COMPOSITION GRADING

Compositions, including those on exams, are graded partly on grammar and partly on style and content. On compositions for which you have time to prepare, content and style will account for about half of the grade; on short exam essays with a little less room for creativity, the ratio tends to be about 60:40.

In general, these criteria are designed to give a slight advantage to students who go ahead and try to use more difficult structures and express complex ideas as opposed to "playing it safe" with extremely simplistic writing.  You can still get a good grade if you're very careful and correct but not very creative, but to get the best possible grades, you have to combine good content with grammatical accuracy.

I use the following formula to grade grammar:

1. The approximate total word count is divided by two.

2. The number of errors is counted as follows:

- 2 pts for a major error in a punto clave (marked by the corresponding letter) or a major problem of comprehensibility (marked by ??)

- 1 pt for less important grammatical errors (circled) or a vocab problem (marked by "voc")

- 1 pt for three "picky" errors - accents which do not change word meaning, spelling, etc. (Marked either by an accent or an x, or "ort").

If you make an error in a structure you're not expected to be able to handle yet, it will be marked between [square brackets], sometimes with an explanation but more often with a page number or handout title so you can look it up yourself and try to figure it out.  No points are lost for anything marked with [square brackets].  Often these are thing that you'll study next semester, so looking up the information in the context of your own writing will help you get ahead and be extra-prepared for 312L.

 3. The final error total is divided by the result of line 1 to give the percent of errors.

Content/style- Actual point values will vary but will usually be a multiple of 3 as follows:

Level of complexity

3 pts -- mostly (75%+) compound/complex sentences, excellent variety in sentence structure

2 pts -- several (30-60%) compound/complex sentences

1 pt.-- only one or two compound/complex sentences, very little variety

 Vocabulary 3 pts -- extensive and accurate vocabulary, very little repetition of items, no more than one or two errors.  Includes appropriate vocabulary beyond what's given in the book.

2 pts -- good breadth of vocabulary, some repetition of items, more than one or two errors.  Very good use of vocabulary from the textbook.

1 pt -- simplistic, repetitive, and/or containing several errors.  Gaps even in vocabulary from the textbook.

 Coherence/cohesion 3 pts -- excellent use of linking and transitional devices, no coherence errors

2 pts -- some use of cohesive devices, 1-2 errors (non-sequiturs, tense inconsistencies, missing information)

1 pt -- little or no use of cohesive devices, multiple coherence errors

 Content/ creativity 3 pts -- creative, interesting, and elaborative

2 pts -- basic reporting, some elaboration

1 pt -- simplistic; a list of sentences rather than a composition

 Puntos clave To get the points for any particular punto clave, you must have used it often enough and in enough different contexts to show that you really do know how to handle it. In other words, if the only past tense you use is a series of repetitions of "fui," you won't get the full credit for P; you need to show that you can use preterite and imperfect appropriately with different verbs. To get the G, you must use more than the word gustar; you'll need a "fascinar" or "dar igual" or two as well.

There are 7 puntos clave, and this section will always be worth a multiple of 4 points. That means that if you effectively use all 5 of the ones we're focussing on, or if you use H or F effectively, you get "bonus" points.

 If you don't understand any of the terminology above (what's a non-sequitur, for example?) please come in during my office hours for an explanation or ask someone in the English department. These are some of the same elements that you need to write well in English.