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.
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