Grading Guidance
Guidance to Graders
- You are not a mind reader! If the student do not attempt parts of the assignment, then you will not know if the student had made an effort to try to understand the issue or not. If you, the grader, don't see work there, then you cannot assume the student understood.
- A question that is honestly answered by a question should be honored as a response. The purpose of the short, simple answers is that it sets up the framework for discussion. Any honest admission by the student that something is unclear and followed by what the student surmises should be given credit as a response.
- You should focus on the correct use of terminology and thought patterns. Students who do not use terminology consistent with the course should be penalized.
- Paper that you cannot read should be marked "illegible" and no credit given.
General Guidance to Students
- You must be present to turn in homework for that day. If you complete all parts of the assignment, are present in class, and participate in class, then you will be credited with participation for that day.
- If you cannot complete some parts of the assignment, and you explain to me
your thoughts and reasoning for not completing other parts of the
assignment (maybe you didn't understand something and need to clear
up questions before completing a part), then you get some credit for the written homework. If you honestly don't understand then formulate a question that captures what you do not understand.
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If you complete some of the assignment without attempting to complete
everything in the assignment (and you give me no indication that you
even thought about the parts you didn't attempt), then you get a 0 for that part of the assignment.
- If it is clear to the grader that you put forth no effort on the homework, you will be given a 0 for the homework.
- If there is no homework for the day, you receive participation for the day if you are present and participate in the day's exercises.
Comments on Specific Types of Homework
What did YouLearn Today?
The purpose of this sort of homework is for you to review what went on in class and what new things you learned. There are three general types of responses.
- The student didn't learn anything. You should state that then convince me that you did in fact understand everything in class by writing the details. If you didn't learn anything because you didn't understand then you should write out your questions.
- The student found everything new. I find that hard to believe. Pick a couple of outstanding things among all you heard.
- The student found a few new things. Pick the ones that tweaked your interest the most and discuss them.
You should expect to spend about 15 minutes writing this sort of homework. It is free writing: that is, it must be legible, but it should be associative writing that is not necessarily organized nor grammatically correct nor spellchecked.
Pseudo-code and Stepwise Refinements
Pseudo-code and stepwise refinement exercises should be complete within themselves. These are the things I look for.
- Does the pseudo-code reflect a serious attempt to solve the problem?
- Does the refinement look like it is a refinement of what has been going on in class?
- References to complex data structures must reference a definition that is included in the assignment.
- References to non-standard operations (those that are not boolean, integer, floating point, or string library functions) must be accompanied by a prototype of the operation and pre- and post-conditions.
By definition, this sort of homework is a design document so it must contain an estimate of the number of lines of code you believe the final product will have in it and how many hours it will take to implement and test the project.
Programs and Milestones
In some classes, individual programs are assigned. In others, a semester long project is broken down into milestones. The grading and documentation requirements are the same regardless of name.