Small Groups

I love small groups of students, the questions, the exchange of ideas.

It's hard to do with 30 students in a classroom, but dividing them into four or five groups and then visiting each group seems really productive.

I'm not sure what they do when I'm NOT there, but when I've asked them to share with the class, it does seem like they have something to say.

Revision Strategies

Here is what I have devised for my students:

Revisions – Writers revise everything. They revise more than once.

They want the text to mean something.

They want the text to speak to the reader.

They want the text to sound good.

How to revise a paper

Look at instructor and peer suggestions

Implement changes according to those suggestions if you agree

Look for passive construction –anything verbs that include “to be” or “to have” – “ing” verbs

Can you use an active verb? Whenever possible, substitute that active verb

Look at sentence structure. Just because I didn’t mark something, doesn’t mean that it is well-written.

Look for ways to combine sentences, eliminate redundant prepositional phrases

Look at punctuation – commas, quotation marks, end punctuation

Look at diction –

Does it meet academic standards?

Is it too conversational?

Do the words add meaning

Are you using vague words that say very little?

Look for ways to add style to your paper

Look for fulfillment of the prompt.

Look for revisions that have no teacher/peer marks.

Don’t assume that if a section has no little marks on it that it’s perfect.

Teachers cannot find everything.

On first drafts, I primarily look for fulfillment of the prompt. If you’ve got all the requirements of the assignment, I spend more time on sentence structure.

It is your job to read, review, revise—to develop the ability to create an effective, persuasive text.

LOOK AT FORMATTING! - MLA – Next time you will look half a grade for failure to follow formatting –

Look at your metadiscourse in the intro. Does it match the organization of your essay?

Look at your organization? Does it make logical sense? Do the ideas follow each other easily?

Strategies for revision:

Read and re-read for comprehension.

Read aloud and listen to your voice. Does your text make sense? Is there more eloquent way to say something? A more direct way?

As I write, I am always going back up to the top and reading through as I go.

I am looking for sentence structure, style, clarity, the way sentences connect to each other.

And then I return to the section I am currently writing—I want that section to fit what I have already written.

Keep your prompt near you so that you can check off all the things you are required to do.

Common Errors –

Format for longer quotes

Floating quotes – Always give context for quotes, before or after. Quotation sandwiches. (See TSIS)

Grading Final Drafts of First Papers

Now I'm actually assigning grades.

I worry I am too random and not entirely objective.

I want to be fair.

I want to value effort.

I want students to feel validated.

I also want them to improve their writing.

I'm working on final draft grading strategies.

It seems they mostly only revise things I have told them to revise. I'm working on a revision strategy handout.

Talking About Culture Blog

I started a blog about our Ape and the Sushi Master book. The first day was great. Apparently the students viewed it as a required assignment.

Nice start.

They commented on each other's blogs.

They gave their own opinions.

I think, "I'm a genius to do this."

The other days haven't been as effective.

Knowing they don't have to do this every day means they don't.

My prompts have been awkward.

I'm not sure how to make them more concrete.

Or how to get the students to improve their diction in a blog format.

Need to think about this.

http://talkingaboutculture.blogspot.com/

Student Conferences

In my examination of Rose's syllabus, I saw that she had blocked out a week for conferences. I think she eventually changed that, but I left it intact. I'm glad I did, but I have to say that they were exhausting. By the last three students, I felt like the things I was saying were meaningless and I wondered if I knew anything at all about teaching.

Reasons I would do conferences again:

Primarily it was an oppportunity to connect with students on an individual basis. Reassure them. Challenge them. Refocus them.

Whatever the difficulty was, whether summary versus analysis, organization, missing elements, or use of active versus passive verbs, I could focus on what that meant and allow them to ask questions.

One-on-one correction is generally more effective than anonymous notes on a piece of paper, whether typed or handwritten.

In 511, we read Ong's (or was it Havelock's) discussion of how writing creates distance. I wanted to break down the distance and connect with students.

I really care about having them get it. (Kirsten says that rather than having my first class be disadvantaged because I am still developing the HOWS of teaching, they are actually advantaged because my need to figure out what works and doesn't work means that I spend more time planning, reading their papers, commenting on their work.)

