Elbow's article on "Ranking, Evaluating and Liking" was very perceptive regarding the process we should use to judge student writing. While it still leaves a few questions, I think his ideas have a great deal of merit. I think that, especially when we first start grading, ranking is the most comfortable option for us. I think when you're grading a set of papers, it's sometimes difficult to really know what the difference between an A and a B is until you start to compare one student's writing to another-- one paper will seem like it may be an A paper until you come upon a paper which clearly surpasses it, making you question if the first paper was really an A at all. I think the difference between the As and Bs is the most difficult to determine. I think the questions that Bean asks himself when grading are true (does it have a thesis, etc. if not then it is a C or lower)--deciding what gets a C or lower is easier to determine than what gets an A or B. Of course, that's where the process of evaluating comes in--establishing the criteria that makes it easier to determine the differences between A, B, C, D and F papers.
Elbow's proposition that we "like" our students and their work is a good suggestion, but problematic. First off, personal feelings regarding a person or their work are hard to create artificially-- there are always people who rub you the wrong way, and it seems difficult to make yourself like something that you clearly feel is unlikable. However, his suggestion that we look for the good qualities in anything is good advice, and may be an analytical way of overcoming our emotional responses. It also seems more constructive to say "here's what was good in your paper" and build on that, than just point out what is lacking.
However, what seems most problematic is that we HAVE to find enough wrong with a piece of writing so that we can meet the Eng 1000 requirement that says our class has to have a C+/B- average. This would suggest that we should do the reverse of "liking"-- that we should be on the lookout for things we don't like in the writing in order to fill our low-grade quota for the semester.
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You know, Darren, I too am struggling with how I'm going to be able to make my grades fit into the expected average. Though, to be honest, the instructor I primary tutored for last semester let me see the first drafts of papers that were turned in, and most of them had major flaws. I would like to think that they would get better with revision, but I don't know. Judging by many of the students in the writing lab, I would say that C+/B- is about accurate.
But, I've thought about this for a week or so and I think that I am going to change my policy to not drop students for absences. Not only does that relieve me of the policing role, but it also gives me an opportunity to fail students who don't come to class, thus letting me give higher grades to those who come and try harder. It sounds so awful when I actually say it!
--Bri
I have to admit that I am tending to agree with Bri on this point no matter how awful it may sound. If there is a student or two who fails, it would make the expected average easier to manage I think. I actually worry about this expected median grade quite a bit because I tend to be a generous grader (despite my comment in class on that last paper). I am affected by the students too much I think.
I've also wondered about this. Judging from the quality of some of the papers I've seen in the writing lab, though, I'm not sure that it will really be so difficult to keep the grades in this range. Some are very strong, of course, but others leave much to be desired. I do know, however, that it's really hard for me to give poor grades, so this may very well be something I struggle with this next year.
I'd agree that generally speaking, the students will take care of the GPA range on their own. Having a true A writer in the class may help identify what's not an A. Then there's the grade-norming that the Comp Office does- that could be a good reality check if we're uncertain about grade levels in general.
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