This week we will focus on another kind of feedback, that of giving points for messages. This type of feedback lets the student know that their attempts at communication are being reviewed and valued. It helps to motivate students to continue working and producing language, as they can see that this effort has benefits.

In the English Online class, all students are expected to get points from communicating. This means they are all eager to received points for their messages to be able to pass the class.

The past two semesters to save time and hassle, we have been giving 5 points to any post that has at least 50 words. No more and no less - only 5 points.

Your practical tasks for this week are as follows:

• Continue moderating the topics that you have started (from the last two weeks), continuing to ask questions and give language feedback where needed (2 points).
• Give points to at least 30 messages that do not have points already. If you do not know how to give points in this system, there is a guide in the links below (2 points). When you give the points, please enter the text "*5" plus your initials, so for someone named Mark Smith that would be: *5 MS. If there are not that many contributions to give points to, choose 30 messages to add some feedback to (feedback on language, contents, some encouragement, recommendations on what to focus on, mistakes, etc., written behind *5 MS - that means you have to add your initials behind *5 since I do not use mine). This rule applies to all the weeks of the semester in which you are supposed to give points to and evaluate a certain number of messages.

Below, in the file Group Assignments (below), you can see which seminar group you should focus your work on for the future. This is where you should start giving points to contributions.

 

 

If you are interested, you can look at the factors we used to give points in the past (a varying system from 1 to 20 points) in the page Evaluation, linked below.

It might feel strange to be evaluating other language learners, but try to remember that you main task to to help them get credit for work they have already done. You are helping them reach their goal of passing the class, so any help you can give will surely be appreciated.

 

 

There is also a forum this week for reflections. There you should (if you are not planning on writing a paper at the end of the semester) reflect on what you think are the most important things to consider when evaluating language in online classrooms. Last week we dealt with questions about how to respond to language when it is part of a broader communication goal. This week think about what is important when reaching a numerical evaluation of the language. This way you can gain 2 points for an initial post and further two possible points for responses to others.