Court's post on the reading for this week got me thinking about Chapter 14 in Bean. I'm starting to realize now that grading and commenting on papers is a delicate dance, and not easy at all.
I saw a student yesterday in the writing lab; she was extremely anxious and on the verge of tears because of the instructor comments on the first draft of her paper. Frankly, I don't blame her. Not only were the comments few, incoherent, and illegible, but there was very little feedback that could be usefully applied to the paper. Also the instructor used the word "tautological," which I found somewhat self-indulgent and unnecessary. I spent at least half of the tutoring session calming the student down. She was on the verge of hysteria and needed all kinds of reassurance, encouagement, counseling, etc. Yes, the student's paper had major flaws, but it still had many good points (exquisite organization, in fact). If we as instructors are supposed to pinpoint the potential in a paper and encourage the student to run with it, then we ought to be telling students what, specifically, was good. I felt really conflicted after the tutoring session; I was very frustrated with the instructor, yet really pleased at how much good work the student accomplished in the session. It also made me late to 8010.
Anyway, I hope that I can internalize these really helpful ideas, so that I don't perpetrate the same silliness on my own students.
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5 comments:
Claire,
I think Bean's point about how students and instructors read comments in different tones was an excellent point. "What does this mean?" can be interpreted many ways — even "interesting" has come to be used in the sense of "I have no idea whether to say this is good or bad" (eg: "Wow. That production of Hamlet that took place on a Martian colony was...interesting.")
Of course, I didn't read the comments that were on this student's paper, so they may have actually been quite confrontational and negative. And the other thing is, no matter how you interpret "what?" or "interesting," a comment of "excellent point" is pretty obviously positive.
And, if I may add to this excellent conversation:
One thing I often do is to ask students to write a response to my comments. I usually ask them some version of what they understand my comments to be saying about their paper, as well as what they agree and disagree with (or what they don't understand). I like this practice because it doesn't make my word the final work on their papers, and it also gives me a chance to see (to some extent) how they're receiving my comments (including tone, etc.).
I think the most challenging thing about working in the writing lab is dealing with drafts that have instructor comments. Often they are vague, and I have to work with the student to see if we can figure out what the instructor meant. Sometimes they are overwhelmingly negative; sometimes they seem to point out negative things about the paper that I would completely disagree with. I had one essay where the instructor had pointed out that the topic sentences of each paragraph needed work. When I looked at the topic sentences with the student, I could not find anything noticably "wrong" with the topic sentences. I tried not to take the route of "well, your instructor doesn't know what he/she's talking about" and instead tried to focus on just finding ways to make what was (I believed) good and making it even better.
I've also thought a bit about making comments on students' papers, partly because I think our work on the Online Writery is somewhat like giving comments on papers we'll grade. The Online Writery is a completely different experience than one-on-one tutoring, I think, and it can be difficult to figure out how to be non-directive, yet helpful, and how to point out problems without being overly negative. I tend to try to put my comments as questions to avoid telling the student what to do (e.g., "What is your thesis statement? What is the point you are trying to make in this paper?"). I also try to make sure that I give some encouraging comments, even if I think the paper as a whole needs a lot of work.
I've had the same difficulties with the Online Writery. I definitely have to restrain myself more than when I'm dealing with someone in person. The mediation of the digital format doesn't allow for the same type of human interaction -- the give and take of a living conversation. I can't see whether something I write is hurtful or overly negative (or just wrong for the type of writer I am addressing) because I don't witness the effects. I find that I have to use a bit of moral imagination to couch my criticism in a friendlier tone. For whatever reason, I tend to be more direct and unapologetic in my textual body than I am in person. And, as Bean reminds us, that type of directness may be misconstrued as ill-will.
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