Faculty and instructors tend to be divided over the use of rubrics and scoring sheets to assess writing. Some instructors appreciate the sense of consistency that rubrics provide and how they simplify grading. Others find scoring rubrics artificial and confining, and worry that splitting hairs between categories increases assessment challenges. In this blog post, we’ll look at the question of scoring rubrics from the perspective of student performance and recent research on how scoring rubrics can help students learn.

One month into the Fall Semester with a round of exams, essay cycles, lab reports, problem sets and other core assignments completed, students may be experiencing fatigue and dips in their engagement. Whether you teach in person, a blended course, or fully online, the discussion forum available through Canvas can be an effective space to (re)engage students in their learning and to support them as they transition into new units of study. This post offers five suggestions for how to use the online discussion forums effectively.

We’ve completed the first week of classes, and campus is vibrant once more. Amidst the bustle of finding classrooms, following safe indoor practices, securing course materials, and navigating the various Canvas sites for their courses, students are apt to feel excited and nervous.

Faculty members and instructors have learned that moving from face-to-face classes to online and hybrid instruction requires careful consideration of how we communicate information and expectations to our students. Meeting students’ needs and building community requires that we present materials in ways that are clear, concrete, and easy to navigate. 

Previous tips and workshops have addressed the importance of formative feedback for student writers, those comments aimed toward generating revision when a student still has time to revise their work. In this tip, we will focus on two types of informal writing that can help students turn formative feedback into effective revision. Revision plans are beneficial for students who have less experience revising the kind of writing they have produced, while revision memos are more useful for more experienced writers.

As we enter the final weeks of the semester and approach the Thanksgiving Break, after which all classes at the University of Minnesota will be fully remote, the need to maintain supportive communication and instructional presence is vital. For many students, end-of-the-term, often high-stakes writing assignments may generate questions and concerns that are intensified in a remote learning environment and differences in time zones.

Educational research strongly underscores the interdependence of reading and writing and the social nature of literacy.

As the risks associated with COVID-19 become clearer, the University of Minnesota has announced that all course work will move to online venues starting on March 18, 2020 and extending to at least April 1, 2020. General resources on the transition to online teaching are available through UMN’s Keep Teaching Website.

This tip suggests informal writing activities to assist with a vexing challenge for instructors: How can instructors promote engagement with course reading, viewing, and listening materials through writing?

Establish context for reading, viewing, and listening assignments

Unfortunately, the direction to “read Chapter 10” or “watch the linked Ted Talk” may not be enough to promote careful reading, viewing, and listening. Students are more likely to be engaged when they investigate and establish the context of reading and viewing activity.

Many writing prompts begin with a question or two, often framed with context from the course. Here are two examples, one from an Introduction to Ecology course, the other from a Studies in Short Fiction class: