WEEK FOUR: Post Two

6/15/2020

Our Second Post this week, is a follow up to some of the work we started to read in class. Last Thursday, we read and started (barely) to respond to a reading journal on Mixed Blood Stew. For this post, please read and respond to the remaining reading journals included in your packet.

When I assess student writing I think about the following:
1. What did I ask them to do in the assignment? Too often, teachers assess on a different set of standards than the ones they told students they would be evaluated on. This is patently unfair. We need to assess students on clearly states outcomes that the students know about well before they turn in that assignment.

2. The second thing I think about is what will the student do with my feedback? Is the student going to put it in a folder and never look at it again--that's a pretty good argument for a heart emoji and a hastily written "nice work." Not every piece of writing has to be evaluated by a teacher; it need only be valued by a teacher. Is the student going to expand or revise that piece of writing? If so, than my assessment should be directed toward that goal by outlining achievable revision goals for that student. Is the student going to have multiple chances at revision? If so, I need to pace my feedback so that the student gets the right kind of revision advice at the right moment. Is this the kind of thing, like a reading journal, where the student is going to end up doing a lot of during the school year and my feedback can help them improve over time? If so, then I might consider pacing my assessments differently to build skills as the writer is ready to work on them.

3. How much time do I have to get this feedback to the student? This has two parts to it. Very literally, how much time do I have and what can I do to maximize my feedback. Maybe a conference is a better idea for getting feedback to a student. Maybe an overall response to the entire class. Maybe it needs to be a very detailed letter. Part of this equation is how much time I'm giving students for turn around time. If they have a lot of time, I can ask for me. If they only have a short turn around time, I need to temper what I ask of them.

I'm sharing this with you because I think it's easy to believe that we read and respond to all student writing in the same way. That's really not the case--nor should it be.

A few things to keep in mind as you read and respond to these reading journals. . .
1) You will recall that, after doing the math, it's nearly impossible to take five minutes per two page piece of writing if you are going to have 120 students to manage in a school year. And yet, as I said, the way students learn to write is not by our correcting their writing, it's by having students actually write--and write a lot and write often. We need to ask our students to do a lot of low-stakes writing--reading journals are low-stakes writing. Thus, honor system in effect, try to only spend about two minutes per reading journal as you read and respond.

2) Make sure you re-familiarize yourself with the assignment. Click here to read the assignment these journals are written in response too.

3) Think about what our readings for the week suggest about how to help our students be better writers.

In your post, identify how you would assess these student samples. You don't need to comment on Taylor's since we already did that in class. Include wether it is acceptable or unacceptable and what you would say to a student in a comment or comments. You can add a comment about how you might mark the actual paper since we won't actually be able to see them. I am going to try to scan my own comments so you can see them on the actual paper.

18 Comments

alexa parham

6/16/2020 10:43:53 pm

The essay with no name that starts with "The main points…": Acceptable - Though this essay has it's struggles, this student does summarize the main points and gives what he or she believes is the main idea.
Feedback: This student should have tried to organize his or her thought better- it is a bit all over the place and a lot of jumping around. Also working on cleaner transitions. You can definitely tell that this student did not go back, and proof read, because there are a few noticeable mistakes without having to really read it - it almost seems a bit rushed. You can tell this student definitely needs to be worked with (like we read - the writing process needs to be worked on). There are things you learn to do with your writing that you may not know when you start out and continued writing helps you become familiar with these things.

Luminda: Acceptable.

Feedback: I think Luminda did a good job with her essay - she did well with summarizing and definitely mentioned key and main points (that I feel the student before did not make connections with). She could work on better transitions along with some other things - but (like Professor Torda explained to me in class) this assignment was not going to be graded on specific form or grammar skills. Therefore, this student did what she was asked to do.

Ivanildo: Acceptable. (English does not seem to be this student's first language - therefore the fluency of his writing is off, the way words are written are incorrect and understanding of some words are compromised, but practice is the only thing that will help)
Feedback: For English most likely not being this student's first language - it seems that he was able to understand the gist of the story and was able to summarize the reading to the best of his ability - along with adding in his own thoughts here and there - though his exact words need revising.

