WRA 150: EVOLUTION OF AMERICAN THOUGHT THURSDAY, OCT. 2, 2013

AGENDA  Housekeeping  Building a rubric  Peer Review  What’s next

GOALS FOR TODAY  Work together to create a rubric that will be used to evaluate your papers  Creating transparency about what is asked and expected of you, how to achieve these expectations, and what is valued in a paper like this  Continue getting/giving feedback from/to your fellow classmates on your papers through peer review.  To leave class with a clear plan for writing your final drafts.

CREATING A RUBRIC  Because the last paper was not evaluated at such a granular level (i.e. I was mainly concerned with abstract things arrangement and voice), this paper will be a little more structured in terms of assessment  The goal of a well-constructed rubric is to identify the criteria for a successful performance and describes the qualities of strong, adequate, and weak performances.  Collaborating together on the rubric can help guide your writing process as you move forward.

CREATING A RUBRIC  With that in mind, what sorts of things do you think this paper should be evaluated on?  What categories should be represented on the rubric?  Basically, what are the essential elements that must be present in the paper to ensure that it is high in quality? Not only that, but how are they being characterized? What makes these strong, weak, etc?  How many categories do we want to be assessed? Things like: Focus/purpose, development/process, arrangement, audience, language, style What do these things actually mean when being assessed?

THINGS WE NEED TO CONSIDER  What are the categories  How should these categories be weighted?  What is the most important element? How many points will it be worth?  What is our scale?  Ex. Grades: A-F; Levels: strong, okay, shitty; ETC.  How do we describe the performance of each category/criteria?

WHAT SHOULD WE ADD? CRITERIAWELL DONESATISFACTORYNEEDS WORK Focus: Valid points/Evidence of culture and artifact Paper stays on task, answers the questions of the assignment thoroughly, strong thesis, which is supported by evidence, Paper has thesis, stays mostly on task, some evidence to support thesis, answers the questions to some extent No/weak/poor thesis, doesn’t stay on task, little to no evidence Arrangement/Structur e/Flow Paper makes sense from beginning to end (flow), good transitions, easy to read, links claims and evidence by means of analysis, Paper makes some sense from beginning to end, few transitions, lacks strong analysis, Makes no sense, little to no transitions, irrelevant or confusing incorporation of analysis of evidence, Style/Language/Audi ence Consistent use of appropriate language (formal, informal), uses language that creates not confuses meaning, Confused use of language (inconsistent), Use of inappropriate language, Research (logos)Supports thesis with clear outside knowledge, uses two sources at least, cites sources correctly, integrates research with analysis and claims well, appropriate use of research (relevant sources), Uses one other outside source (or a few unreliable sources), research doesn’t support analysis, No outside research, doesn’t cite, no analysis of research, no hard facts MechanicsUse of good grammar and punctuation, appropriate word choice, consistent formatting (MLA, APA, etc), includes work cited page, 6 pages (including works cited), 1 inch margins, 12 point font, double spaced, title Few grammar and punctuation mistakes, some iffy word choices, inconsistent formatting, attempt to include work cited page, less than 6 pages Many, spelling errors, grammar distracts from meaning, no attempt to format their paper, no works cited, no adherence to paper guidelines.

RUBRIC  Having discussed what makes a strong paper and outlining the categories that you guys think are the most important for assessment should help guide you as you engage in…

PEER REVIEW!

PEER REVIEW  Just like last time, take some time to jot down two to three things that you specifically want your peer reviewers to focus on  This will help make the peer review useful for you in very pointed ways  Think about the things we just talked about while creating the rubric.

PEER REVIEW  Get into groups of three and exchange papers  Take minutes to reading through each paper carefully (twice, if necessary) taking notes and paying special attention to the areas of concern that the writer already outlined.  After everyone is finished reading and reviewing each paper in the group, take 10 or so minutes to discuss—as a group—one paper at a time.  Again, use the rubric we made as talking points.

TO SUM UP  Hopefully building the rubric together helps you better understand what is expected of you and how to achieve the benchmarks we as a group came up with  Coupled with the peer review, hopefully you leave class with a clear writing agenda for your final drafts.  That’s all

FOR NEXT CLASS  We will be talking about the Project 3: the Disciplinary Literacies paper  Read:  “Blue Collar Brilliance” by Mike Rose (on course website)