Category: the Rant Board
Okay, so I currently take a college writing class as a high school senior. My teacher gave us this paper to revise. It was written by a student from one of the local community colleges. It has got to be the absolute worse piece of writing I have ever seen! Almost any rule that can be broken in writing is broken in the paper. And it was their final draft! As a writer, this is an absolute nightmare to me. This person has to be foreign or have a mental impairment.
Take a look for yourself.
The Virginia colony was not allowed to make their decided about what they land law and living law would be for the self they did not have the right to vote in the colony. They were pointed and govern by the board of London. They did not vote. They work as hired help for company. The company rewards them the way they wanted to and rewards them with what they wanted to. They did fight for they religious right.
Massachusetts Colony was different they would be able to vote on who would be govern of their colony. Then down the road years later they took their right and point a power of appoint and dismiss. They cannot every have meeting a discuses in town about business without govern consent. They can have one meeting without permission is the annual meeting. They all had the same belief in religious and wealth.
Virginia Colony social was to convert everyone in Christian by one man who found the desired to gain the wealth of the colony. It was a few men were fighting to gain them owed religious and trying to keep the wealth in the colony.
Massachusetts Colony was different they was all convert into one religious. They was able to have a lot of colony to follow them and got them to convert over into the religious and give up they wealth and live like them on they colony, as one big family in the one colony.
Virginia Colony was more as a colony they did not have to much to say about what they wanted as a law, as the way they live, are as they way they would get pay for they work. Massachusetts Colony was more like the colony that was running everything. Colony that a lot of colony was happy to be a part of they did have some kind of say so and a lot of colony wanted want they have and was easy to convert into the living with the promises of have a better life. They took the power form them because they was lack of knowledge and the lack of education. They all thought they were making good discuss. In all the way of laws and having right they give the Massachusetts colony.
I know I am not a teacher, and never will be, but just out of curiosity, how would you guys help this student? What would you do with this paper?
The sad thing is that the law requires schools to have a certain graduation rate, or else, they lose funding. It's all about money instead of education. Then there's the no-child-left-behind law here where every child must progress to the next grade, regardless of the markings they receive, if I'm not mistaken. So this law is actually leaving children behind.
How could the writer of this paper still have this problem? Is it the teacher's fault or maybe the student's refusal to learn? I'm sure this is not the only person to write like this, after all, my teacher says that she's received papers like this. But I'm totally calling bullshit on this one! What do you guys think?
It's terrible what lousy students colleges except. I have a friend with a son in elementary school, and the teacher regularly emails parents with updates on class activities, the progress of kids in the class, etc. My friend says that this teacher's spelling and grammar is horrible. So if people like this are today's teachers, what else can we expect from students.
Is proofreading and using the spelling and grammar checker really that difficult?
And youre right. The person may have graduated, but whow they got into college is beyond me. They probably did some dirty little deeds for some folks. If they haven't got brains, you'd hope they were at least very good-looking.
And like I said before, you'd hope this person was foreign and is not as good with English as they believe they are. If not, they need some serious help.
Normally, As someone who graduated with a 4.0 gpa, who was on the dean's list, the honor role etc. and as one who enjoys speaking, I'd try to help the student and would do whatever I could to insure that I was being understood as a teacher. All that said, if I were to receive a paper like this, I'd rip it up and either start shouting or simply stare open-mouthed at the complete ignorance and stupidity that it demonstrated. Even foreigners, if they're in a college setting, should never be expected to write like that. They're not children and, since they've made it to this level, they're clearly not illiterate. This especially holds true for native English speakers. I've never in my life agreed with teachers ripping up papers until now.
In college, one of my best friends was always asking for my help on her papers. I didn't mind so much, but what bothered me, was the fact that she has a learning disability, maybe dyslexia, and she never informed our disabilities office about this. I told her that it might help her, cause then she could possibly have gotten extra time on tests, or extra help. I also encouraged her to visit the campus writing center-neither of which she did. I read a couple of grants for an allocation panel recently, and they came from the same agency she works for, but not her program. I'm not sure, but she may have written them. Either way, they were horrible grants, with typos and crappy wording, nevermind the financial stuff. I'm not allowed to say anything about the grants to the agencies at this point. But I'll write the panel review for one of the programs, and I'm gonna have to bring up the crappy grant writing. If I can vent, the thing that bothers me most, is my friend seems to have a chip on her shoulder, cause one of her elementary school teachers called her retarded. Of course, this is horrible, and it must have been a very difficult issue to deal with. But, she is a grown woman, and not retarded. I wish she would get some more advanced help with her writing. I read her papers, and they just don't really make sense. I've brought up this problem with her, but she gets kind of defensive, and I think she is ashamed of her disability. I can understand this in a sense, as learning disabilities are more hidden, and therefore probably more difficult to address in many ways. Sorry if this was off topic, I just wanted to explain my dilemma, cause reading this thread brought back some hairy college paper-reading and writing sessions with my friend.