I feel like it is difficult to give a student an unacceptable in this situation because if they are doing what you asked for but made mistakes - that is okay. If they just get an unacceptable back, then they will just be disappointed and it will not motivate them to want to fix their writing in a positive way. I think from what I have learned - I think it is important to see where they are coming from (especially in the last essay) and then being able to work with them in the future on their writing process.

Lydia

6/17/2020 03:54:59 pm

Hi Alexa,

To bounce off what you were saying in your last paragraph, it is hard to give these students "unacceptables" because of what was being asked of them, which was not a lot. These students may be new writers or have always shied away at writing or just never liked to write. So giving them, not necessarily a gross amount of positive fake responses, but a lot of positivity is good and encourages them to try again, and more frequently. This forces students to look at what they have done - which was to read, and comprehend what they had read, and then turn it around to put ink on paper and form intelligible thoughts. That can be tough. Instead of all the "things" that make a good paper. Focusing on the negatives will cause students to be frustrated too soon and quite.

Maddie Butkus

6/19/2020 05:49:10 pm

Hey Alexa!

You make some excellent points here throughout your assessments. When you mentioned, “If they just get an unacceptable back, then they will just be disappointed and it will not motivate them to want to fix their writing in a positive way,” it really got me to thinking. While I do agree with you, I am also looking at this from a possible perspective of a student. This may sound confusing but hear me out. Say the student got an acceptable or a good grade on an assignment. Then say on the next assignment (with similar requirements) they got an unacceptable or bad grade with all the comments attached. It is possible that that student would question why their first piece of writing was acceptable but their second one wasn’t and thus not be motivated to change anything since they thought that first piece of writing was good? Even with the comments, are we giving students false hope that their writing is really good from the beginning? Again, I definitely see where you are coming and I do agree with you I am just thinking of other possible situations that could come from giving acceptable grades, especially if there are no real comments attached. I don’t mean to sound confusing but I am genuinely curious if that would be the case and I wouldn’t be completely surprised if it was. What do you think?

Hannah Dziadyk

6/17/2020 10:12:08 am

In the assignement the student follows the directions and in the writing the students follow the guidelines of puts all of the correct points and trys to just summerize the main points, this writing is not perfect but the student is following the teachers directions. It is important to follow the standards that the teacher addresses for each writing because each writings are different with different standards attached to the writing. It is important for teachers to follow their standards for the writings for each paper and to address the grades and writing properly.
Luminda has an acceptable essay its just needs to be re-written and organized better. For feedback, this part comes back into the students hands. Sometimes you don't want to read the red pen marks on the side of your paper but the teacher is there to help guide you to be a better writer and help you catch and fix mistakes in your writing. Hoping for students to get a second chance at their writing will help them learn from their mistakes and then fix then and you as a educator can see that revision and change happening in their writing. The student besides some grammar and transistions completed the task the way she was suppose to.
For Ivanildo this assignment is acceptable, because like what Alexa said is seems like this student english is not their first language and they are struggling with sentence strucuture and organizing their thoughts, along with grammar and transitions. But overall, the student followed the standards given by the teacher and got on paper the main points of the writing. For the feeback portion it seems like this student did the best they could with comprehending the story and writing down the main points of the story.
Having the one on one conference maybe the best situation if you have the time to do so. You can read and write down notes and then discuss with the student or maybe you can get them to expand on their writing and their thoughts and work through the writing together. So that you and the student are on the same page and you know that they understand the feedback. It is important to understand them and giving them a place to grow from their mistakes will make the process go places. Being able to work with them to better future writings and improving their skills is the end goal.

6/17/2020 03:47:37 pm

After considering the five criteria for an acceptable essay: 500 words, short summary of main points, don’t make summary too long – maybe thesis, possible to talk about what is confusing instead, try to make a connection. I have determined the essays as followed:

Unnamed – Acceptable.

