Establishing a way to grade papers is something I am beginning to struggle with. Throughout my junior high and high school English classes, my teachers gave us a grading rubric that they would use to grade papers with. I thought it was helpful--I knew what my teachers expected from me and I could easily mold my papers to be A+ papers. I found my writing to be more impersonal and "voice-less" but, hey, grades were more important.
Now as an aspiring teacher, I want my students to actually enjoy writing and I do not want them to write cookie cutter, boring papers in order to try and please me. As Renee stated in her one pager, I too want my students to "write with wine." When I think about this, however, I do not know how to create a grading system that is fair to all students, especially the ones who ask "What exactly do you want from me?" or "What do you want for an 'A' paper?" As of now, I would ideally want my students to follow a general set of instructions (i.e. answering a general question) and create something they are truly proud of but still relevant to the paper topic.
There are times when I really hate page requirements; sometimes I feel like I say everything I have to but still have half of a page to go before I meet the page requirement. Then I feel like I have to go back and add fillers to make it long enough, making me less proud of my paper. So for my future classroom, I would want give my general paper topics and say something along the lines of "I expect most people to write this in about 4-6 pages, but if you feel content with a finished product under four pages, I'd rather have 3 1/2 pages of great writing that I know you're proud of than four pages of mostly good writing but has unnecessary, clearly filler words and phrases placed throughout."
In my ideal world, though, I don't know how I would create a fair grading system that students can rely on. I suppose I will continue to think about it and learn from others, and hopefully by the time I have my own classroom I will be able to develop something that works and that I'm truly happy with.
Kristen,
ReplyDeleteAs you note, grading is the most difficult part about teaching writing. I like the way you are grappling with different ideas. You will be able to find what works for you in your classroom. Student expect and want some guidelines, but I think flexibility is key as you noted with page-requirement. Some students are quite capable of putting together a wonderful piece of writing in less than the "required" pages.
Amie
I love what you said about page requirements- it can be such a road block for writing to think about the end result rather than the drive. Sometimes- you can take a more direct route and other times- you are on the scenic road and it takes twice as long but is a beautiful experience. I am with you on giving them a rough idea, but not necessarily punishing them for brevity and succinctness.
ReplyDeleteI sort of laugh when I think about rubrics. I pretty much all but ignored them when I was in school, I would usually glance at them the day I had to turn the assignment in to make sure I had the right bibliography format and had made the right number of pages, but I rarely found them stifling to my writing. I am curious after reading this post on how different students receive the guidelines of a rubric compared to my own attitude.
ReplyDeleteI think a useful exercise to try out with a class would be offering a maximum that would challenge students to fit all of the necessary information within the alloted space. This might offer them a new perspective on page length and a chance to work on some really rich filler-free writing.
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