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I teach courses in physics, astronomy and planetary science.

Often, but certainly not always, international students (and even some domestic students, for whom English is not their primary language), write worse than their domestic peers who have grown up with English.

For most assignments, I take up to a couple points off for negligence of spelling and grammar, depending on how bad their writing was. The point is to remind students that their writing should be professional. I never nit-pick about a typo here or there, but if there is a whole slew of them, I'll make a note and take off what would amount to be a few percentage points of the assignment's total score.

I'd like to give grace to those for whom English is not their primary language. At the same time, I need to be fair and grade equally. As it stands, I grade equally for everyone, but I try to give more feedback to those who need it.

Does anyone have any better ideas about how to do this?

jvriesem
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    Should the a in I take a up to a couple points off be "an"? Should I downvote this question because of this minor thing? No, I would never do that. – Nobody Sep 22 '15 at 03:08
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    @scaaahu Actually, it should be "take up to a couple of points off" (not "take an up to a couple points off")... but, good point :) – ff524 Sep 22 '15 at 03:14
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    Can you clarify which discipline you are talking about? From your profile it seems like you're in physics, in which case I would say you should be grading the work primarily for its scientific accuracy and its ability to put the point across in an easily understandable way (which correlates with, but does not equate with, grammatical correctness and proper spelling) and much less for other things. For other disciplines the answer would be very different. – Dan Romik Sep 22 '15 at 04:32
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    "how badly the writing was"? People who live in glass houses... – David Gelhar Sep 22 '15 at 05:08
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    It's like a comma shotgun went off in our living room. – L0j1k Sep 22 '15 at 06:03
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    Related:http://academia.stackexchange.com/q/19756/8494 -- http://academia.stackexchange.com/q/44260/8494 (in fact this second question is arguably a duplicate). – Chris H Sep 22 '15 at 08:26
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    A few years ago I was in a position where I had to grade programming assignments that also contained documentation in German or English (the students could choose). When there were grammar mistakes that hurt my eyes (e.g. das-dass in German) I marked them. I only withdrew points when it was not clear anymore what the sentence meant (and that also happened to German natives who wrote their homework in German). I also withdrew points when there were so many typos that I had the impression that the student didn't take care much (everyone should be able to use a spelling correction program). – Verena Praher Sep 22 '15 at 12:09
  • @DanRomik: Physics, astronomy. The content does not emphasize writing, so I don't emphasize it when grading. That said, sometimes it's really bad! – jvriesem Sep 22 '15 at 14:00
  • @VerenaHaunschmid That's almost exactly what I do, too. – jvriesem Sep 22 '15 at 14:09
  • A couple of years ago I attended a Professional Writing Class at a top American university . Even at that class grammar and spelling was corrected but not influenced the grading system, as it was not the focus of the class. Considering that, I feel your grading practice rather ridiculous. – Greg Sep 22 '15 at 18:03
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    @Greg: This may be a little off-topic, but I think it's commendable for a school to encourage professional writing skills in all aspects of their curriculum. If a student can calculate something advanced, but can't communicate their results to somebody else, what good is their calculation to anyone but themselves? This is how professional science works, so it doesn't seem wrong to include this in the curriculum. – jvriesem Sep 22 '15 at 22:36
  • @jvriesem Professional writing skills are something that most academics never taught or learn. It is admirable if you teach or at least remarks on it, but I am not sure yourself have these skills if your main focus is spelling and grammar. – Greg Sep 23 '15 at 03:30
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    @Greg: Science is what I teach; spelling and grammar is a side remark in comparison. I certainly do not let spelling and grammar become a main focus! I'm not sure I follow your last sentence. – jvriesem Sep 23 '15 at 03:37
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    @jvriesem I refereed to spelling and grammar's role in professional communication. Read: if grammar and spelling is your main focus in professional communication (vs actual rhetoric etc) you may be not as good as you think. My other remark is about only grading (without any teaching) is a very poor way of education, if your goal is "encouraging professional writing skills". – Greg Sep 23 '15 at 22:48
  • @Greg: Thanks. I agree with those things. Thanks for clarifying! – jvriesem Sep 24 '15 at 17:03

3 Answers3

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There are two different types of value judgement that you are discussing here---communication goals and grading---and I think it's important to carefully separate them.

