The good news is that once we see connections, we usually take advantage of them. This basic sequence helps students articulate and internalize writing strategies they can use again and again. Because the work of self-assessment is done primarily by students, it adds little to your workload while providing a touchstone to which you can refer with later assignments. Moreover, self-assessments give information about individual students' thinking processes that can help focus your instruction. In this issue of Writing Matters, we describe several self-assessment practices that some of our UH colleagues use to help their students make connections across writing assignments and expand their understanding of writers' strategies.
Most professors give some feedback on each student's draft text.
Some write comments in margins. Ask students to compare the kinds of feedback received from you or their peers on different assignments. At the end of a course, ask students to evaluate themselves as writers by reviewing all of their self-assessments. Students look for any patterns or recurring observations, e.g., areas of difficulty, projects that have been easy to write, strategies they have often used to solve a writing problem. Students analyze what they've learned about themselves as writers and describe how they might use what they've learned in the future.