On the other hand, it got old repeating some things over and over again. I want to think about ways to discuss the common misunderstandings in class.

I probably won't require conferences again this semester. Too exhausting. Too much time. I am still available if they WANT conferences, I don't want to do them for everyone.

On Monday, I get final drafts. It will be interesting to learn whether or not the conferences made any difference. I sure hope so.

Grading First Drafts of First Papers

I was looking forward to seeing the first drafts.

I hadn't anticipated how hard it would be to evaluate them.

• Many students missed the objectives from the prompt. I am wondering if I didn't clarify what we wanted. Next time I want to touch each of those topics specifically.
• About a third of the students focused on summary. I'll need to differentiate between summary and analysis.
• Organization. At least half the students have no idea how to structure a paper of this nature. I'll need to touch on that as well.
• I also need to spend more time on the text.

Insane. Definitely not enough classroom hours to do everything that needs to be done.

Strategies for grading - Given my general frustration with student texts, it took me forever to develop a strategy for grading papers. Eventually I recalled that I should examine student texts the same way I look at any text.

I put aside my lovely gel pens and got out the mechanical pencil. The use of a pencil is familiar to me. It automatically helps me see myself as looking for specific things.

I began to identify the required elements -

• Hook
• Description of Project
• Description of Argument
• Identification of Claims - does this tie back to the argument
• Identification of Evidence supporting claims
• Discussion of strategic organization of the text
• Discussion of significance
• Organizational strategy of the student essay

In identifying what should be there and what shouldn't be there, I began to type out comments for students.

I gave no grades for the first draft because I don't want any student to think they have it nailed and they don't need to do anything else. There were probably three or four A papers, but those students still need to get in the habit of revision and refinement.

Intro Drafts

One of the most recent assignments was to write an intro draft for Pinker. The intro is one of the hardest things to write. It requires a hook, understanding project and argument, and a plan for the rest of the paper. If students have all of that, it should make writing their paper easier.

Reading the intro draft ahead of time allowed me to give advice on the papers before the first draft.

I do wish I had done this earlier, but of course I wish we had given more time to Pinker, to his project, claims, strategies.

Next time. Next time.

Claims Charts

I like the claims chart we used. I think it was helpful for students in identifying claims, evidence, and strategy, and I would like to use it for de Waal.

Project

Argument/Main Claim

Claims -

Evidence - what evidence is de Waal using to support these claims?

Strategies - what is de Waal DOING in the text to develop his argument? Why is he using these sub-claims/this evidence/these words?

I'll need to print these out and post them on BB for the students. Today.

I also need to figure out what I want to do for Peer Review. I'll figure it out and post later how it went. Sigh. So many things to figure out.

Schmoker and Close Readings

We read an article for 511 that talked about the importance of close reading/critical reading skills. I want to go back and study this article in more depth because I think it is significant in teaching students of all ages how to read/understand/interact with a text.

I think I can use this material in teaching at a college level, although it also has significance in teaching younger students. I would be interested in reading more from Schmoker.

There is also significance with teaching students argument at a very young age.

I know the students who study debate, even starting at age 13, begin to develop exactly the type of skills advocated by Schmoker.

More on this later. Just wanted to jot down a few ideas before I forget.

They Say/I Say

I like the idea of templates.

Basically, it goes back to the study of the Progymnasmata we read last fall. Personally, I hate using them, but that's because I have developed a series of intuitive templates in my head.

Most students have not.

The use of templates allows students to say what they need to say using solid academic phrases, modifying words, developing a useful academic vocabulary.

Next time around, or perhaps this time around after I look at their first drafts, I want to develop a plan for including TS/IS in the curriculum.

Understanding how to use quotations

A lot of students have difficulty using quotes, knowing how to insert them, how to analyze them, how to build "quotation sandwiches," so to speak.

Two things have occurred to me:

First, I would like to have spent more time in They Say/I Say and given them practice with templates.

Second, and this might have been more practical, I would like to have spent time looking at Pinker's text and studied how he used quotations and sources. That would give students a model for how they can use quotes in their own papers.