1. It looks to be 500 words
2. Thought it felt like the entire essay was a summary, it was summarized
3. Yes, the summary was long, but I think there was a thesis attempted with “however, she would soon realize that this was not the case.” Maybe? Even though we are not sure what the thesis is, it was not it’s own criteria, so it passed
4. There was no mention of anything confusing, but the summary was not too short
5. An attempt to make a connection was stated at the end with “the main point of this essay is that…”

Luminda – Acceptable

1. Yes, 500 words
2. Essay was summarized
3. Attempted thesis with “girl doesn’t know who she is”
4. No mention of being confused, but long summary
5. There was an attempt at a connection made with “all humans have red blood”

Ivanildo – Acceptable

1. Yes, 500 words
2. Essay was summarized
3. I don’t see a thesis
4. Not confused, just a long summary
5. There was a connection attempted with “for her mother the idea of mixed blood was too complicated”

With this all said, I am still very new and know nothing about how to mark up a paper. Considering that these are “low stakes” writing, and the idea is just to get thoughts out, I thought they did a good job and seeing the essence or gist of this essay. I think there is much improvement to be made, but getting students to write is the first step, right? Everything else can be fixed later.

Fiona Bell

6/18/2020 12:49:50 pm

Hey Lydia! I completely agree with all the points/justifications you brought up and I’m a big fan of how you laid it all out- really well said and put together. I also liked that you mentioned how you’re new at this and know nothing about how to go about grading a paper- Me. Too. I have absolutely no idea but I crossed my fingers and tossed out the fishing line anyway. Last thing I’ll touch on is you saying “everything else can be fixed later”- I think that’s an awesome outlook to have on teaching and student learning (and life too???) and yea! I thought that was super cool!

Lindsay Vo

6/23/2020 12:01:56 pm

Hi Lydia,
I really like how you approached this question! When I was answering the prompt myself, I didn't even think about word count. With that being said, I think it's a very important factor when it comes to grading essays. I also like the last two sentences of your response. Even though these essays aren't perfect, you're absolutely right: the first step is to get students to write.

6/25/2020 05:35:05 pm

Hi Lydia,

I really liked the way you set up your "critique". I think it was well thought-out. You set the ground works at the beginning with what you felt like this summary required (with about 500 words). I also loved how you brought up "making a connection". I believe that is so important when a student is trying to understand an assigned reading. Making connections can help the reader understand concepts that they are not familiar with. It can also open up so many new ideas.

I also believe that these are "101 students" so they have a lot of progress to make! I remember being one of those students trying my hardest and getting these same results. I think writing is a process and the only way to get better is by WRITING and WRITING... along with some advice and critiques. I do not think any of these were unacceptable but I believe the teacher should offer advice to help these students get better.

6/18/2020 12:10:51 pm

Anonymous: Acceptable
I think this student did a good job with the paper. There was awkward wording at some points (no biggie though) but I think they grasped the concept of the assignment pretty well. They introduce their paper with the “main points” they’re going to cover and go on to lay out those points in a manner that’s clean and makes sense. The transitions between their points could have been better- it was a little choppy- as well as the set-up of their sentences (they started with “she” a lot) but, as for whether or not they gave a short summary of the main points of the material, I would say they did.

Luminda: Acceptable for the most part
Luminda definitely grasped the main idea of this assignment (she kicked off the paper with a relatively strong thesis statement and followed up with it throughout the length of her paper) but I do think the paper needs a lot of work. I liked that she used quotes, which is something the other two students didn’t do, and I liked her ending. However (if we’re gonna nitpick), there were some spelling mistakes, it was awkwardly worded at times and the transitions weren’t always there. But it isn’t too long/too short and I think she did a relatively good job with summarizing the material

Ivanildo: Acceptable
Ivanildo’s paper had good structure and good transitions and I think he summed up the story very well. My only complaints would be: there were a few spelling errors and there was some insensitive wording that should be altered a bit.