Hmmm, Essence, I had to laugh a little at this, as it looks like the kind of writing I see every day here on the Zone. Using a spell-checker, and simply proof-reading one's writings really should not be difficult, but I swear some people think it's the inconvenience of their lives to do that.
BTW, I'm moving this one to the rant board. I debated between that and cram session, but this is a very valid rant to me. Smile.
Bad spelling and grammar are more valid on a chat site than in an academic paper though. I am not saying it is, cool, but I think one is more free to use bad grammar and not be so precise about their spelling when they are writing to a live chat. The complete opposite, of course, holds true for a college, or even high school, paper.
All foreigners that want to get into a U.S. college need to take the TOEFL (Test of English as a Foreign Language), it is not nrealy on difficulty level with the SATs for instance, but one that scores sufficiently high on that exam would know English better than this paper indicates.
And the problem isn't just the grammar and the spelling, there is no coherent thought or argument or point to the paper, it is not constructed to convey a thought or message or facts and it has no logical flow.
Perhaps you were given that paper on purpose so that you had the experience of reading and commenting on something as bad as it?
Ben, that was my thought as well.
I have to agree. surely, this can't be a real essay. And how can any agency employ someone whose job it is to write things like grants when their writing skills are not up to par? do they honestly think that someone in a position to aid them monitarily would do so after seeing a grant written like that?
Is that a joke? What horrible writing skills! Must be an E S L student...but that should still not be allowed.
Actually wildebrew, I can draw several things from this essay. It's a comparison essay between the colonies of Virginia and Massachusetts. From their conclusion, I think the point of the paper was to argue that the Colony of Massachusetts had more rights than the Colony of Virginia. They have some good supporting information, but they could elaborate more on some details.
These things are hard to figure out though, especially when there's no introduction paragraph and the sentences, if you'd like to call them that, barely make any sense at all.
I had to evaluate and revise this paper to make sense, but only with what was there, so I wrote no intro. I had to rate this paper on things like organization, focus, sentence-style, vocabulary, elaboration, and four other categories. The rating scale was from four to zero, four being the best. I gave them two fours on focus and supporting information. I only gave them a zero on conventions, which is sentence formation, spelling, punctuation, and so on. Overall, I gave this person a total of nineteen out of 36, which is 52.78%: an F.
Goes to show the whole thing people point out on here about being blind and not being able to write or spell is ... as I have said before ... all rot.
See, this person was sighted and wrote like this, probably because that's expected at least in some parts of the country. However, that probably depends on the school system, as my daughter's teachers are really tough. So tough that even when we parents assist in the project, she sends back reproofs beyond what we used to see.
Dunno, but there must be a gap somewhere, some school systems really on the ball with this stuff, others not.
lol I wish I could get some grammar worksheets from her. It's nice to see that there are some good teachers out there, but I also think that even this can be taken to an extreme.
This reminds me of American Idol, where they only show you the really good and the really bad auditions on TV, probably for publicity, but also to bring out the best in the good ones, probably. I only found this out recently when I auditioned for Canadian Idol, and saw a little behind the scenes. They don't show any of the tallent in the middle.
Sorry. Off topic, I know, but it does relate in a way to the paper you were shown. It wouldn't be as interesting to work with if they showed you an average paper, would it.
One of my high school English teachers honestly struggled with spelling. Students would often correct his mistakes. there were even some really simple spelling errors on the final exam. It's not just college students.
There's a difference between little mistakes here and there, but something like this paper is another circumstance. I do understand where you're coming from though I too have seen spelling errors on assignments often enough to ask myself if these teachers run their work through a spelling and grammar checker. Of course, like this student probably did, teachers fix up things at the last minute. Not all but most.
And let me tell you, sometimes, people will spell things wrong and honestly believe it is correct. I don't know why, but I often mix up the words rough and roof. I remember I wrote rough in a paper where I meant to write roof, but because I know I was supposed to write roof and was convinced that I did, I saw that word every time I was actually reading rough. Luckily, I had someone else read my paper before I turned it in.
