Advice from faculty: Handling Conferences (2008)
from November 19, 2008, faculty meeting
==> Instructors generally meet with each student three or four times during the quarter to discuss his or her writing.
==> Conferences don’t have to be long in order to be useful. Ellen Wright sometimes meets with students for 10 or 12 minutes, just to help them decide what to work on next in their papers. Penny Hirsch schedules conferences that are 15, 20, or 30 minutes long, depending on the paper assignment.
==> Some instructors cancel a class around the time that they will be holding the conferences. Ellen cancels one class hour; this helps accommodate students who have little time outside of the class period in which to meet. She also notes that holding conferences makes grading faster. You don’t have to write lengthy remarks on the papers if you know you’re going to be able to give full explanations of the problems to the students in person.
==> Many people ask students to prepare something specific for the conference. Bob Gundlach asks students to bring two peer reviews of an initial draft, a paragraph-by-paragraph “x-ray” outline derived from the initial draft, and notes on plans for revision. Jeanne Herrick gives students several questions to answer (in writing) for the conference, in addition to a peer review if they have one.
==> Instead of writing extensive comments on students’ papers, Penny makes a list of topics she wants to discuss with the student during the conference. She—or the student—makes more specific notes during the conference itself.
==> Jeanne sometimes suggest that students follow a conference with a trip to the Writing Place so that they can continue to get help with – or another perspective on -- an issue.
==> It’s helpful at the end of the conference to make sure the student knows what she or he is expected to do next—what areas s/he is going to work on, whether s/he is going to submit another draft, when (and how) the paper is due.
How to help students become better readers
==> Asking students to submit summaries of an assigned reading when class is due. One instructor took a class in which the professor required 150 word summaries and strictly adhered to the word limit. This not only helped students with the reading but also with writing concisely.
==> Asking students to identify what point the writer is making, how the writer makes his/her point, and whether the argument is convincing.
==> Asking students to bring a short written response to the reading and then reading those aloud at the beginning of the class. These are ungraded, unless someone fails to do one. Reading them aloud helps students distinguish a good response from a poor one and also stimulates the discussion.
==> Having students write a blog entry on the reading. Blogs can be added to any Course Management site.
==> Asking students to summarize the reading and then identify the gaps. When these are read aloud, students feel really good about finding that they have identified some of the same gaps as their peers did.
==> Taking a whole class period to read through a difficult reading with the class. This can show them that more is expected of them in reading as they become more advanced in a subject.
