Assignments: Contributions to In-Class Discussions

Deliverable

Verbal comments and questions given during class-wide discussions.

Due Date

Each class meeting.

The purpose of this assignment is to incentivize you to

• Engage in civil and productive oral intellectual discourse.
• Respond to and build upon classmates’ ideas in realtime.
• Build trust and respect among members of your discourse community.
• Contextualize readings relative to the course’s overarching themes.
• Articulate arguments about what the text is doing or meaning, and support them with evidence.

Instructions

1. Listen to the contributions offered by the instructor and classmates.
2. When something strikes your attention or sparks an idea, raise your hand to offer a comment or ask a question.
3. After being recognized to speak, frame your contribution in the context of previous speaker(s) as possible (e.g. “In response to what Avery said...,” “I respectfully disagree with Philip’s point, because...”).
4. State your comment or ask your question.

Assessment Notification Timing and Criteria

At the mid-point of the semester, I will record a Contributions to In-Class Discussion grade that counts for 0% of your final grade. This will let you know how you’re doing and incentivize you to either keep up the good work, or improve as needed.

After the last class meeting, I will assess your contributions throughout the whole semester and indicate the corresponding grade in Canvas.

I will assess your contributions according to the following rubric:

A
The student has contributed multiple times during each class meeting. These contributions are relational: they relate the student’s arguments and observations to other students’ remarks, and/or to other conversations, texts, and themes of the course. Questions prompt other students to respond and refine each others’ ideas. They demonstrate attentive and respectful listening, and a thorough command of the readings.

B
The student has contributed at least once per class meeting. These contributions articulate arguments based on textual evidence, and familiarity with the reading, though they may be less likely to advance the conversation or inspire other students’ questions and comments.

C
The student has contributed roughly once every two class meetings. While comments are occasionally constructive, they may frequently be left unsupported by textual evidence, be left unconnected to the current topic of conversation, or may be ignorant of what has already been said in class.

D
Does not contribute to in-class discussions.

F
Disrupts in-class discussions.

Special Notes

In-class discussion is the heart of a literature course, and that’s why I emphasize it so heavily here. If the thought of speaking in class causes you anxiety, contact me and we can identify another way for you to contribute to class conversations. This would likely take the form of a brief written comment or question submitted before the start of each class meeting.