This document discusses the process of evaluating writing. It outlines several key steps: assessing drafts using evaluation criteria, becoming your own critic by applying criteria to your own work, responding to writing as a reader rather than evaluator, and conferencing between teachers and students. Student self-evaluation is important, and teachers should emphasize the positive in their feedback and responses. Evaluating other students' work and receiving feedback helps build self-assessment skills. The goal of evaluation is to continue improving drafts through an interactive process.

1. Process Writing:
EVALUATING
By Ron White and Valerie Arndt
Delivered by: Professor:
Zaina Dali Ayad Chraa

2. “
“They (students) have to be their
own evaluators, for without a
sense of what is wrong with a text,
there is little hope of being able to
put it right”

4. Outline
◈ Assessing the Draft
◈ Developing criteria for evaluation
◈ Becoming your own critic
◈ Responding
◈ Teacher to student
◈ Teacher to class
◈ Student to student
◈ Conferencing
◈ Continuing and improving the draft
◈ Responding to student self-evaluation

5. I. Assessing The Draft
◈ Students’ writing is read and assessed only by the teacher.
◈ When students’ writing is read by many people, it encourages
them to make more efforts and enhances their capacity for self-
assessment.
◈ Self-assessment is built by evaluating others’ work and
responding to evaluation of their own.

6. Developing Criteria for Evaluation
◈Cognitive approach: writing is a problem-solving activity
◈Misconception about being critical
◈Coherence over grammatical structure
Asking the right questions to asses the coherence of the
text.
◈The use of checklists

7. Becoming Your Own Critic
◈ In this stage, students apply the evaluation criteria to their
own and others’ work.
Materials:
◈Copies of the students’ draft texts
◈Handouts of evaluation checklists

8. Procedure
◈Putting students into groups
◈Make students read their own drafts critically, then exchange
them with the rest of the group
◈Suggestions and feedback
Listening to recorded drafts

9. II. Responding
◈ Responding to a text as a reader rather than a marker
◈Emphasizing the positive over the negative
◈Students should respond to each other’s work
◈Publishing students’ work can be motivating

10. Teacher to Student
◈The teacher/reader reads the text and notes down his/her
responses (these can be used for redrafting or individual
conferencing with each student alone)

11. Notes of Frank Diffley and Ronald Lapp (1988) on written
feedback:
1. Respond in pencil or black ink. Red pens can be threatening.
2.Write comments and notes in the margins and avoid
comments which correct spelling, grammar and mechanics.
3. All comments should be specific and content-related. Avoid
comments which can apply to any text.
4. Reread your responses and ask yourself if they make sense.
5. Ask students for feedback on the responses given to them.
6. Respond as a genuine and interested reader rather than as a
judge and evaluator

12. Teacher to Class
◈ Sometimes the work of one or two students is dealt with
publicly
◈ Advantages: time efficient, and some students enjoy having
their work read publicly
◈Disadvantages: Some students may feel left out or less
competent

13. Procedure
◈Example:
Students are given the topic of “Cats as domestic animals”, and
they are asked to focus on organizing an argument
◈ When responding, the teacher uses the original version or a
corrected one in terms of grammatical and mechanical errors
◈The advantage of using a corrected version is that students will
direct their attention to the content rather than surface errors

14. Student to Student
◈How we respond to others’ texts as readers
◈Procedure:
1. Put students into groups and have them read each others’
drafts and make notes about:
◈ What they liked or enjoyed
◈ What they disliked or found unnecessary
◈ What they found unclear
◈ What they would have liked to know more about
Finally, they should summarize their partner’s text

15. Procedure
2. At this phase, students should return their drafts to each
other and discuss the summary and the points they have
noted down starting with the good ones with the goal of
improving their texts
Activity: Write a paragraph about who you think is more
powerful, vampires or werewolves.

16. III. Conferencing
◈ A procedure in which the teacher and the writer work together
on the text the writer wrote with the goal of identifying the
writer’s intentions, purpose, and meanings.
◈ Can be done during or post composition
◈Individualized attention
◈Interactional/ two-way discussion

17. Continuing and Improving the Draft
◈ Conferencing depends on the nature of the relationship
between the student and the teacher.

18. Technics of conferencing from Donald Graves (1983):
Basic questions for teacher/student conferencing:
Before Writing:
1. What are you going to
write about?
2. How are you going to
put that down on paper?
3. How did you choose
your topic?
4. What problems might
you run into?
While writing
1. How is it going?
2. What are you writing about now?
3. Where are you now in your draft?
4. I noticed that you changed youur
lead. Is it much more direct. How
did you do that?
5. How would you go about putting
new information?
6. How do you go about figuring
what to do when you don’t know
how to spell a word?
7. What strategy do you use to
fugure out where one sentence
ends and the other begins?
8. What will you do with this piece of
writing once it is all done?
After writing:
1. How did you go about
this?
2. Did you make any
changes?
3. What are you going to
do next with this piece
of writing?
4. What do you think of
this piece of writing?

19. Suggestions by Donald Graves:
◈The teacher should sit next to the student not opposite
her/him

20. ◈It is good to pause for fifteen seconds between question and
answer
◈ It is better for both the teacher and the writer to read the text
before the conference

21. Responding to Student Self-evaluation
◈ Maggie Charles (1988):
◈Students should point out where they need help and write their
comments in a column alongside the text.
◈Students should be trained to increase the quality of their self-
evaluation

22. Scheme suggested by Norman Coe (1989)
◈Students can be independent by telling the teacher what kind
of help they want
◈Students can use the following codes:
R
CM
IM
IMAC
WOU

23. CONCLUSION
“It is essential that the language be understood
and the reasoning well-maintained”

24. References
◈White, R. and Arndt, V. (1991) Process Writing.
Essex: Addison Wesley Longman Ltd.

25. Thanks!
Any questions?
You can contact me at: zainadali8@gmail.com