What You Do with the History Changes Feedback AND Grading for All Unit Essays |
What’s on This
Webpage:
Making Sure I
Try to Be Clear about the Limits of What I Am Saying
What’s in the
File That I Sent You?
What Do You
Do to Complete This (and Get the Extra Credit)?
If You Are
Really Puzzled Because You Have QP Marked
How Can You
Prevent the Problems Identified by the Evidence Checklist/Rubric?
How Does Your
Instructor Grade Your Writing?
What Is the
Evidence Checklist/Rubric and What Are Its 2-Letter Abbreviations for Feedback?
Click here to hear a voice explanation of the main points in next heading. |
I stress what works based on learning history. I stress what is necessary:
HOWEVER, if bosses or professors say to do the opposite, then do that for them. That is the right thing to do.
Click here to hear a voice explanation of how grading works and how this process works. |
§
I record a real
grade for your work on the History Changes Essay.
Why? So you can tell the percentage
you will make on the 50-point assignments (2 essays each at 25 points) if you
keep working as you are. If you made a 4 on the 10-point History Changes Essay
and did the same manner of working on the 50-point essays, you would get only
20 points (40% of 50).
§
If you do the instructions below, I record all
of the extra credit I have promised. If
you cannot tell what to do, talk to me. I am glad to help you.
Why? Because I do not think people should be zapped for having a misunderstanding.
That is why you can get extra credit to cover any low grade.
§ If you change how you work in the future, you will not only learn history a lot better (my goal for all this), but practice skills to help you for your entire life. Practice being the person you want to be.
Click here to hear a voice explanation of what’s in the file I sent you. |
The file has two things:
1.
My feedback to you, with Xs marked and
comments added to show you the feedback.
2.
A copy of what you submitted for the History Changes Essay—and this is where you do what you need to do so
that you can catch on to the feedback
I have marked this with a common example of someone with interrelated
bad habits (with blue highlights).
Habits (or how you work) are what
gets you in trouble—being smart is never enough. I have also placed links in
the example so you can go to more information if you want to.
Keep in mind I know I can be wrong. If you can tell me on the phone
where the source supports something, I am fine.
My feedback to you, with Xs marked and comments added to show
you the feedback These are the 5 items in
the Evidence Checklist/Rubric. If I placed an X below the item, you had this problem
and you need to look at the instructions in the link and then do that IN the
copy of your work below.
These are general problems. If I placed an X to the left of the item,
you seem to have these problems.
A copy of what you
submitted for the History Changes Essay—and this is where you do what you
need to do TO STRESS THIS, you do NOT rewrite anything. You mainly underline or strike through.
|
Click here to hear a voice explanation of the main points in next two headings. |
You are not rewriting, not modifying anything, and not creating a new version of this assignment. So are you to do?
In this order, do this:
Example: If the author wrote the word demonstrating and if you wrote demonstrated, then you underline demonstrated |
|
So what do you do? You go compare letter-by-letter the author’s words and yours:
|
Students are usually puzzled about the QP marking because they lack some basic information. Here are the basics.
1. The
submission of a paper with words from an author without quotation marks can be the professor's evidence that you plagiarized. Some professors may not
notice, but some may call it plagiarism. Do
not assume that past responses by professors guarantees what future
professors will want (and no boss ever will pay people—not well anyway—to copy
words from one place to another).
2. If you do this, some professors may label your work as “half-copy” plagiarism (term from The Bedford Handbook, page 692) if you:
§ Either copy an author’s phrases without quotation marks (“”)
§ Or
use the author’s sentence structure and
just swap a few words with what you think are synonyms
3. Caution: If you think saying the name of the source means you can copy another’s words without quotations marks, look at this table. If you use a fact in the author’s words, citation is not enough; you must also use quotation marks.