Overall, I think all of the students did a pretty good job. If I was to give a general feedback for all of them, I would say to not focus so much on stating every single bit of the piece they’re reading. While, yes, it is a summary they’re doing and, yes, they are doing a good job at actually summarizing, it might be beneficial to not go about summarizing it all in a list type fashion/like they’re reading a grocery list? If that makes sense?

brianna

6/19/2020 03:55:56 pm

Hi Fiona!
I did think the anonymous did a good job with hitting the main points and summarizing. I do agree that the wording was kind of weird at some points and there were some small grammar issues. I do think that they could have also organized it a little better than they did. I know that we aren’t grading them on grammar or organization though. I do think that Luminda did grasp the main idea and I am not sure if I would say it was a strong thesis though. I saw that she did make an attempt at the thesis by saying “the theme of this story is.” I did see the spelling errors and agree that there could be more work done for smoother transitions. I do think that she did meet the word count and summarized well though. I also did like Ivanildo’s and thought that his was lengthy, but it also really hit the key points of the story. I do agree that there was spelling and other grammar errors. I think that even though he has spelling errors, I feel like he put more detail into his essay. I think many of the students just need to just fix grammar, spelling, and more organization if this were to be made into a bigger paper. I also agree that they all their essays were acceptable.

6/19/2020 03:11:29 pm

In these assignments the students are asked to write a 500-word summary where we can clearly identify the thesis.
For the first student who was unnamed I would grade her essay as acceptable. I think that she did a very well job summarizing and did over 500 words. I feel like in the end if we were to make this into a bigger paper then I would correct some of the grammar. I also do think it could be organized a little better, but she wouldn’t be graded on organization for this summary. She did cover the main points, so she did everything that she was supposed to do.
For the second student Luminda, she wrote 500 words or more and did write a summary of the story. She did attempt a thesis by saying “the theme of this story is.” I also think she was able to gather some key points that tie into eachother and bring them together well. I would say that this essay is acceptable.
For Ivanildo, I do see an attempt for what I think is the thesis at the beginning. This is a very long summary that is probably over 500 words. I think he did a good summary of the story. This essay goes into multiple key points in the story and ties them in together. I also think that besides some grammar errors, it is a really good summary. This summary is acceptable.

6/19/2020 05:31:01 pm

I am stealing the beginning of Lydia’s post because it helped me remember exactly what I was looking for when assessing each essay. Thanks Lydia!!

“After considering the five criteria for an acceptable essay: 500 words, short summary of main points, don’t make summary too long – maybe thesis, possible to talk about what is confusing instead, try to make a connection. I have determined the essays as followed:”

Anonymous - Acceptable

Feedback : This student’s reading journal fulfills are of the requirements that were listed. The writing seems to be over 500 words and towards the end, with the paragraph beginning with “The main point of this essay,” seems to be referring to a potential thesis. It seems as if this student tried to make a connection between their potential thesis and the summary of the text, especially towards the end of their journal. The student did not mention any confusion about the text but I believe they did not need to due to their understanding of the text within their summary. The summary as a whole could probably be cleaned up a bit by using a little less description but overall I think this student did a good job fulfilling the requirements. I would make a note to this student to always reread their work to look for noticeable errors but while we are not so much focused on this aspect right now, I would tell them overall good work.

Luminda - Acceptable

Feedback : While this student’s writing definitely needs some work, she does fulfill all the requirements for this assignment. The reading journal seems to be 500 words and while it was mainly a summary, I do believe that she tried to incorporate this summary into her theme/main idea of the text. This student did not mention what she might have been confused on but after reading through this reading journal, it seems clear to me that she did not need to mention any confusion she had because she hit the overall main points of the text. I would make a note to ask Luminda whether she meant theme or thesis within her first sentence because it seems like more of an attempt towards the thesis than theme but I could be wrong. Overall, while I know this piece of writing in not focused on grammar, sentence structure, transitions, etc., I found it extremely hard to read through this reading journal. As Alexa had mentioned, it seems as if this student did not go back and reread their work for their are noticeable errors that could have been corrected. Going further, I would definitely want to work with Luminda on the aspects I had previously mentioned (grammar, sentence structure and transitions) in order to help better her writing. This would obviously start with more readings being assigned.

