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Evaluating Writing

Page history last edited by Charlie Bakker 11 years, 2 months ago

Part I. EVALUATING WRITING:

 

First of all, begin with a guiding light that recognizes this broad generalization: Effective writing clearly communicates a point or relays information. This is, of course, relative to what the writing prompts ask of the student. See the prompt below:

 

 Many factors led to the outbreak of the Civil War. In a well-developed, multi-paragraph essay based on information covered in your textbook and in-class discussions, thoroughly explain a significant cause (other than slavery) of the American Civil War, using specific examples and elaboration to show how these factors led our nation to internal military conflict.

 

The parameters of this assignment are laid out clearly. The written response needs to be specific and elaborate on key ideas in the student's response. It does not, however, require research. This might be an in-class essay given as an essay portion of a test, or it might be an assessment that helps build up to a unit test, helping to prepare the student for future assessments. At this point of the evaluation process, students have already been guided through pre-writing and writing strategies, and now you are ready to see how they have done. 

 

The guiding light for assessing student responses in a way that fairly evaluates how effectively they answered question is this: Did the student clearly relay the information asked of him/her?

 

Take a look at Sample I:

 

SAMPLE I.

 

                    The Civil War is known as one of the darkest periods in United States history. While many factors led to this four-year conflict,

               one of the most prominent causes was the economic difference between the North and South because these differences caused a

               shift in the power structure of the U.S. government.

 

                   Prior to the Civil War, the economy of the North became larger and more diverse. This growth inspired a higher birth rate and

               attracted more immigrants from Europe. Meanwhile in the South, economic growth was slower, and the population did not keep pace

               with the North. When the North ultimately outpaced the South in both economic and population growth, their influence in the federal

               government shifted, giving the North an advantage in abolishing slavery.

 

                 This ultimately led the South to secede from the union. Once the course for secession was set, political struggles turned violent. While

                 most experts agree the secession caused the Civil war, it was the economic differences between the North and South that allowed the

                 North to gain the political advantage needed to put an end to slavery in the South, which pushed the two sides to war. 

 

 

It looks like this is a pretty solid answer in that it clearly answers the question with its thesis: "...one of the most prominent causes [of the Civil War] was the economic difference between the North and the South because these differences caused a shift in the power structure of the U.S. government." 

 

The writing has a clear point, which provides the focus for the essay's ideas and content as well as the organizational building block for the essay (2 of the six traits).

 

The support (ideas and content) is logical and helps explain a major cause of the Civil War. Because of this, the essay is at least minimally effective. It is the second part of the prompt where we can begin to detect the problems of this writing: "...using specific examples and elaboration to show how these factors led to internal military conflict." 

 

The essay "tells" us but does not "show" us how economic differences led to conflict. According to how most standardized tests (MCA-II, AP Literature and Composition, and ACT plus), and Minnesota graduation standards (Common Core Standards), generalized writing cannot exceed middle-level, or average-level quality. Compare Sample I. with Sample II. and note the differences:

 

SAMPLE II.

 

                    The Civil War is known as one of the darkest periods in United States history. While many factors led to this four-year conflict, one of

                the most prominent causes was the economic differences between the North and South because these differences caused a shift in the

                power structure of the U.S. government.

           

                 Prior to the Civil War, the economy of the North became larger and more diverse. As the economy of the North became more industrial,

               factories provided more jobs, which in turn created more large urban areas. This growth inspired a higher birth rate and attracted more

               immigrants from Europe. Meanwhile in the South, economic growth was slower, and the population did not keep pace with the North. The

               South grew increasingly dependent on cotton plantations as their primary source of trade. Inventions like the cotton gin helped the Southern

               economy to expand but actually increased their dependency on the use of slaves on plantations. When the North ultimately outpaced the

               South in both economic and population growth, their influence in the federal government shifted, giving the North an advantage in abolishing

               slavery. Since the South had an economy that was built on the backs of slaves and faced more pressure to end slavery from a more politically

               powerful North, they decided to secede from the union.

