Grammar and punctuation
What is a good strategy to encourage a student's proper use of grammar and punctuation in the forum setting? I have been trying to give effective feedback in my responses, but the bad habits continue. Docking points does not seem to have much of an effect on their performance either. Any comments would be appreciated.
If you haven't been able to get the message across with feedback on the postings nor deducting points, I would attempt to contact the student by phone. Explaining what you are looking for in the postings in person might be helpful. Does anyone else have other suggestions?
How about posting a well written paper that demonstrates goog grammar use etc. Point out the aspects of the paper that make it good so that students will know what your expectations are.
That is an interesting idea Stephanie. Have you tried something similar in one of your online classes?
Dear Dr. Ernst:
One way you can get across that grammar is important is creating a rubric and allowing the students to see the rubric. If you include grammar as one of the elements that they will lose points on, then they will realize that it is important. Or, if you have chats with your students, you may want to use some "real" world examples. One example could be a resume and/or a cover letter. Ask them, if it is ok to use bad grammar or slang on either of these two documents. Most students will tell you no. They "might" see the connection at that point.
Elaine Swallow
Great examples Elaine. Creating a rubric and sharing it with students when you give the assignment is a great way to communicate to students your expectations. The suggestion of providing real world examples is another good idea. I also emphasize to students that they need to write like they would on the job and that it is important that their writing is always professional.
Hello,
One of the strategies that I use is provide students with two identical papers, once with grammatical errors and one that has been corrected. I use items that students typically error on, like using first person, passive voice, comma usage, improper semi-colon usage, ending sentences with prepositions. I am an accounting instructor and I explain to my students that even though this is not an English class the more their writing skills improve, they will also become better public speakers. I can speak from experience on this. I was a horrible writer until I completed my MBA, and not only did I begin to write better, but I also spoke better. I encourage students to also read their papers backwards. Take one sentence at a time and start from the end. This way they are not focused on content, rather the mechanics of their writing. I tend to get involved more and more with a student if I do not see an improvement with each writing they submit. In many cases students do not read their feedback if they are content with their grade, however, they do read their email, and I send a message and expect a response. Unless you have a student who truly does not care, you will see an improvement. I ask questions that require them to answer me back.
Hope these help.
Matthew Fowler
Those are terrific suggestions. I very strongly agree with your philosophy about every instructor, regardless of subject matter, needing to help students improve their writing. As you point out based on your experience in yoru MBA program, writing is a skill that needs to be continually developed and we are providing our students a wonderful learning opportunity by providing clear feedback to help them improve their writing. Thanks for your very helpful response Matthew.
Thank you all very much! I read through the suggestions and worked with our Student Success Coordinator to make a rubric not just for my online classes but also our brick-and-mortar students!
In addition, Pinnacle Career Institute-Lawrence started a Friday tutoring session that is open to all students (online & B/M) that includes free tutoring help in Sentence Structure, Writing, Grammar usage, and basic Student Success strategies along with tutoring in our medical-specific courses! So far, turnout has been great and I've even had a few of my online students show up for help!
I enjoyed your ideas and put them to good use! I'm sure that I will still have those student that don't want to put the effort in, but hopefully they will be fewer now. I'm going to 'raise the bar' of expectation for writing and make sure that we are all working from the same source (rubric).
Thanks again!
Wendy
I am so glad you have been able to put some of the suggestions to work Wendy! Thanks for sharing.
The best way to get them to use proper grammar and punctuation is by posting examples of what their posts should look like. You can do examples of the correct and incorrect ways to post and provide why each is correct or incorrect. There are also examples of "proper netiquette" such as articles you can post to give them a go by.
Terrific idea Heather! Sometimes the best way to "show" a student how to do something is to "show" the right way along with the wrong way. Thanks for sharing your idea with the group.
Regarding both grammar and particularly punctuation (I am a semi-colon *nut*), for one of the on-line essay projects--critical essay of a short story--I posted the story (2 pages)on a separate whiteboard and used different colors, underlining, bold face, etc to show pertinent and applicable points while reading the story and *instructing* those points at the same time. It was the closest application to an on-ground classroom that I could think of.
I know that some of my colleagues mentioned this already, but it is important to make students aware of any tutoring and writing lab assistance that they can access online.
Online/distance learning draws a lot of non-traditional students, so the disparity in skill levels can be great in a classroom--not to mention we might have some students who haven't written any type of paper in years.
So, yes, I agree--make them aware of the assistance they can get since some students might not even be capable of writing clean assignments (no matter what the rubric says their loss of points will be).
Best,
Mica
That is a great idea Mark. Thanks for sharing it with the group.
Matthew,
Thanks for sharing that idea. I am going to do that this next session. I am teaching the first courses that students coming in take and too many of them have very bad writing skills. Some of them I think really don't know. They were raised saying, "It be that way" and they don't see any problem with it. Sometimes my feedback is longer than their paper.
I'm not an English person and I have to look things up myself. But every time I do I get better and continue to improve.
Dera Burt
Slang and/or regional phrases can create problems when students go to write a paper. There are also the issues with phrases and punctuation that is used during texting that some students try to utilize in group discussions.
Providing direct feedback to the students is very important. It does take a great deal of time, but if a student doesn't realize they are doing it wrong, they won't try and correct it.
Thanks for your comments Dera.
I teach law based courses, so the most effective way I have found to resolve this issue is to use a real world scenario to show students the consequences of not proofing their work.
That is terrific! Anytime you can relate classroom learning to a real life example is very effective.
I really liked the suggestions of using real-life scenarios as examples of proper use of grammar and punctuation. I am finding that students are using "text" spelling and wordage which would not be appropriate in a professional setting; yet they don't seem aware of the fact that it's not appropriate!
We do use a rubric, which lists grammar, punctuation, and spelling, as criteria for the grade, but as someone mentioned earlier, the students who make the errors don't know how to do it correctly in the first place. Maybe understanding that it's all about accurate COMMUNICATION will get the point across!