Ivanildo - Acceptable

Feedback : This student’s writing seems to indicate that English is a second language being learned. He met all of the listed requirements for his reading journal although I believe his summary could use some work. As I had mentioned in my first feedback, I think that Ivanildo here could have left certain details out of his summary that were not really “main points.” It seems clear that while he might be learning English as a second language, Ivanildo got the overall gist of this text and to make sure he did, he added his opinions here and there. Additionally, while it was not directly stated, I believe that he was trying to suggest a type of thesis by bringing his own opinion into his writing as well as what he found interesting. I would make a note to ask Ivanildo if he had a thesis in mind as well as work on grammar with him by certain assigned reading and writing activities.

As many of my classmates have discussed, I felt it to be difficult to give a student an “unacceptable” in this case because they overall did do all of the requirements listed. The only one I really questioned was Ivanildo’s due to the little indication of a thesis being pointed out. The grammar, sentence structure, and transitions throughout each journal definitely need to be worked on but that will happen over time and thus was not a requirement within this assignment. I think the biggest aspect of this writing overall was just to get the students writing on a low stakes assignment (as Lydia had mentioned) in order to get them to practice their summarizing / writing abilities in general.

Paige Couture

6/21/2020 12:56:45 pm

Hi Madie,

That’s funny, I actually got the idea to use Professor Torda’s journal requirements from the beginning of Lydia’s post too. I was going to use the essay requirements, but I thought using our professors would be more fitting. Thank you, both: Lydia and Maddie! I had the same response about the first journal, when anonymous used: “The main point of this essay...” as a paragraph at the end, when it could have been used as a thesis. There was a lot of description, it did make sense though when reading it. It seemed like they were just trying to get in a word count. Something I noticed about all three assignments, is that Professor Torda requires us to write our reactions to the piece and I did not see that in these submissions. I did find that reading Luminda’s journal seemed to be all over the place. I would recommend to her to read over what she had written to make sure it made sense. I did find Ivanildo’s journal a bit difficult to read, but its understandable considering English is not this individuals first language. I would make a note on all of them to double check grammar. I do think it was a good idea to use his journal as an example to critique. As educators, we are going to get students who learn differently from all over the world.

6/21/2020 12:43:37 pm

The requirements for Professor Torda’s journals are the following: 300-words, a summary with reactions, the argument and possibly a thesis. A connection to the main idea is also important. An unacceptable journal entry will not meet the above requirements.

Unknown: Acceptable
• There is more than 300 words.
• The journal was confusing in some places. It was talking about living with her grandparents then skipped over to “later in her life”.
• I am still confused on the thesis. Is it supposed to be the main character trying to be accepted by others? She has a good start.
• The connection in the last paragraph is well-written. I had a clear understanding of what “Mixed Blood” could be about.
• The last paragraph could have been switched to the first paragraph.
• I also would suggest to put their name on the paper, in proper MLA format.

Luminda: Acceptable
• More than 300 words.
• Jumps right into the theme: “who doesn’t know ‘who she is’.” Was this supposed to be her thesis, too? If it were, I would still accept it because she has a good start.
• The connection at the end could be developed more.

Araujo:
• 300 word minimum.
• Clear thesis: “The story of a girl…”
• This person’s first language is not English, just by looking at her name.
• No confusion.
• There was a start of a connection at the end.

Even though all these journal entries have lack of correct grammar, the amount of time taken to grade still must be taken into consideration. Focusing on grammar was not a requirement when submitting this homework assignment. Before learning that students should pass when they do what you asked them too, I would have failed them all because of grammar. However, I do think all the students put effort into their entries. I would pass them for the effort that they put in.

Ali Nolan

6/22/2020 08:50:59 am

What was asked of students: Write a 500 word journal giving a summary of main points. Do not over summarize. Come up with either some sort of thesis, or delve into something that may have been confusing. If possible, try to make some sort of connection.

Unnamed: Acceptable
This journal meets 500 words and while it does a good job at summarizing some key points in Mixed Blood Stew, it also jumps around quickly. Lack of transitions can be forgiven so long as the content is good, which it is. The student grasped many concepts of the text and was able to sum it up nicely in their work. The students' conclusion proves that the student understood the metaphor of the story. Some points in the journal are not clearly developed, there are some sentence structure and grammatical issues. This would not be considered unacceptable because the student did what was asked.

