Category · 395 articles
Writing
Essay Comment Excuses
Teachers know that detailed essay comments are keys to effective writing instruction but are adept at creating essay comment excuses to avoid the time and energy…
How to Grade Writing
How can we effectively assess student writing? Should we grade upon effort, completion, standards, achievement, or improvement? Is our primary task to respond or to grade?…
How to Write Effective Essay Comments
Teachers need to know how to distinguish among corrective, directive, and facilitative responses, the components of written discourse, and closing comments to provide instructive essay comments.
How to Add Essay e-Comments to Your Computer
Wouldn't it be wonderful if teachers could type and save their commonly-used "canned" writing comments to automatically insert into student essays without all the bother of…
What’s Wrong with Holistic Rubrics?
Holistic rubrics are fine for quick overviews and are the staples of performance-based standardized tests, such as the SAT®; however, they serve little instructional purpose and…
How to Use the Computer to Grade Essays
Here's how one teacher began using the computer to grade student writing and developed a free download of 438 e-comments to automatically insert into student essays.
Analytical Rubrics
Analytical rubrics help teachers differentiate instruction, use progress monitoring, involve students, and provide a specific language of writing language instruction throughout the writing process.
Grammar Checkers for Teachers
It’s exhausting and time-consuming. So, naturally, teachers look for short-cuts that will save energy and time, but ones which will still give students what they need…