The In-Class Essay HowTo
With AI undermining the value of at-home work, the in-class essay becomes a key assignment that achieves multiple goals. It assesses student mastery of the subject in a controlled environment, it develops planning and critical thinking skills, and it hones student writing ability.
The naturally shorter length of the in-class essay can be leveraged as an opportunity to train students in writing by sending them to the Writing Center to workshop the essays with a tutor, after the instructor provides feedback. This is already implemented in the composition sequence. The re-writing would focus on grammar and clarity, not content, so the the extra credit would be awarded conservatively, according to the following rubric, rewarding students who have to do the most work:
90 and up: +1 point
85 and up: + 2 points
80 and up: +3 points
75 and up: + 4 points
65 and up: + 5 points
50: No extra credit
Freshmen should be able to write at least 500 words and sophomores around 600 words. Juniors and Seniors can be asked for a minimum of 800 words. Many students will be approaching or exceeding 1000 words on their second experience.
In-class essays work best with the following requirements:
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have a clear prompt and instructions
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a list of allowed materials
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an outline in short sentences to be turned in with the assignment (recommended)
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the textbook or any relevant reading material (recommended for analytical essays)
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a specified number of quotes with in-text citation from course material
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formal requirements
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writing lead-in and follow-up sentences before and after quotes
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including in-text citations
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excluding the Works Cited
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a clear minimum word requirement; a maximum is not strictly needed as time is limited time and students will manage at most 1000-1200 words. Ex.:
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essays under 600 words will receive a top grade of C
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essays under 450 words will receive an F, regardless of quality.
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An AUR template module for an in-class essay can be found in the Canvas Commons and can be imported into any course.
Grading Tips
To grade an in-class essay, instructors should copy the text from Canvas to a Word file and use the highlighting, evising, and commenting feature to provide feedback. Whereas in composition instructors provide extensive and detailed feedback on grammar and style, as well as content, instructors in disciplinary courses could use a simplified method to signal which parts of the essa need to be workshopped at the Writing Center. In Word, mark the essay as follows:
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Use highlighting for words, sentences, passages, or paragraphs that need to be revised.
The tutor will do the rest. -
If inclined to provide more detailed feedback, use, in addition to highlighting,
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[awkward] for passages that have grammatical issues;
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[unclear] for passages that have coherence problems;
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Use bubble comments to provide content feedback that justifies the grade for the essay
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The Writing Center rewrite will not address content issues, except for clarity where needed.
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Upload the Word file to Canvas as an attachment to the assignment grade for the student to take to the Writing Center.
When you receive a clean copy of the reworked essay back, with an email confirmation from the tutor, glance through it to make sure changes have been made and assign the extra points as "fudge points" directly in Speed Grader.