Teaching English, How To.... Essential Ideas 03

Teaching English, How To…. Essential Ideas 03

How can students evaluate the unity, clarity and smoothness of their expression—without the aid of the teacher? Self-evaluation of writing: unity. Fold a sheet of paper in half horizontally. The writer writes the main idea of the composition on one side of the folded paper. Gives the folded paper to the partner who reads the composition silently, then writes the main idea on the other side of the folded sheet of paper. Unfold the paper. If the two main ideas are similar, the composition is probably unified. If they differ significantly, the writer should check the thesis, topic sentences and summary paragraph. p. 139.

Self-evaluation of writing: clarity. Partner reads the writer’s composition silently. Whenever the partner has a question about meaning, he or she places a question mark in the margin. The writer then re-reads and decides whether to rewrite or add information to clarify meaning. Important for the partner not to make judgment statements like, “Good.” No judgments. Just question marks. pp. 139-141.

Self-evaluation of writing: smoothness (i.e., eliminating awkward expression). Writer reads paper aloud. Wherever the writer stumbles in reading aloud, he or she underlines the “stumble.” Later, the writer re-reads silently and decides whether to revise expressions that have been underlined. An additional step would be to have the partner read the composition aloud and underline the “stumbles.” pp. 139-141.

Self-evaluation of writing: spelling. Often we miss misspellings because we read for ideas, passing over the words too rapidly from left to right, and do not pay attention to the details of the words. Try reading from the last word back to the first. You will see the details of the individual words and can correct the spelling. pp. 139-141.

Teacher’s evaluation scale:
Opening paragraph (interesting introductory material) - 15 pts.
Clear thesis sentence - 15 pts.
Middle paragraphs: clear topic sentences
and fully developed - 15 pts.
Summary concluding paragraph - 15 pts.
Coherence and style: “flow,” begins to read
and is not distracted by unnecessary
repetition, dangling modifiers,
parallel structure, etc., in reading
through to the end. - 15 pts.
Grammar, spelling and mechanics - 10 pts.
100 pts.
p. 144.

Essay exams. No introductory material. Begin with the thesis sentence that re-states the question, i.e., “What were the three causes of the X War?” Rephrase and answer the question: “The three causes of the X War were economic expansion, ethnic hatred and the king’s personal ambition.” Each of the three points in the thesis sentence serves as the topic sentence of the paragraph explaining each cause of the X War. p. 141.