Writing Lab and Your Grade

Lessons for each quarter

On-Screen Drafting & Self-Edit This is your first attempt at writing your piece.  Draft your prose in sentences and paragraphs.  Draft your poems in lines and stanzas.  This is what writers do.  Don't tell me you are going to make a mess and try to create order later.  Punctuate and spell as best you can while you're composing.  This is what writers do. When writing essays, you should focus your ideas, experiment with the order of your arguments (for example, chronologically or by importance).    Do not print when you are finished writing: Revise this draft on-screen.  W.PR.08.03

Peer Review Draft After you revise your first draft on-screen, print it and give it to another student to review.  Ask that student to make sure it all works together, not only plot and character, but also in word choice, structure, and style.  Do not review another student's work for conventions (grammar, capitalization, punctuation, and spelling) unless it seriously interferes with your understanding of what was written.  This draft will end up with another student's marks on it.  W.PR.08.04

Presentation Copy This is your final writing, edited after the teacher has reviewed it.  File the entire packet in your English file.  This draft will be free of marks and corrections.

Pre-Write This may be quick notes or a graphic organizer such as a web.  In these notes, you must declare your purpose, consider your audience, etc. When preparing to write a narrative, your notes or graphic should depict the rising and falling action of the plot, describe the main character, define roles of minor characters, etc.    When preparing to write an informational piece, plan whether your organization will be compare/contrast, cause/effect, or sequential.  W.PR.08.01&02

Teacher's Review Draft After your piece is reviewed by another student, you will revise it according to his or her suggestions and also your own ideas.  You will turn this draft into the teacher for review. The teacher will review it for organization, sentence structure, and word choice as well as conventions.  This draft will end up with the teacher's marks on it.  W.PR.08.05 W.GR.08.01 W.SP.08.01