By Julia Joseph
I think it is most helpful to students when comments on papers pose questions rather than simply stating criticism. In certain cases, where there appears to be a major error, such as a misreading of a text or a blatant contradiction between paragraphs, a statement may be appropriate, but otherwise, it’s best to get the student thinking about his work by questioning troubling parts of the paper. A big problem I found in this sample paper was an issue of clarity. There were several instances on the first page in which the writer made many generalities. This was a big problem that I’ve encountered with my students, which was always easily fixed simply by asking questions like, “What things?” Specificity is especially important when trying to make a point that contributes to the thesis. I wrote on the sample essay a couple times, “What do you mean by this?” If I read the unclear sentence over and over again, or if I continued reading, I could eventually figure out when the writer meant, but good analytical writing is not supposed to make the reader figure it out–the writer is supposed to explain it as clearly as he can. By asking to clarify in unclear places, the writer will hopefully question his own clarity in future writing and make sure that his writing is linear and logical.
There were also a couple issues with quote usage in the sample paper. The writer did not provide much interpretation for some of the quotes, and in one instance, the writer clearly misread the quote that he used. I tried to ask how some of the quotes related back to the topic sentence. In reminding the student to always be mindful of the topic sentence, it helps him to stay on track with his writing and lot let his interpretations of quotes stray too far from his intended point.
However, another weakness in the paper was clarity of the topic sentences. They were rather vague, and did not make quite clear connections with one another, which made the paper seem a bit disjointed. I asked questions that might help the student write more specific topic sentences while putting them in context with what the rest of his paper seems to be arguing. The third body paragraph was especially problematic because it seemed to contradict what the writer was saying in the previous paragraph, and then did not connect very well to the following paragraph. I tried to draw attention to the contradictory nature of the paragraph by questioning what he wrote in the previous paragraph. Sometimes it’s hard for student to see papers as one big picture because they’re so focused on trying to make different points (although they forget it is to support one argument), so it helps to bring attention to what the writer is saying in each paragraph so that they can notice inconsistencies.
As nice as they are, a paper full of positive comments is not helpful at all. I had a student who said his instructor wrote all positive comments on his paper, but then gave him a C+. Obviously the student wanted to know why he received the grade, but he could not tell me why. Even if it’s an A paper, there’s always something that can be improved upon. A couple comments of praise here and there are fine, but a paper full of them simply is not constructive. Comments that point out specific problems are more helpful, and the best comment is one that gets the student to question his own writing.
plangereinternship 