  • Communication Goals: I think that it is unfair to a person who isn't a native English speaker to not expect them to aim for the same goals of clear and lucid communication. When giving feedback, don't brush over the language and grammar errors just because a person is not a native speaker. They should have the same chance to learn and improve as anyone else.

  • Grading: Unless the class is about English grammar, making English quality a significant part of the grade is generally a bad way to evaluate a person's work. If the language is bad enough that it interferes with your ability to understand the class-relevant content, then yes, that's a problem and should receive proportional demerits. If the class-relevant content is clear, however, it's questionable to me whether any points should be taken off at all.

In short: grade very generously on language issues, but point out the mistakes so the student can continue to learn and improve.

Ryan Dougherty
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jakebeal
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    "grade very generously on language issues" - Just to be clear, do you mean to grade more generously if the student speaks English as a second language, or to grade equally generously for both primary and second language English speakers. – ff524 Sep 22 '15 at 03:10
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    @ff524 Honestly, I wouldn't recommend taking off points for language, per se, from anybody, no matter their native language (unless it's a language class). In any non-language-centric class, I think language issues should only affect grade if they affect the comprehensibility of content. – jakebeal Sep 22 '15 at 03:16
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    @jakebeal: That mentality must be what leads to all the manuals and documentation written by technical people that leave no doubts about what was actually meant, yet give me a headache for all the language and stylistic issues found therein. No, I wouldn't usually subtract points for single mistakes in a STEM subject, but if an overall diligence in the handling of the language is absent, I think there must still be some consequence, also in a non-language-centric class. The goal is not just that students somehow get across what they want to say, but that they do so in a professional way. – O. R. Mapper Sep 22 '15 at 08:19
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    @O.R.Mapper jakebeal's get-out clause -- "I think language issues should only affect grade if they affect the comprehensibility of content" -- is subjective, of course, but my take is that comprehensibility is rapidly affected as writing quality falls. In the past I've also found that the more formal English taught as a second language works well in student writing compare to the sloppy naturally-absorbed English spoken by many natives. There are of course foreign students who seem to have had a miracle to get through the English test. – Chris H Sep 22 '15 at 08:30
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    @ChrisH: Granted, I see this situation from the point of view of a German native speaker, and I feel a lot can be done to make a German text awfully incorrectly written, yet still entirely comprehensible. (Or maybe that is the effect of reading so many such texts? :) ) Of course, things also extend to stylistic issues - statements such as "We now come to the next topic, which is quite a cool tool for managing the database access, that I have often used at the university." do not hinder my comprehension in the least, yet they are a total stylistic failure in a (text looking like a) paper. – O. R. Mapper Sep 22 '15 at 08:40
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    @O.R.Mapper I find that the typical faults a German introduces to English are exactly those which make the text odd-but comprehensible. Run-on sentences are a problem for native speakers and Germans speaking English (though the latter are more likely to put a verb at the end to make you backtrack). I have a little familiarity with German and have seen how English is taught in the schools there which may help. I know if I try to write in German I get hung up in cases and conjugations. – Chris H Sep 22 '15 at 09:09
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    @ChrisH: My comment was rather referring to texts written in German, but from "the typical faults a German introduces to English are exactly those which make the text odd-but comprehensible", it seems your experience in English precisely matches my impression, as well. – O. R. Mapper Sep 22 '15 at 12:45
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    @O.R.Mapper Perhaps I am just more tolerant in my reading, but I tend to distinguish strongly between "technically correct, but an American would never do that" and "breaks the sentence." The first I tend to hear as essentially an accent, and it can apply just as strongly to colleagues from places like England or India. To judge that seem to me pure cultural chauvinism; to provide information that can allow a person to sound more American if they wish (which does have advantages) is a very different thing. – jakebeal Sep 22 '15 at 12:56
  • @jakebeal: Most examples I can think of are beyond the "technically correct" or "regionally correct" threshold, but even so - would you consider texts that use a dialect rather than the standard language or colloquial language to be professional? – O. R. Mapper Sep 22 '15 at 13:25
  • @O.R.Mapper Really hard to evaluate without a specific example, so I will provide an anonymized one, from a paper I have recently read: "Clearly, such possibility must be considered since the [PHASE] of the [WORK]." If I were writing it, I would say: "Clearly, such a possibility must be considered from the [PHASE] of the [WORK]." The original would probably never be written by an American, but the usage is quite clear. I can see why the article is omitted and the reason I would make a different prepositional choice is quite subtle. I would consider this to be quite professional. – jakebeal Sep 22 '15 at 14:10
  • @O.R.Mapper: That's exactly it: we need to encourage professionalism. – jvriesem Sep 22 '15 at 14:14
  • @jakebeal: Good example. I would mark that or insert the article, but wouldn't take off points for that, unless nearly every sentence had something like that. – jvriesem Sep 22 '15 at 14:23
  • @jvriesem It is very important to be careful not to confuse professionalism with linguistic prestige, particularly if one wants to support an open academic culture. – jakebeal Sep 22 '15 at 14:31
  • @jakebeal: I provided an example above (which was a combination of several different actual texts). Note that my experience in this respect comes mostly from German texts, though, where there is essentially one (well, kind of one per country) acceptable standard language, vocabulary, grammar, style, etc., and a normative entity that more or less clearly defines what is or isn't official or colloquial style. Possibly, things are less clearly defined in English. – O. R. Mapper Sep 22 '15 at 14:47
  • @O.R.Mapper English is much less clearly defined. In your example, by the way, I see problems not with the grammar but with the subjectivity of the statement: why should we care the the author thinks something is "cool" or that they have used it at university? In short, the problem is not style but content. – jakebeal Sep 22 '15 at 15:13
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    @jakebeal: I consider the issues to be stylistic; for instance, papers routinely state that the authors consider something cool - it's just conveyed with a different style of speech, by using a more concrete description such as "versatile" or "flexible", or by using an equally nondescript, but less flashy word such as "interesting" or "helpful". Likewise, "that I have often used at the university" is very questionable in style; rather, the same content could be conveyed as "we have had some positive experience with this software in the past". In any case, this is slowly going off-topic ;) – O. R. Mapper Sep 22 '15 at 15:22
  • How would you deal with students who had a learning disability (thinking primarily of dyslexia)? Is it productive to point out something, of which the student is most likely already aware, and possibly somewhat ashamed of? – Jekowl Sep 22 '15 at 19:11
  • @Jekowl If the goal is education, then ask the student whether it will be more supportive to note or to not note non-essential spelling/grammar issues. – jakebeal Sep 23 '15 at 02:00
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I've had many international students in my courses with different English-language abilities.

