Whats everyone doing today?

[silverwhisper]

if you send me placement essays, i swear to you, you'll see a rant the likes of which you've never seen.

never seen, at least, since the last time you had to read more than a handful at a stretch, anyway. :>

ed

 

[Sarojaede]

Ohhh...if only I could share them with you. But, that would violate too many principles I hold.

And, well, when SC is fixed, you might just see a couple of rants like you have never seen. You have been waiting for an alpha rant from me. Well, hold onto your socks because you are going to get two or three in the space of one day.

 

[silverwhisper]

is it wrong that i have to remain seated right now at the prospect of that?



[j/k!]

ed

 

[Sarojaede]

is it wrong that i have to remain seated right now at the prospect of that?



[j/k!]

ed

HAHAHAHAHAAA

Okay, that made my day.

[snickers]

Thanks, Silver. I'm off to the tenth circle of hell.

 

[Guest]

 

[silverwhisper]

i'm fairly certain that comments from us like, "please return to sender for remedial seventh-grade english" wouldn't be particularly helpful to her.

nor, for that matter, the image of everyone stabbing out their eyes with the eraser end of our respective pencils.

:>

ed

 

[Guest]

 

[silverwhisper]

see, you can tell that i have staff: i have superior "this task doesn't require doing" skills.

ed

 

[Sarojaede]

good point. I'd probably just put "This sucks" on it, but then they'd know SJ didn't do the work.

Believe it or not, I cannot actually make comments on the essays. I have to read them and simply write which section of Comp they should go in on them.

My comments, rest assured, would not be nice, if I were able to actually write comments on them. But then, they would be useless as the students don't actually see the placement essays after they submit them.

 

[Guest]

 

[Guest]

 

[Denae]

I have a list a mile long and two days to cross off items.

I'm very lucky. My back was killing me again last week & on Thursday my supervisor suggested I take a long weekend....so I have today & tomorrow off and I'm very happy right now.

My back has felt better in the last two days than it has in the past month. I think I've finally turned that recovery corner.

 

[Sarojaede]

I'm curious SJ. My son took one of these essay tests in June. He was ranked 3 on a scale of 1 to 5 - which sort or surprised me because I didn't think his writing skills were very strong - and allows him to enroll in the first required writing class.

So, I'm just wondering what sort of percentages do you see as far as students falling below the minimum criteria, meeting it, or surpassing it?

Ohhh...Scaly, what a question you have asked.

This response may be too long for a post in here. (Sorry in advance.)

Essentially, when we read placement essays, one person reads them and then writes his/her opinion about whether the student should be enrolled in Skills 090, English 100, or English 101, or in VERY rare cases, Composition II. The assessment is based on whether, as an experienced Comp teacher, the reader thinks the student can pass English 101 with a C or better. If the reader feels the student cannot pass 101 with a C or better, then he or she marks the essay is 100. If the reader feels like the writer cannot pass 100 with a C or better, then the essay is marked as 090.

A second reader is required for each essay; if the second reader agrees with the first reader's assessment (which he or she is not supposed to look at beforehand) then the student is enrolled in whichever course the two readers have agreed on. If the first and second reader do not agree, then the essay goes to a third reader and, in rare cases, can go to a fourth, if there is no agreement among the three readers.

(That's a short verision of how the process works. I don't want to bore anyone to tears explaining the markers we as readers look for to help us determine whether the student will pass a certain level of First-year Comp with a C or better.)

I can't give you a summer's worth of percentages, but I can tell you today that of the 41 placement essays read, 25 were designated to be enrolled in English 100, 11 were designated to be enrolled in English 110, and 5 were designated to be enrolled in Skill 090.

 

[Guest]

 

[Sarojaede]

I think that is very similar to my son's school. Is English 101 the first of the required core curriculum?

At my son's school, the core curriculum requirement is Writing 101 and 102. Each major may have additional requirements. The Level 3 rank he earned allowed him to enroll in Writing 101. A lower rank would mean there would be additional courses to take prior to enrolling in Writing 101. a level 4 or 5 (or some specific AP exam) would have allowed him to skip Writing 101 and enroll in Writing 102.

Either English 100 or English 101 counts as the first semester of the two semester writing requirement. The material gone over in both courses is the same; the assignments are the same, depending on who teaches the course, of course. The only real difference is that 100 is considered a workshop class, so it is a 5 credit hour class which meets 5 hours a week; whereas, English 110 is a 3 hour class that meets 3 hours a week. The theory is that the English 100 students simply need more time writing and more face time with the instructor.

 

[Guest]

 

[Sarojaede]

That seems like a reasonable solution.

It can be a reasonable solution, but honestly many an instructore does not quite know what to do with that extra time for the English 100 class.

And, there is strong theoretical and research evidence to suggest that integrating students who are not strong writers into a class with stronger writers is actually better for them than segregating them into their own separate class.

So, I think the university at some point is going to push for a single 4 credit hour Composition I class instead of the separate 100 and 110 classes. The Skills 090 class would still exist because that is a class in basic reading comprehension skills and writing skills. You know, the this is a subject and this is a predicate and it takes both to make a sentence kind of thing. Or "are" is a verb; "our" is a pronoun kind of thing.

 

[Guest]

 

[Sarojaede]

Honestly, Scaly, I have no clue about HS English classes either. But I can tell you that every summer when I read placement essays there are always more than a handful of essays that make me go "How the hell did this person graduate from high school?".

Every semester, when I ask my students to tell me about their writing experiences from high school--because I like to get a sense of their background and what I am dealing with--I am appalled to find that nearly half my class has never written one essay in their entire four years. I grit my teeth and want to scream in frustration when I have to teach the concept of a thesis, something that I knew before I made it out of 7th grade. Yet, I keep going back to this job, drawn like a moth to a flame. Soon, I don't know if I can bear the singes.

 

[bobsgirl]

Honestly, Scaly, I have no clue about HS English classes either. But I can tell you that every summer when I read placement essays there are always more than a handful of essays that make me go "How the hell did this person graduate from high school?".

Every semester, when I ask my students to tell me about their writing experiences from high school--because I like to get a sense of their background and what I am dealing with--I am appalled to find that nearly half my class has never written one essay in their entire four years. I grit my teeth and want to scream in frustration when I have to teach the concept of a thesis, something that I knew before I made it out of 7th grade. Yet, I keep going back to this job, drawn like a moth to a flame. Soon, I don't know if I can bear the singes.

Interesting. When my daughter was in high school, seniors were required to write a 10-page research paper on the topic of their choice. They were guided through the process by the English teacher. My daughter told me that was the one thing she learned in high school that helped her in college--how to research, organize and write a paper.

 

[Sarojaede]

Trying to decide what's for lunch.

 

[midwestyankee]

Trying to decide what's for lunch.

It was a chicken burrito...$4.38, tax included.

 

[Guest]

 

[silverwhisper]

holy crap, i've forgotten my lunch! i never do that!

ed

 

[Sarojaede]

Turkey and swiss on homemade marble rye.