Feedback and grading support session

• Research Paper assignment document

• Research Paper rubric

• Links to pdfs/images coming soon here.

• Do you find yourself giving the same comment over and over again? Keep a document for yourself with your most used comments (and variations of them). The you can copy and paste them on subsequent student drafts. Or use the BIOL3004 shared frequent comments document for this purpose (also embedded below).

• A little can go a long way. Simply highlighting or underlining a selection of a student's work can often be enough to draw that students attention and thinking to that area. Add a few words or a sentence if you really want to guide them in a certain direction. A big benefit of this feedback style is that it motivates student critical thinking, rather than a "chekclist" response. 

• Along the same lines, communicate to your class that you are giving the most impactful areas or revision, not necessarily a list of things they can fix to have a "perfect" paper. Encourage your students to follow up on your feedback, either with you, other course instructors, or even a writing consultant from the Center for Writing on campus.

• Resource: Slides from the CBS pre-semester workshop for TAs on responding to student writing

  • Think about your role in this assignment. Are you commenting (meant to elicit reflection and revision) or grading (meant to evaluate based on specific criteria)? Or both?  Are you giving global level feedback? Looking for specific ideas, aspects, or sentences?  Focused on mechanics and format?

  • Choose you battles: limit comments. Highlight only 2-3 of the most impactful areas for revision. Limit focus on surface level concerns (small grammatical issues, word choice) to focus on content, logical organization, and accuracy. 

BIOL3004 TAs and other instructors have compiled a list of common pieces of feedback for each section draft (also embedded below). This is meant to be an interactive document. Add your own frequently used comments. Copy and modify existing ones. Transfer useful comments to your own personal list. Use this document to make your feedback easier, quicker and more effective as you see fit!