Responding Online to Student Writing

Rudy: There are different ways to respond to student writing. Choosing the right technology and method for response depends on what you want to accomplish. Consider:

1. Private or personal student-instructor interaction vs. public, workshop or peer-editing approaches
2. Are you commenting to facilitate further revision on this current project or are you offering a final (summative) set of comments that reviews work on current project and possibly offers advice for future projects?
3. Is the writing project individual or collaborative? What is expected of the individual and what is expected of the group?
4. What objectives have you set for the project? Are you evaluating the process, the product, both?
5. How you will transfer files and communicate with each other? Uploading files? Posting documents online (e.g., in a blog or on a wiki)?
6. How will you keep track of revision? Make drafts available in a portfolio or public folder? Wiki revision history?
7. What software or applications you will use?
8. What file formats you will accept? What can you expect of every student? What won't you accept?

Jon: The pedagogy of commenting; best practices

Jon: An example that incorporates communication through Blackboard's discussion board, MS Word's commenting feature, and email.

Rudy: An example using a wiki and peer-review. (Experiment with Dokuwiki here.)

Rudy: Some online applications that might be useful.

• Google Docs | Zoho | Buzzword (creating and sharing documents online)
• PBwiki | WetPaint | Wikispaces (create a class or individual wiki)
• MediaFire (transfer, store and share files)
• Scribd (share documents by embedding or URL)
• Create a grading toolbar in MS Word
• Thirteen online word processors that facilitate collaboration