The Red X (R)evolution

Take a look at the above example. This is not an actual piece of writing from a student, but it is an approximation; it is an amalgam of several students’ work, and I created this to show you what my students’ typical introductory paragraphs (for this compare/contrast paper) look like.

Some are different, because they’ve already been run through the Red X Assignment — those introductory paragraphs talk about the meaning of the word “Holocaust,” and describe the background history before delving into the similarities and differences between the two texts we’ve read — but for the most part, this is what my students’ papers look like.

With the rough drafts in, I asked students to type them up today. We headed to the computer lab and got to work. I walked around the room during each class and did <a href=”http://heymister.wordpress.com/2008/04/07/markers-work-on-computer-screens-too/” target=”_blank”mark up their screens with a red-flavored Expo™ dry-erase marker. I marked only simple errors and simple spelling problems, because I remembered the whole “Track Changes” ability built into the word processor we use at school…and then it hit me: there’s an easier, quicker way to reach each student. An easier quicker way to get each student writing to his/her potential.

So, in my preparatory speech to the kids today I prefaced with two things. One was this:

You will win this game. If you’re willing to work. You will beat me. If you don’t give up, you will win.

The other was this:

If you think there’s someone better than you in this school, there isn’t. If you think there’s a few students who always get “A’s” no matter what, you’re wrong. Everyone has difficulties with writing. Even the people who “always get an ‘A.’” I want you to be the best writer you can be, and I will help you do that. Show me your work, and I won’t tell anyone what’s wrong with it. I’ll only tell you.

The easier, quicker way of telling students how to better their writing was to utilize the “Track Changes” option in their work, and so a student who wrote this:

eventually got this back from me:

A student may have gotten this all at once (if I thought he/she could handle it), or it may have come one item at a time.

The truly interesting part was that most students did not complain about these questions I added — they marveled at how quickly I typed, and they made fun of the spelling errors I made, saying: “Holy cow, do you even know how to spell?!?” But they went right back to work, fixed those problems, lengthened their papers, added quality to their content (content, too, I might add), and kept on going.

They compared their markups against each other:

• “Dude, I got that same comment.”
• “What’s it mean?”
• “It means you need to talk about the story, and then talk about the similarities and differences.”
• “Ohhh!”

Some students didn’t get to a point where they could show me their work.
Some students barely made it past the header to inform me who wrote the paper.

I’ll grade higher the students who turned in draft after draft, and I’ll offer the chance to make it even better.

I’ll grade a little lower the students who turn in their work this Thursday, the final due date.

As it stands, this type of grading and editing is not something I’ve done before. There are strengths and weaknesses to this type of grading, but I think I’ll stick to the original due date for the purposes of overall grading:

• Was the paper ready Monday, April 7?
  • If so, sorry. I have to give a higher grade for effort.
• Was the paper typed Tuesday, April 8?
  • If so, sorry. I have to give preference to the students who worked to complete a draft by today.
• Was the paper complete by Thursday, April 9?
  • If so, the student’s grade will reflect that this student has gone through the process of writing, revising and editing.
• If a student turns in a paper this Thursday, and I haven’t previously seen it, I’ll have to mark it lower. It will be a rough draft, and will get the same comments I gave to other students, but I can’t direct my full attention toward it. This is the day final drafts are due.

There’s got to be a cut-and-dry date somewhere.