Guide to Commenting in this Class

Commenting Basics

This course emphasizes dialoguing with others instead of trying to learn in isolation. The commenting project requires you to read and engage blogs of other members of the class on a weekly basis.

Basic Requirements

• You must write a minimum of three comments per week.
• You ought to write a mixture of medium length comments, long comments (say 50 words plus), and short comments (say, less than 10 words). Most entries should be on the blogs of the other members of your small group.
• The comments should contribute to the ongoing dialogue of the class.

Late or Missing Comments

Late or missing comments receive no credit. Each week of comments missed costs you a little more than a full percent (1%) off your final grade.

Passes

You may "pass" on one week worth of comments, a total of three comments, without penalty.

Possible Penalties

There are several things that you can fail to do on your own blog, making it difficult for others to comment on your blog and resulting in a grade penalty for you. If you set your blog to private without inviting all of the class members to become readers, then you will face a penalty up to a full letter grade off of your final grade, to be taken out of the grade for the commenting project. If you fail to turn off “comment verification,” you will face a penalty up to half a letter grade. See: How to Set Up Your Blog.

Commenting Portfolio and Evaluation Criteria

Your commenting project will be evaluated on quantitative and qualitative aspects. A portfolio with a log will be used for assessment.

Quantitative Evaluation Criteria

In assessing your commenting, first ask:

• How many on time comments were there?

Late and missing comments receive no credit, each week worth of comments (3 comments) costing up one whole percent (1%) off the final grade. Commenting projects with no late or missing comments usually earn at least a "B-" regardless of the overall quality. The grade assigned in answer to this quantitative question serves as a base grade onto which a quality grade is added, if applicable. Typical base grades based on number of late or missing comments for the final submission:

• 0-3 late or missing typically earns a base grade of B-
• 4-9 late or missing typically earns a base grade of C
• 10-15 late or missing typically earns a base grade of D
• 16 or more late or missing typically earns a base grade of F

Qualitative Evaluation Criteria

After counting to see how many comments were made on time, ask questions about the overall quality of the commenting project, based on the reflection and the sample comments:

• Does the selection include a variety of kinds and lengths of comments?
• Do the comments in the selection take part in engaging the text at hand?
• Do the comments overall seem to take place as part of an engaged dialogue, as opposed to seeming perfunctory?
• Does the reflection show thought and understanding about role of dialogue in engaging texts?

Poor and average commenting (for which the answers to these questions are “somewhat” or “mostly”) typically keep the base grade as the final grade. Strong and excellent commenting (logs for which the answers to these questions are “yes” or “absolutely”) can earn up to a full letter grade and a half beyond the base grade.

Portfolio

The commenting project will be assessed through a commenting portfolio that you will submit at the end of the semester to demonstrate, and reflect on the work you did. Use the Commenting Portfolio Template (download .doc file here) and include:

1. Log of Comments: Include a log of all the comments you’ve made, including a breakdown of the number of comments made each week with the names of the people on whose blog the comments were left and a tally of the total number of comments. To avoid scrambling to create this log when it is time to submit it, you should keep up with this log throughout the semester. It is highly recommended that, as you make each comment, you either record it or use a free, online comment tracking tool like coComment.
2. Sample Comments: Select and provide thefull text of the best and the most representative of your comments throughout the semester. You should choose ones as you go along throughout the semester. At the mid-semester assessment, this might include about ten comments. For the final submission, it should typically include around twenty comments.
3. Self-Assessment and Reflection: Write a self-assessment addressing the qualitative evaluation criteria and a reflection on your commenting experience during the semester. 

How to Write Comments

Usually, any civil response you can think of can be appropriate as a comment. Over the course of the semester, however, you should aim to become more skillful of a commenter. You want to leave comments that positively contribute to dialogue. Depending on the situation, there are quite variety of different kinds of comments that can do this. You should aim to employ a range of kinds of comments. You should leave some long comments and some short comments, for instance. You should leave some comments that respond to the main blog entry and some that respond to other comments and some that respond to both. Below are a handful of other categories that your comments could fall in, based on what each kind of comment does, rather than how long it is or who it responds:

• Exclamation. Some comments can be very brief. For instance, no one would be insulted by a comment that says “Amen!” or “well said.” Or “I like, good job here.” Or “I had trouble with that same passage.”
• Pointing. Pointing is simply where you point to a particular phrase or sentence or move and say something to the effect of, “hey, I like how that sounds” or “that resonates with me.” Usually, when you point, you quote the item you are referring to (using cut and paste, of course). Specificity helps.
• Speaking back. You can summarize or put into your own words the point the other person is making, “What I hear you saying is . . .” This is useful for that other person.
• Applying. You can apply an idea suggested in a post to another instance.
• Elaborating. You can add to what has been said by going deeper or expanding on it.
• Connections. You can connect what has been said to your personal experience, to another literary text, or to something that someone else has said.
• Agreeing. Taking the argument further, by saying “yes, and also . . .”
• Disagreeing. You can offer an alternative view by saying, “yes, but . . .” or "maybe, but . . . "

There certainly could be more categories and one comment could certainly use more than one category within it. Thinking about the kinds of comments you leave should help you develop as a leave better comments. Clearly, you don’t want to only ever use short exclamations. But you also don't want to never leave short exclamations! You should aim for a skillful variety of comments, different kinds and different lengths, showing authentic and thoughtful engagement. This will mean that you should have a lot of longer and more sophisticated comments and a lot of short, simply and well placed comments.

Also, you can comment more than once on any given post, for instance, if you think of something else to say or if you want to respond to a comment someone left after yours. Discussions back and forth through comments are excellent for the commenting project portfolio!

Obviously, no comments should be disparaging. Disagreements should be dealt with positively and constructively. Beyond what is obvious, however, it is imperative to be encouraging. Encouragement comes both from using encouraging language and from engaging the posts in specific and meaningful ways.

 

"The Guide to Commenting in this Class" byPaul T. Corrigan is licensed under a 

Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 United States License. Updated 13 August 2010.