And grading an average paper would have been just as interesting to me because I often only look at my writing, which is well above average. Evaluating and grading this paper made me want to bang my head on a wall, perhaps an average paper would only have made me puncture my palms with my fingernails.
I want to point out to you guys that this paper looks like someone took all their notes that they gathered on the subject and combined but did not edit them. Anyone else think this looks something like that?
Yes, now that you mention it, that is how it seems. *smile* Glad I'm not the only one who felt that way after reading this. I'd b ashamed to turn in anything like this, even in greek, wherein I don't have a full grasp of the language. I'd still ask for help or at least try to make sense and to spell things correctly. Also agreed about minor errors. They're understandable.
Wow, you were entirely too nice in grading the paper. Was there any way you could contact the student? If so, you could have asked them what they wanted to say. The reason I say that is because I see no way to edit that paper without compromising its integrity. The integrity would be, in this case, the crappy writing, and cleaning it up too much might have made the teacher think it was plagiarized.
Yeah, I was. During class today, the class compared evaluations, and I was quite generous. Of course, I did not give this student a passing grade.
I did have to correct the paper and turn it in. The corrected version makes much more sense as you would imagine, but there's still a lack of supporting information, and details in general.
And no, I have no way of contacting the student. I don't want to contact this person anyway. If this is how they write, how proficient is their speech? And, I'd have too many bad things to say to this person, and I've never even met them.
In a comp2 course, I had to grade someone's paper (I know, what a task!) Well it was horrible and I gave the student an F. I felt bad but I was trying to help her...it was the worst paper!
Yes, minor errors on a minor asignment are nothing to scream too loudly about, but I have to agree. I think the person who wrote that paper just free-wrote the whole thing, and didn't bother to edit when they finished. It does make sense. there's just no flow whatsoever, not something that would keep me thinking after I'd finished reading, and that's what a really good paper should do.
Yeah, this is the kind of stuff that decreases a person's IQ.
And I have to tell you, giving a person an F is not what will help them. People who write terribly need writing and grammar tutors. Or maybe they just shouldn't be allowed into the English department.
Yeah, if a person has trouble with writing or has a learning disability or something, they should get tutoring, which is easier said than done, especially if people in your environment aren't supportive. Been there, done that, which is why I suck at math. But if the person was just being lazy and throwing their notes together, that's unacceptable. And maybe giving them an F now won't be a punishment, but if they fail out of their college course there certainly will be hell to pay.
It's one thing to be careless in high school, but to not give a shit in college? That's quite a price whether it is money out of pocket or scholarship money. If it's scholarship money, it's a total waste on the people who think they can just take the class over, no big deal. Someone more productive and task-oriented would be more deserving of the scholarship.
Well sounds harsh but something like a paper can be broken down like this:
Spelling--today, with spell checking software, I see no reason for so much poor spelling--
Grammar--if you make a few errors, no big deal, but let's be reasonable!
Flowing paragraphs--at least try. Get tutoring but that only gets you so far--
Damn, I wonder how the hell that person got into college! That paper sucks! They should get some kinda tutoring or somethin...
And that was a little too nice to give that person two 4s.
I know my English teacher in college never would have been that generous. Lol.
Well, I just scored the paper according to the criteria on the rubric. After all, they did stay on topic and provide supporting details of their argument, so if there was anything to give them credit for, there's that. If I was this person's professor, I honestly don't know what I would have done. Though I would like to say I would give this person a zero, I probably would do the same thing I've done. I thought I would give them a zero in the first place, or just all ones and that one zero I gave them, but giving the paper all zeros would not have been very honest, especially since the zero score for style-vocabulary said: blank response or off-topic. If I put the rubric up here, you guys would know why I didn't give them all zeros.
Ones or twos probably could've worked, maybe a three if that. as for supporting details, they didn't site any sources even in sentences (According to...) let alone in parenthetical documentation etc. Granted, this could've been an assignment where that wasn't required but it's still something to consider.
I agree with you on that one. Yes, they provided supporting information, but no internal citations or a works cited page whatsoever. That's most definitely not a good thing because readers don't know where the information was drawn from, if it's true, and then there's the case of plagiarism.
Yes, who knows where the info came from.
Sometimes, writing a paper where you are not required to cite your sources is actually more challenging, because you have to provide examples that are least likely to make the reader question the credibility of.
I actually sometimes prefer those because I am good at persuasive/argumentative writing but I see your point.
