Grading students' writing in college English: A history.

Abstract

Since the classical era of education, the evaluation of written compositions has been an important responsibility of teachers, and written compositions have had some bearing on the ranking of students within both class and institution. In the late nineteenth century, composition-teaching and the ranking of students' work merged in the freshman composition courses in this country. The merger has obscured the controversies attending composition-teaching and ranking, and has contributed to a continuing emphasis on the surface details of writing. Teachers' attitudes about ranking, overlooked by most researchers, reveal a common tendency to emphasize concern for the students' attitude about writing and concern for the student-teacher relationship, above any need or desire to rank. Together their recommendations create consistent criteria that teachers may follow and suggest that ranking does not belong in the freshman composition classroom.