Self-Evaluation Form
Note: A completed self-evaluation form must be turned in with your final draft of every essay.
READ THIS FIRST:
Self-Evaluation of Essays: A Brief Guide to Evaluating Your Own Writing
By Richard Nordquist
You’re probably used to having your writing evaluated by teachers. The odd abbreviations (“AGR,” “REF,” “AWK!”), the comments in the margins, the grade at the end of the paper – these are all methods used by instructors to identify what they see as the strengths and weaknesses of your work. Such evaluations can be helpful, but they’re no substitute for a thoughtful self-evaluation.
As the writer, you can evaluate the whole process of composing a paper, from coming up with a topic to editing the final draft. Your instructor, on the other hand, often can evaluate only the final product.
A good self-evaluation is neither a defense nor an apology. Rather, it’s a way of becoming more aware of what you go through when you write and of what troubles (if any) that you regularly run into. Writing a brief self-evaluation each time you have completed a writing project should make you more aware of your strengths as a writer and help you see more clearly what skills you need to work on.
Finally, if you decide to share your self-evaluations with a writing instructor or tutor, your comments can guide your teachers as well. By seeing where you are having problems, they may be able to offer more helpful advice when they come to evaluate your work.
So after you finish your next composition, try writing a concise self-evaluation.
Author: In order to help your instructor evaluate this essay, you should be as specific as possible in answering the following questions.
- Without looking at the assignment sheet, paraphrase the assignment for this essay.
- What is the thesis (main idea) of your essay? What are you trying to say in this essay?
- What part of writing this essay took the most time? What did you have the most trouble with?
- What are the strengths of your essay? What do you like best about your essay?
- What are the weaknesses of your essay? What do you like least about your essay? What part of this essay could still be improved?
- How much time did you spend on this essay?
- Free-write for a few minutes (at least 75 words) about the process of writing this essay and how you feel that it turned out. Was it easy to write or difficult to write? How did you find the revision process? What changes did you make during revision? Are you overall pleased with the results?
- What grade do you deserve on this essay? Justify it.
Sources:
Richard Nordquist – http://grammar.about.com/od/developingessays/a/selfeval.htm
Christine Alfano – http://www.stanford.edu/~steener/PWR/sp02/forms/sev1.htm
Tori Haring-Smith. Brown University – http://library.cn.edu/wacn/WACforFAC/Ex3_SelfEval.pdf
http://pegasus.cc.ucf.edu/~uwc/Faculty_Resources/fac_assessing_writing_pages/fac_questions_student_evaluation.htm
Cooper & Odell. Evaluating Writing, Urbana, IL: NCTE, 1977. 143
Brooks Educationhttp://brooks-education.com/blog/?page_id=224
