User:1013-josh/grading

Grading Criteria

How I Will Grade Your Wikipedia Article

The version I grade will be the version you approve when you “turn in your homework” for the final draft and stamp it with the time. Note that it doesn’t matter who contributes to that version. It could be 100% your work, or it could be 50% your work and 50% content contributed by your colleagues or by strangers on Wikipedia. You get the grade. Your grade will benefit if your colleagues help improve your paper. If they make any changes that you think will worsen your grade, you are free to revert those changes before you turn it in for a grade.

• Organization (article ordered logically, concise, avoids repetition)
• Content (quality of information, potential to contribute to the body of knowledge at Wikipedia, smart decisions about what to include and what to exclude)
• Citation (appropriate use of footnotes, outside and internal hyperlinks, quality and authority of sources)
• Wikipedia Style (formal tone, fact-based encyclopedia style, “neutral point of view”)
• Formatting (attractive presentation, a design that makes it easy to find information and read it efficiently, addition of images and other goodies as appropriate)

How I Will Grade Your Participation

You will keep a record of your contributions to your colleagues’ articles in the “Participation” section on your talk page. Be sure that this record fully and accurately reflects your work. I will also gauge your participation level from how your colleagues score you at the end of their reflective essays and from my own observation of your participation work.

• Did you make a good first effort on your rough draft?
• How helpful are you in editing your colleagues’ pages (adding content, editing for grammar and style)? Do you add to their content and help them improve their work, or do you just run roughshod over it and do it your own way? Do you make changes with kindness? How much thought and effort do you put into the process?
• How helpful are you in providing feedback and suggestions for revision in the “Workshop” section of your colleagues’ talk pages? Do you give them honest and useful guidance?
• Do you participate in discussions on my talk page? Do you ask questions and answer other people’s questions?

How I Will Grade Your Reflective Essay

Your essay should be 2 to 3 double-spaced pages, formatted as a letter addressed to me. This is not the kind of thing you write one hour before class. (Yes, I know that kind of “reflective essay.” This ain’t it.) This should be a carefully composed and revised personal essay that makes room for analysis of Wikipedia, as well as reflection on your experience with this research unit. Remember, that I am asking for a HARD COPY to my box.

Answer some of the following questions. You shouldn't try to answer all of them. Going deep into one or two questions will make for a better essay than skimming the surface of five of them. Or answer questions of your own.

• What did you learn from the Wikipedia unit?
• What does Wikipedia teach us about the way information is organized and controlled?
• What does public space mean to you?
• What does public discourse mean to you?
• Is Wikipedia a viable “public space”? Is it a viable mode of discourse?
• What are its strengths and limitations?
• What theoretical or practical problems do you see?
• What was it like to have other people monkeying around with your prose? What was it like to be monkeying around with other people’s prose?
• What do you think about current models of academic scholarship and peer review vs. the model of collaborative editing that Wikipedia provides?
• What do you think about current models of individual authorship vs. the model of collective authorship that Wikipedia provides?
• What do you think about current models of individual copyright vs. the public domain model that Wikipedia provides?

At the end of your reflective essay, please give each of your colleagues a participation score on a scale of 1 to 10. How cooperative were they in helping you revise your work? You may give no fewer than 21 and no more than 27 total points, divided among 3 colleagues. (For group 6, this would be no fewer than 14 and no more than 18 total points, divided among 2 colleagues.)

I will grade your reflective essay on the following criteria:

• Is your essay honest and thoughtful with regard to your personal experience in this unit?
• Is it insightful in its discussion of Wikipedia?
• Is it well-written (organization, prose style, grammar)?

Grading Breakdown

Your Wikipedia article score (final draft) - 50%
Your Wikipedia participation score - 25%
Your reflective essay - 25%