Homework Grading Outline
Homeworks are handed out every Wednesday and are due the following
Wednesday. There will be 9 homeworks in total. Each homework will
consist of about five grading atoms (a grading atom is a part
of each student writeup that will not be subdivided among graders; it
will typically be one problem, possibly with subparts), and each
grading atom will be assigned to a team of about three students.
Here is an outline of what happens during each grading cycle. The
grading cycle for each homework starts the Wednesday the homework is
handed out to class, and ends on the day the graded homeworks are
handed back to the students (this will be the Monday after the Wednesday
the homeworks are due).
- Wednesday: Teams are formed out of `volunteers' at the
end of class (It may be advisable to volunteer at the beginning of
quarter, when workloads are lighter). You may volunteer in advance by
sending an email to me (Rob). Each team gets assigned a grading atom
and a supervising TA.
- Wednesday-Sunday:
The team members solve the assigned grading atom (only); ask
each other or TA for advice if necessary. If they do a good job in
grading their atom (on time) and writing down the final model
solution for that atom, the graders get full credit for that week's
homework. (Graders may still do the extra credit problems if they like
- these will be graded by us.)
- Monday:
Team meets with TA and proposes model solution for team's grading
atom. Default meeting time with TA: after class.
In case the team submits a totally acceptable solution by email, a
meeting may not be needed.
- Wednesday: Team collects homeworks in class from other students.
- Wednesday-Friday:
Team members make a first pass over homeworks, annotate homeworks
extensively without assigning points and note down partial
credit cases. Use a red pen (or a color different from the students
work) to write comments (legibly!) explaining the students mistakes.
- Friday:
Team meets to finish model solutions. The model solution should be in
a form that can be put on the web (latex, postscript, plain text, a
scanned picture, etc.). Later, team meets with TA to present model
solutions and to prepare uniform (consistent) partial credit policy.
Default meeting time with TAs: Before discussion hours.
The approved model solution should be send to me (Rob).
- Friday-Monday: Team members finish grading according to
agreed-upon partial credit policy and fill in scoresheet. The final
score for each problem should be written clearly and circled. Put your
initials next to each final score.
- Monday:
Team returns graded homeworks (sorted alphabetically by lastname)
and the scoresheet to TA, by noon. This
is a hard deadline, as grades have to be reviewed and homeworks
returned to students in class the same day.
The scoresheet takes the shape of a list of names that you can
annotate with scores. Please give a paper copy, send it by email, to
Stephen. Stephen may also make an .xls spreadsheet available to you as
an alternative.