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Suggestions for Streamlining Responses to Student Writing

Don’t grade all student writing; responses should be appropriate for the stage of writing. For most low-stakes writing, students need credit and perhaps a check or check plus or minus to indicate quality. Tailor the response to the need, considering Belanoff’s concepts of Guts, Bones, and Skin:

  •  GUTS: Invention and drafting
    • talking, listing, brainstorming 
    • writing for the writer 
    • talking 
  • BONES: Revising 
    • shaping for audiences
    • organization and structure
    • group reading and feedback 
  • SKIN: Editing for surface error
    • polishing and proofreading

Create situations in which groups or partners can provide helpful feedback. 

  • When students are asked to read papers from other students, the activity should be focused and the readers should be prepared to offer real help. Two areas are most helpful to the revising writer:
    • Meeting the assignment requirements.
      • After seeing models that show what and how to evaluate, readers can tell writers whether the assignment’s components are present and fully answered.
    • Clarity. Readers can tell writers what they understand and what might be missing.
      • One method that can help identify what is missing is to ask readers to write a summary of the paper for the writer.
    • See WAC’s Types of Feedbackfor more suggestions about revision.
  • If students are writing multiple versions of a basic assignment (as in several article reviews), ask that all copies be turned in for credit with only one revised and edited for your feedback and/or grade.
    • Students gain authority over their writing 
    • You evaluate only the best product
  • Avoid writing on student papers
    • Development: Answers assignment’s requirements 
    • Clarity: Notes about what’s clear and what’s not 
    • Style/Editing notes
    • Use grading cover sheets with three categories:
  • Ask students for cover letters for assignments, in which they describe their process and their writing.
    • Respond to the letter as part of your response to the assignment. 
  • In responding to student writing, use positive aspects of the paper to model revision: Don’t just read negatively.
    • For example, instead of just writing that analysis is thin, point out that analysis in the first section is supported by specific examples and ask for a similar level of support in the next section.
  • Don’t edit: Tell students about the patterns of error you note. Other resources for editing are the following:

Suggestions for Aiding Transfer of Skills

In designing assignments, consider the conventions of writing in the discipline. See the writing project as a process, and turn it into a list of tasks, if possible.

  • What’s new: Spell out which elements of the assignment are particular to the discipline and model these for students
    • Register terms 
    • Documentation 
    • Analysis of writing in the field
  • What’s familiar: Consider which tasks students are likely to have learned in earlier writing courses
    • Summaries/abstracts 
    • Similar documenting concerns 
    • Basic report format 
    • Comparison and contrast 
    • Analysis
  • Ask students for a cover letter for writing assignments in which they describe their process and write about their writing.
    • Respond to this letter as part of your response to the assignment.

Consult the WAC Glossary of common terms in writing pedagogy.

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