In the Chronicle of Higher Ed, Alan Levinovitz (James Madison University) discusses how he uses the ritual of grading 2,700 pop quizzes a year to cultivate a “learning community” in the classroom. Levinovitz defines a ritual as an action that can give significance to an aspect of reality through the sacrifice of something valuable, such as time. “Human communities cohere through endless ritual acts. [… And] the classroom, lest we need reminding, is a human community,” he writes. Levinovitz explains that giving up his time to read and grade the quizzes by hand helps to build a sense of community dedicated to learning. He concludes by stating that education is more than simply information transfer and skills training and emphasizes the importance of the communal nature of learning.