I believe the answer can depend on your discipline as I teach business courses and English courses could be held to higher standards in terms to language abilities.

I am often forgiving with things such as plurals,conjugation, and misuse of grammar with no overall impact (for example using a semicolon instead of a comma). However, I can generally tell how much effort was put into the paper. If the paper seems rushed and thrown together then the points will start to drop. The student may not be well versed in advanced English word usage but if they can get the overall point across and the work is readable I often dismiss the broken-English.

I do remind all students that he have tutors in our student center that can review papers. While this will vary from institution to institution I try and be as fair as I can given student circumstances and help all students succeed without handholding

Memj
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No. You should definitively just ignore the fact that you are teaching to someone who can barely conjugate verbs, set tenses, create adequately descriptive phraseology, and who has a massive deficit of knowledge as to homonyms, synonyms, colloquialism and when it is and isn't appropriate to use them. Just ignore all of that and do your best to understand what they meant to say... or what you think they meant to say. You could use a fuzzy logic routine to see if the words they have cobbled together fall into a subset of words that may have been used to correctly respond to a query of their understanding. They are probably very smart and since most modern professionals currently entering their field in the United States are most likely from one of their countries then the fact that they barely have a grasp on the native language of the country from which they are seeking their degree should only serve to make degrees from our country more valuable in the eyes of the world. Lastly, a large majority of these students will simply be taking their expensive degree back to their own country so, as long as the university is getting their check... why should it matter. (tongue firmly in cheek... but not smiling)

Mitch Bird
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