclusion

     In summary, I recommend that we, as accounting teachers, adopt a more interactive teaching model, that is, return all unacceptable work to the student for the student to redo until they do it well. This is the model that many of us encountered in graduate school. Although this means more work for both the student and the instructor, the result is that students have a better understanding of the materials and achieve higher grades.