 

                   Once the course for secession was set, political struggles turned violent. While most experts agree the secession caused the Civil war, it was the

                 economic differences between the North and South that allowed the North to gain the political advantage needed to put an end to slavery in the

                 South, which pushed the two sides to war

 

 

The changes to Sample I are indicated in blue. Notice the level of specificity of Sample II, comparatively. The extra attention to detail shows the reader what is meant by economic differences. The prompt asks for this and the essay delivers.

 

Sample I is a glorified list, written and organized into an expository essay. Sample II states the ideas, then shows the ideas and content in its specific examples. This makes this an above average essay, and should cause the teacher evaluating it to focus on helping this writer become more sophisticated. There are no obvious grammatical issues, but word choice, sentence fluency, or even encouraging this writer to pursue the next level of specifics by expanding on main ideas, would all be skills that could move this essay into the ranks of exemplary.

 

Sample I and II provide examples of average and good writings respectively. So what does a lower level writing look like?

 

Most readers can identify problems with clunky wording, obvious grammatical issues, or writing that is so random that it is difficult to follow the writer's ideas. Sample III, however shows another common issue found in a great deal of writings that would be deemed ineffective:

 

SAMPLE III.

 

                 One of the leading causes of the U.S. Civil War was the issue of "States' Rights." Slaveholders in the South believed that the federal

               government did not have the right to determine slavery issues; rather, they believed, these decisions should be left up to the individual

               states themselves.

 

                 Another interesting aspect of the Civil War was the advancement in new technologies. In fact, the superior technological capability of

               the North actually helped it to win the war. One important advantage the North had was the railroad. The North had 22,000 miles of

               track, while the South had only 9,000. Furthermore, much of the South's tracks were not "standard gauge," meaning there were

               compatibility issues in the South that were not present in the North. Another technological advancement was the use of guns. Prior to

               the Civil War, muskets were the weapons of choice, but musketswere only accurate to about 80 yards and had no rifling. Rifling is

               putting grooves in a barrel of the gun, so when a projectile is shot it would spin as it was traveling down the barrel and continued spinning

               as it hurled through the air. This allowed these guns tohave three times the effective range of the traditional musket.

 

                 So, as you can see, the combination of advancements intechnology and the issue of states' rights were central to the outbreak of the

               Civil War and, in fact, helped contribute to theNorth's eventual victory. 

 

 

Sample III, at first glance, is written well. It relays information and is free of major grammatical issues. Coming back to the prompt, however, things change dramatically. This essay quickly strays from the question it is answering, paying brief attention to it with its thesis, which cites "states' rights" as a cause of the Civil War. It quickly ventures into weaponry of the Civil War, and does not even explain how states' rights led to Civil War. The point of this essay was abandoned, then briefly mentioned again in the conclusion, though the advancements in technology (weaponry) have slid into the discussion without being connected to the thesis of the essay.

 

CONCLUSION:

 

The writing prompt or assignment descriptions essentially shape how we should evaluate students' writing. Sample I been a response to, "Briefly explain one major factor that led the U.S. into the Civil War," Sample I would have been a very good answer.

 

Had Sample II been a response to a similar prompt that had called for "utilizing and quoting 3 outside sources in your essay," it would not have been successful. Sample III, while off-topic, would not have been deemed entirely ineffective had the prompt asked for an explanation of how advancements in weaponry impacted the American Civil War.

 

This discussion of how to evaluate responses to one prompt by no means captures all that a teacher will see in a stack of his or her essays. Instead, it focuses on a few of the most difficult dilemmas teachers face when grading essays, which usually surround what it is we should do when the writing seems pretty good in terms of basic skills, but does not execute the assignment. 

 

A good way to think of this is to put it into real-world comparisons: If a company answered an inquiry from a customer on why his or her loan request had not been processed and was written in a way that contained tremendous sentence fluency, strong voice, and vivid word choice, yet explained the late fee penalty policy to the customer who had not yet received a loan, is this successful writing? 

 

Good writing conveys a point or relays information clearly...as it pertains to the task at hand.

 

NEXT PAGE: Creating Rubrics

 

 

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