Evaluation in my courses has four primary objectives:
A minimum grade will be determined by the aspects of your performance that I can count, such as numbers of class or group meetings attended, assignments completed and so forth. I don't evaluate these, beyond determining that they really are completed; I simply count them up. If you don't miss any, your grade can't fall below a B, whatever else happens. Because this is the real world, though, it's unlikely that anyone will be able to complete every single assignment. So I create a sliding scale, from doing all of them, down to doing about three-quarters of them (which would guarantee a pass, or grade of C), below which point the minimum grade would cease to exist. What this means is that simply by doing everything that's asked -- by taking a consistently active role in the work of the section, that is -- you can be assured of a reasonable grade.
To get a grade better than the minimum established by that process, or any grade in the A range, you have to do more than merely fulfil requirements. In defining an "A" the university calendar uses the phrase "outstanding powers of analysis, criticism, articulation, and demonstrated originality" (p. 316). It goes on, "A performance qualitatively better than that expected of a student who does the assignment or course well." In my experience those grades are earned by students who become engaged and interested in projects and take initiative in pursuing them. How do I assess this? Primarily, by asking you to think about, and then write about, your own learning, and explain it to me, and everyone else in the course, in a written "learning reflection" published online and available to everyone in the course.
Normally, at a number of times during a full-year course -- at midterm in the fall term, before the Christmas break, and at the end of the year -- you'll be invited to assemble this learning reflection. I'll offer you some guidelines or guiding questions. You can think of it as a "take-home" examination in which you have the ability to make up your own questions.
On the basis of that reflection, and considering such other matters as whether, and how often, and how substantively, others, in their learning reflections, identify you and your work as having been important to their learning, I'll use my professional judgement to assign a mark. If it's higher than the minimum generated by completing tasks, that's the mark you'll get; if it's lower, you'll get the minimum mark. This is important, and worth making clear: if you do all, or nearly all, the assignments during the course, your mark cannot fall below a B, because that's the minimum.
It's also important to be clear about this: I don't average marks out over the term, or the year, and that I don't calculate in-process marks as part of a final mark. I think of it this way: this is a lot like gardening. If my tomatoes aren't doing well in July, I'll respond to that and try to fix things, but I won't average that evaluation into the final judgement about whether the tomatoes are any good or not when I slice them in September.