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When you come in… take out the rubrics (back side of assignment sheet from Friday). Today we are going to go through your rubric together to make sure you understand our expectations and how our grading system will work.
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When you come in… take out the rubrics (back side of assignment sheet from Friday) • Today we are going to go through your rubric together to make sure you understand our expectations and how our grading system will work.
Title: does the title creatively and concisely articulate the essay’s content. Is it given in the creative: descriptive format? (ex: Down to Earth: A History of the American Environment) • Essay • In-class Essay • The Puritans • The Puritan Dilemma: The Story of John Winthrop • The Big Oyster: History on the Half Shell • An Empire of Wealth: The Epic History of American Economic Power
Introduction: does the essay’s first sentence grab the reader’s attention? Does the essay’s first paragraph set up the topic and provide a logical context for the thesis statement at the end of the paragraph? • Puritans thought of God in many ways. • The Puritans believed in many things. • I once single handedly wrestled a bear into submission and then taught him how to recite the alphabet… now that I have your attention.
Thesis: Does the thesis statement clearly, concisely, and accurately address the writing prompt in a way that is specific and arguable? • Ask yourself why? Who? What? When? • These should be clearly established in your thesis. • CLEAR – don’t have bad things • Concise – sometimes a thesis can have too many words in and this will often hurt the clarity of your thesis and will make it harder to read, try to make it as short as possible and use as few words as you can to express your idea fully • Accuracy • Arguable – The Puritans liked God.
Focus and development: Are the essay’s arguments and ideas sustained and developed throughout the essay? • Watch you don’t drift • Stay on topic • Develop your ideas fully • “articulate” your idea completely – connect your specific evidence to your thesis (in your body paragraphs)
Conclusion: Does the conclusion synthesize the essay’s discussion of various texts and suggest the broader implications of the thesis? • Synthesize the essay’s discussion • Broader implications – ask yourself: who cares? • Imagine you had written this essay for fun – of what benefit would it be? Have the Puritans provided you with a good model of what you should do or should avoid doing?
Originality: Does the overall design of the project reflect intellectual daring, fearlessness, risk? • Take a risk… but a calculated risk… • What is courage? • This is! … no… this is a very poor decision!
Source Requirement: Does the paper contain at least 1 art source, and either 1 history or literature source. (serious deductions will result in failure to do this) • Note… you cannot exceed our expectations on this!
Source 1: Is the information presented and explained accurately? • Straighforward – is it accurate?
Insights into Source 1: Does the essay reveal thoughtful understanding and analysis of this source? Is there adequate contextual information to set up the argument? • Analysis of the source – have you referred to specifics within the source? • Insight – how creative were you? Did you show us the deeper level of meaning?
Topic Sentences: Does each paragraph’s topic sentence clearly state the paragraph’s main point as it relates to the thesis and provide logical transitions between paragraphs? • straightforward
Organization / Paragraphing: Does the essay have logical paragraph breaks and follow a logical order? • We don’t want to read one long paragraph… please!
Quotation Integration: Are quotations properly introduced, quoted, and analyzed? • During a murder trial a lawyer held up a gun and said… I rest my case. • You need to give context, who said it? What was said? What does it actually mean? • NO BLOCK QUOTES! Give us just a taste!
Overall Clarity: Are the ideas expressed in clear, straight-forward, concise language? • Clarity is important because if a paper does not have clarity it can sometimes by not being too clear impact how easy it is to understand what a student is saying. • Simplicity is not a bad thing! • DO NOT USE WORD’S THESAURUS!
Writing Conventions: Does the paper follow standard writing conventions of the academic essay? (Present tense for literature, third-person, no contractions, etc.) • Formal writing! • John Winthrop really stepped up to the plate.
Proofreading: Is the paper free from simple spelling, typing and formatting errors? • straightforward
MLA / Paper Requirements: Does the paper adhere to MLA formatting? Does the essay fall between the length requirement (800-1000 words (2-2 ½ pages))? • This is rather short for an essay. • Heading • Your name, our name, class name, date, title • Name #
How is my grade determined? • If you do exactly what we ask and meet every performance standard, you will receive a grade of a B (85). • Any time you exceed our expectations, you will be rewarded points, any time you do not exceed our expectations you will have points deducted. • Your grade will start at an 85 and then be adjusted according to what you gained and lost.