What
Kind of Fact Are You Using |
Do
You Need Citation (Page # etc.)? |
Do
You Need Quotation Marks (“”)? |
A fact in your own words |
Yes |
No |
A fact in the author’s words |
Yes |
Yes <Notice this. |
Specifics about this course:
I will provide a link to preventions. If you do not see them here by Thursday afternoon, please remind me.
With
something that people talk about in many ways, sometimes it helps to state what
is not the goal. With writing in this course, you are not
summarizing or paraphrasing the textbook. You do not, therefore, need to
repeat every fact or word in the textbook. You are also not showing your
personal writing style while stating your feelings or your opinions.
Instead,
in this course, the goal of all writing assignments is for you to do activities
that help you learn the history of our nation. One of the most powerful ways to
learn something is to try to teach it. You will succeed in these assignments if
you do these things:
§ If you read carefully and work to understand what
happened and ask if you need help.
§ If you figure out what essential facts that you
would teach your cousin.
§ If you figure how you could organize those facts as
simply and as accurately as you can.
§ If you write in a common sense way as though you are
teaching your cousin history that he or she needs to understand.
Because
the goal of writing is to hTo help you learn our nation’s history and the
priority is for you to be accurate, I grade your writing by comparing what you
wrote side by side with the facts in the textbook. With essays submitted, I use
a method that lets me quickly identify all of the submissions where the
students wrote on the same question.
1. I download those submissions, print them, and place
side by side:
§ On the left, the textbook opened to the probable
section or sections students should have used. § On the right, the submissions of students’ papers
on that question. |
2. I use the Evidence Checklist/Rubric and its 2-letter
abbreviations for feedback (shown below) and grade each student’s submissions
one by one.
3. If there are multiple possible questions, I then
repeat the steps above with the next question.
With
the two essays for the Unit exams, I grade one of the questions using the
method above. Unless I find problems such as factual errors in that essay, I
grade the other one without the textbook side by side with your paper—a quicker
method.
th the e
I
use the Evidence Checklist/Rubric to grade on common standards (accepted rules or models) for academics and for jobs
that depend on evidence. The word evidence
emphasizes that you must have proof
for what you say—some fact from our approved source that anyone using that
source can see for himself or herself. The word checklist means a list of steps or things necessary for success
(such as a pilot’s checklist for takeoff). The word rubric usually means a way to give feedback (such as confirmation of success, guidance for
improvement, or corrections) that is useful but quick for instructors and
students.
The
term checklist/rubric indicates this
is both a checklist (on the left) for success with evidence and a way to
give feedback (on the right) about your use of evidence as a 2-letter
abbreviation. Each checklist item begins with an informal statement of a common
standard. Beneath that are our specific requirements, identified with the
underlined phrase In this course.
Do each of the things on the checklist below or you
may see the letters on the right as Feedback on your paper. |
Feedback Letters |
|
1. |
For
your source of facts, you use only
sources your professor (or boss) accepts as reliable. In this course, the only
sources are the textbook chosen by the History Department and the sources provided at our Course Website. Do not use Internet websites, another textbook, or any other
source—including your own memory. |
NS =
Fact is Not from an approved Source |
2. |
You must follow common
standards to reveal to your reader who created the words and/or found the
facts you are using in your writing. This is a requirement in courses and in
some jobs. In
this course, you may: §
Either write
facts in your own words §
Or you may use
exact sentences or phrases from the textbook placed within quotation marks
according to the specific rules for quotation marks (“”) to reveal ownership
that are covered in The Bedford
Handbook In this course, you may not
copy an author’s phrases without quotation marks. You also may not replace a few words in an
author’s sentence. Both are what The
Bedford Handbook calls “half-copy” plagiarism (page 692). |
QP = Quotation includes Plagiarized text |
3. |
You must
follow common standards to reveal any changes you made to the author’s words.