Yes, but this is not a persuasive essay, this is a comparison essay.
oh yes I agree.
I agree too, in the case of this essay. If anything, a comparrison essay should be the easiest to write without citation, because you have to know the examples to compare them.
And if you don't, then you can't write it. Simple as that.
I think whoever wrote that paper just made that very clear. Lol.
Of course, had it been more carefully thought out, it probably would have been a half decent paper.
If a person wants or is required to use citation in their essay, regardless of what type it is, they should. The problem with having no internal citations or works cited pages is that your readers will not be able to confirm that the given information is true, or at least believed or supported by others.
I agree with the rest here, this cannot be a legytimit paper.
As for your friend, she may have been ashamed of her disability, or thought she may be judged or penalised for it, but still, she should have spoken up.
In all fairness, there are times when professors had us write papers that didn't require sitations. usually, these came about when reading a chapter in the textbook, so the information was clearly taken from there. Of course, if we used other sources, though, we had to site them.
From your post it is not clear if this essay was handed to you specifically, or if it was handed out to the entire class. If it was handed out to the entire class, then I commend your teacher for conducting such an exercise. I think there are several reasons why your teacher may have chosen to hand out such a poorly written essay.
In some college writing classes, the first draft of an essay does not always count as much as a more polished draft that is submitted at the end of the semester. Your teacher could have been trying to show you the importance of the writing process illustrating the changes that are made to a piece of writing as it goes from a rough draft to a final polished draft.
Additionally, even though students may be capable of producing something better, they sometimes choose to leave things to the last minute that can result in turning in something that is basically a piece of crap. With this in mind, your teacher may have been trying to teach you the importance of taking the time to produce essays that are well written. Sometimes the only thing a student cares about is putting something together at the last minute simply for the sake of handing something into the professor.
fHow very philosophical. I never even thought of that. You could be right.
Um, Cat, if you read my posts carefully, you can tell that my teacher handed this out to the entire class, not just me. My teacher would never hand the paper to only me to teach the value of time and the writing process because as I have stated before, my writing and revision abilities are well above average.
I understand what this teacher was trying to teach through having the class evaluate this paper. I don't have a problem with her handing out something like this to show the class the importance of the writing process and taking time to develop a paper.
I wonder if this person even handed in a rough draft. Or maybe they only had one draft and this was it. A person would have to be nothing but careless in order to have the audacity to turn in such work.
You'd be surprised how many papers in high school I read in my senior year that were a lot like that. Of course, this is college, and the standards should, and are higher, but high school students should, by their senior year, be able to determine whether their paper is worth handing in or not. Personally, I think that not enough attention is given to essay writing in high school. Of course, this is only how the curriculum works where I live. It could be different for other places.
It amazes me how many students piddle away as if they don't care. They write down all this nonsense because they think they'll get to take the easy way out.
It really depends on what classes a person is taking. For example, papers aren't done in high school science classes like they are in college ones.
I myself only have two classes in which the students are assigned papers.
when my daughter was in seccond grade, this is the comment I received on the back of her report card "her name, has difficulty with math and sciance. in additionally, she has truble with communication, both orally and writtenly." when my daughter was in sixth grade, this is what I heard at parent teacher ight. "with the no child left behind law, I am graded on your child's performance in math and english. If you want your son or daughter to learn history or science, he or she will learn on your time." So since I was doing half the teacher's job anyway, I decided to home school. How can these people who spend on an average of $8,000.00 of our tax dollars a year to educatejustify these actions?
Oh yes, as a retired but not retiring home school teacher, if I'd gotten a paper like that, I'd have sat the student down and asked them to tell me in their words what they were trying to say. That way I'd have had an idea if they knew the subject. Then I'd have torn up the paper and told them they would have to take a beginning english class.
Glad you brought that up. The teachers today are simply not where they should be but it is not all thier fault. The majority of the fault lies with these boards of directors.
Holly, that sounds like a good idea. But it still leaves me wondering what the hell happened with their papers in junior high and high school?
If that was the person's final draft, I wonder what the rough one would be like. Lol.
O wow. I don't want to know.
There probably was no rough draft. That was the rough one. Hahaha.
yeah...or, how bout a final rough draft? lol.
Holly, that's horrible about your daughter's school experience and what you were told by the teacher. I've never heard of such nonsense in my life, choosing certain subjects over others etc. And you wonder why history repeats itself or why no one has a clue about it? Did they honestly write "writtenly" in the report card or was that a typo?