Luminda: Acceptable
This journal meets 500 words and does a good job of summarizing the text. I thought the essay was well done and delves into key points a bit better than the unnamed one. It feels a bit more fluid. While the essay includes mostly summary, there could have been a deeper conversation with connections. She points out the metaphor, and delves into some connections with “all blood is red”. This essay is acceptable because it meets the requirements, and frankly, a good effort was made.

Ivanildo: Acceptable
This journal meets 500 words and has a clear thesis as the first sentence. The sentence structure and grammar can be forgiven as it seems this student does not speak English as a first language. The content is legible. There could have been more efforts to make connections and some things could have been left out.

In conclusion, I don’t feel that any of these essays need to be given an unacceptable rating. There were efforts made, and I do feel that students could have tried to delve deeper into the text. However, I don’t know the majors of these students and I don’t know what their reading and writing levels are. What I would do in this situation is try to focus on making journals more analysis-oriented. I would try to push for these students to interpret texts in newer and more complex ways.

Kaylee Tavares

6/22/2020 04:45:49 pm

1st: Acceptable
Although there are some issues with this work that could be addressed, I think this work is acceptable due to the fact that the student met the guidelines given. The word count was acceptable and there was a good amount of summary and analysis. There were some confusing aspects of this piece. I think the student would benefit from working on structure and proofreading their work. Perhaps the student would benefit from having office hour discussions in which the professor/a peer could help them with some of the issues they have with their writing. However, as a whole, the assignment was completed as expected.
2nd: Acceptable
I think this writing was well developed and well written. There were minimal spelling or grammar issues. They took the time to analyze some of the devices used rather than just summarizing. The word minimum was met and there was quite a bit of summary along with the analysis. I think the structure made the piece enjoyable to read and prevented some of the confusion that is prevalent in the other works.
3rd: Acceptable
I think this writing was effective although it was, at times, difficult to understand. Some of the spelling/grammar issues caused there to be sentences and phrases that were confusing. Also, I struggled to find some connections that I think could have been mentioned in order to bring this work to the next level. However, I think this work was effective overall and it was a reflection of what was asked. There was a good amount of summary which was emphasized as being important in the assignment.

Megan

6/23/2020 08:52:35 am

Acceptable. Slight mechanical issues but overall, not a truly big deal if it isn’t a habit of the writer. The summary is there, and it is clear. The writer hits on the big main points of the story and it was written in a way that was easy to understand but was a bit too bland for my preferences. Try to be a bit more organized and be careful of capitalizations and other mechanical features of papers.

Tavares – Acceptable. This writing was clear, specific, and concise. It featured specific references to the story that were relevant and were not overused at all. The summary was not embellished unnecessarily, and it was a smooth, enjoyable read.

Araujo – Acceptable. The mechanical and structural difficulties make the paper hard to understand and read and it actively impacts the quality of understanding. The introductory sentences don’t really make sense and it isn’t a good way to introduce readers to your topic. However, the summary is there. I recommend working to be a bit clearer with word choice and if this is an ongoing problem, it’ll need to be addressed.

6/23/2020 11:59:08 am

1st essay: Acceptable
Feedback: Even though there was no name and no title to the paper, we can still see that the student tried. There were a lot of capitalization mistakes, as the student didn't capitalize the A's in African American. I also think maybe the student summarized too much (for example we don't need to know that Jewell had a successful job when she grew up). Besides that though, this student followed directions like they were supposed to, therefore it's acceptable.

2nd Essay: Acceptable
Feedback: Just like the previous essay, we can tell this student tried. The only major critiques I have are run-on sentences but an easy way to fix this is by using periods. Although there were some grammatical issues, it's still acceptable because they followed directions and answered the prompt.

3rd Essay: Acceptable
Feedback: This essay had a lot of grammatical errors, but the student answers the prompt efficiently. This student also uses run-on sentences and doesn't indent after paragraphs, but this can be fixed with periods.

WEEK FOUR: Post Two

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Summer 2020 ENGL 301

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