This may not be just a punctuation error. You may be misleading your reader
about the evidence. In this course, if
you use another’s words, you must be sure either not to change them or—if you
change them—to follow the specific rules in The Bedford Handbook to reveal those changes to the reader. |
QC = Quotation is Changed from the source. |
4. |
You must use reliable
sources to verify what you write—to confirm its accuracy. In
this course, if you cannot verify
the fact, do not write it and do not assume that the source agrees
with you. If you are certain something is true and you cannot find it clearly
in our sources, ask me for help. §
If a question is
about something specific (such as a time, type of person, or region), verify
that the source is about that specific thing. §
If the source
covers facts about two or more sides or positions, do not include only one
side as though the other did not occur. |
NT =
Fact is Not True. It is not verifiable using the probable page in the source.
|
5. |
With most written work for professors (or bosses), if
asked, you must be able to state exactly where
(a specific page) in the source
that each fact came from—whether
you wrote the words or the author did. With many college assignments, you
must provide citations and use a specific standard (such as MLA, APA, or the Chicago Manual
of Style). In this course with most
written assignments, you do not need to provide citations (the
specific page number from our textbook) unless I cannot recognize
where the fact came from. If you ask to do the more challenging alternative assignment
instead of the essays for Unit 3, then you must cite according to the
instructions. |
W? = Where is the specific page
where this is supported in our textbook? |
In
the module for the History Changes Essay, you will also find brief tips on
reading for evidence and writing with evidence (including preventing problems
with quotations). If you would also like a personal conference, I am glad to
help you.
With
all written assignments, you write briefly and within the maximum length listed
for the assignment and according to the Evidence Checklist/Rubric and
the Goal for Written Assignments (both on the prior page).
§ You
know all of the possible questions before you write, but you do not know which
question(s) Blackboard will display for you.
§ You
must write on the question(s) displayed. The reason for listing the
questions and providing ways to locate what you need in the textbook is for
you to read and prepare ahead of time for all possible questions.
History Changes Essay, a 10-point assignment: You
know the questions ahead. It is brief—you write about the amount you would
write by hand on a ½ sheet of Xerox paper. You must write only on the question
you received.
After the date listed in the Course Schedule, you
can click on the History Changes Essay. You can see not only the list of all
possible questions but also aids to help you. You see a table comparing the
content to help you see changes over time (also provided as a handout) and you
know the specific parts of the textbook for each column in the table.
The History Changes Essay
is meant to introduce you to several things:
§ Content
that is part of Unit 1 and essential to understanding the remaining Units in
the course and our history as a whole
§ Content
as a way to examine how and why events change over time—something key to being
accurate in writing about history and to noticing how human beings’ actions or
lack of action can alter their futures.
§ How
grading works in this course and what
is frequently expected in courses and jobs that require evidence
§ How
you work with evidence, with reading,
and with writing
Because some students have an “aha moment” when they do this essay and follow
the feedback instructions, this is the assignment where you can receive up to
10 extra points (100% extra credit) for following the instructions with the
feedback I provide on your History Changes Essay. This means full credit for
this assignment no matter what your initial grade.
Caution: You must
do the History Changes Essay to see the essay part of the three Unit exams.
Essay Part of the Exams That End Unit 1, 2, and 3, with
2 essays, each at 25 Points:
You can take an exam only one
time. You know the questions ahead.
Each question should be brief—for each one, you write about the amount you
would write by hand on a ½ sheet of Xerox paper. The questions work in this
way:
§ At the beginning of a Unit,
you see at the top of the Unit a link to all possible essay questions, with the
possible questions grouped for the first essay question and for the second one.
§ On the day of your Unit
exam, Blackboard displays 2 of the possible questions in the group for the
first essay and 2 for the second essay. You write one essay for each group.
Alternative Assignment for Unit 3’s Essays (1-page
typed essay at 50 points): You
may choose to write a more challenging writing assignment, a comparison,
instead of writing the essays for Unit 3. It is requires citation and is graded
on formal language and organization. If you want more information on this alternative,
contact me.
Copyright C. J. Bibus,
Ed.D. 2003-2013 |