The instructor can make it clear that the grade is for the whole presentation -- clarity, organization, relevance -- and then routinely make the same correction marks made by a copy editor, without tying the grade to number or severity of those errors, e.g., no-errors gets an A, 1 to 5 gets a B, etc.
 
I once wrote ten words on the board and asked students to decide which of them they could reasonably define or explain. Raise your hand if you know one of the words. All hands came up. Two? Three? etc. They quickly dwindled until four admitted to knowing six, two knew 7 and no one knew 8 of the ten. The class was 32 college students.
 
I then revealed that the ten words were taken from the first two pages of the current TIME magazine, a "general circulation" publication. The result was a very interesting discussion of the relationship between vocabulary and understanding and how one might enhance one's vocabulary and hence one's ability to understand.
 
.brad.11dec08.

--- On Wed, 12/10/08, Scott Woods <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
 





Is there any research on the effect of different methods of teacher correction of errors, specifically, grammar errors? Which methods are better?  Are some common methods very ineffective?  If we want to change student behavior, how can we best do that?  Which combination of teacher actions is most effective and efficient: pre-instruction, correction by marking, correction by commenting, correction by showing how it could be done, targeted instruction (by this, I mean instruction directed toward a specific student for his specific errors, e.g., attaching an instructional and practice packet on perfect aspect when a student makes such an error), requested correction (by this, I mean correcting what students ask to be corrected, e.g., "My paragraph seems lifeless, how can I make it lively?" or "I'm concerned about my use of the perfect aspect, especially the past perfect.  Please show me what I'm doing right and wrong."), others?
 
Scott Woods
BASIS Scottsdale



      

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