WAC E-thoughts » Blog Archive » Mid-SP08 Writing Across the Curriculum Tip: Grading Student Writing

April 13, 2009

Mid-SP08 Writing Across the Curriculum Tip: Grading Student Writing

Filed under: Evaluating Student Writing, WAC Tip — at 1:55 pm

Do you have difficulty explaining to a student why s/he earned a particular grade? Are you frustrated by what seems to be a subjective and time-consuming process? How can you grade more efficiently and fairly?

Grading student writing can be a challenging process that may initially appear subjective. However, there are certain strategies that you can implement to make grading writing a more objective and transparent process for both you and your students. Furthermore, you can make grading become as much a form of feedback to students as it is an evaluation of them. Consider the following strategies:

Designing clear assignments with specific grading criteria will help students understand what a paper should do, and it will help you grade more efficiently: If a writing assignment has specific, clear expectations, students’ drafts are less likely to be confusing and disorganized. Particularly helpful are rubrics that are framed according to a particular assignment rather than to general characteristics (though these can certainly be helpful as well). By checking off a grading rubric, you can give students a lot of specific feedback in a short amount of time.

Providing successful samples of past students’ writing will give current students a clearer idea of what you’re after: Once you have obtained permission from students to use their writing in future classes, you are free to put student-written passages on overheads, in course packets, or on handouts. Explain what you find to be most effective about the samples; or, you could have students themselves evaluate the samples and determine what was most effective about them. If possible, give them a variety of models to work from so that students don’t feel that they are being asked to follow the models as recipes.

Asking students to create a reflective “cover letter” or “revision memo” can save you from telling them what they already know, and can provide you with valuable information. When students identify what they think of as the strongest and weakest aspects of their work using the same rubric you plan to use, you are in position to agree or disagree with their assessments and to check their understanding of your criteria. Moreover, this reflective writing can help students think back through their work and come to new insights.

Allowing only so many minutes per paper you grade will help you focus your commenting: Spend a half-an-hour or so carefully reading through a random sample of papers without commenting on them, noting general patterns of how these students have responded to the assignment. If you’ve created a rubric ahead of time, this should help you very quickly develop a set of common responses that you’ll likely use frequently as you respond. Determine how many papers you can read in an hour, then divide your papers into hour’s-worth stacks. Read a stack, take a break, and then start on the next hour’s stack. If you come across a paper that particularly frustrates you, put it aside and come back to it with fresh eyes–look for patterns that can help you focus your comments.

For an archive of our bi-quarterly WAC tips, go to our blog: http://cstw.org/WAC/?cat=50

If you want to learn more strategies for grading student writing, consider attending the following workshop next week:

Get Help with Grading Student Writing
Monday, May 5, 2008, 11:30–1:00 p.m., 300 Younkin Success Center
In this session, we will discuss ways to develop effective grading rubrics for your classes, talk about how you can negotiate common grading criteria with your colleagues, and give you time saving tips to help you manage your work efficiently and effectively.

Upcoming Workshops:

Making Ordinary Writing Assignments Extraordinary: A Hands-on Workshop
Monday, May 12, 2008, 11:30–1:00 p.m., 300 Younkin Success Center
Are you unsatisfied with how students are responding to major research assignment prompts? Tired of receiving the same bland papers from students? Bring one of your “tried-and-true” writing assignments to the workshop and learn how to revamp it into a sequence of new assignments that your students will want to write and you will want to read.

Grammar 102: Helping International Students with Surface Errors in Writing
Monday, May 19, 2008, 11:30–1:00 p.m., 300 Younkin Success Center
In this workshop, we will discuss some of the most common ESL writing issues at the college level and explore writing pedagogies that introduce ESL students to discipline-specific writing rules and conventions. As part of this discussion, we will work with two academic papers written by international students from different countries of origin.

Let us know how we can help you. Contact us by phone (292-9650), e-mail (waccstw@osu.edu), or through our website (http://cstw.osu.edu/wac).

Have a great rest of the quarter,
The WAC Team
Dr. Chris Manion, coordinator
Kelly Bradbury
Kate White
Shannon Thomas
Lisya Seloni

April 13, 2009

Mid-SP08 Writing Across the Curriculum Tip: Grading Student Writing

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