Comments on: #WeekendWatch: Peer Review Commenting Strategies

By: Faizal Zulkifli

Faizal Zulkifli — Sat, 03 Feb 2018 03:18:11 +0000

What I can say is that it is sometimes hard to be a reviewer especially in the situation whether your peer’s draft is too good or too bad. When it is too good, to find a mistake or a thing too comment would surely be a pain in a neck which is why I always end up just complimenting him or her in the end. The same case for when the draft is too bad I tend to feel obligated to comment as I worry that he might think I did not appreciate his or her work.

Thankfully, the video gave out tips on how to handle both situations which is to put reasons for the positive comments while putting ‘I’ statements to address the problems we have with the draft. I do think I can implement it for my future peer reviews.

By: Youngsu Kim

Youngsu Kim — Tue, 30 Jan 2018 15:24:34 +0000

I found this video very helpful for me because It taught me how to efficiently comment and review peer’s paper. After watching the video, I realized that I had done almost everything wrong. For instance, I think I barely used the ” I statement” and I always commented something like “Sounds good”. So I will use what I’ve just learned when I give feedback to my group members.

By: Kimberly

Kimberly — Tue, 30 Jan 2018 00:38:05 +0000

As a senior that has not taken an English course since my senior year in high school, I found this video to be a great refresher on how to provide constructive feedback to my peers. In this digital age that we are experiencing, it is easy to post comments on articles and social media posts or leave reviews on Yelp or Amazon. What we don’t often do is offer anything constructive in these comments, especially since it is easy to hide behind our computer or cell phone screen. By asking questions, using “I” statements, and offering suggestions during the peer review process, I hope to be an asset to those individuals in my writing group this semester.

By: Mackenzie Knox

Mackenzie Knox — Mon, 29 Jan 2018 18:37:52 +0000

I think an important point that you mentioned is the fear of failure in others’ eyes. I too want feedback on my writing but am scared to open it up to my peers and sometimes my professors to read over. However, it is important to acknowledge you cannot get better all by yourself and do need to call on your resources to help. You need to trust that those reading over your work have your best intentions at heart and will not unnecessarily be rude or mean in their comments.

By: Abigail Wasson

Abigail Wasson — Mon, 29 Jan 2018 17:31:01 +0000

This video was definitely very helpful in light of the peer review assignment this week. I never realized there was an art to commenting on a peer’s paper. After watching this video, I realized in the past I have given vague comments. The example of the “sounds good” comment stuck out to me. I am most definitely guilty of this, and I know for this assignment I will work on leaving more constructive comments.

By: Zachary Cohen

Zachary Cohen — Mon, 29 Jan 2018 16:06:31 +0000

I felt that the University of Minnesota video was extremely helpful, it had a lot of new information in it for me. For instance, I never knew the difference between local aspects and global aspects in an essay, but I think when editing an essay it’s important to place an equal amount of focus on each. Additionally, I really liked what the video said about having elaborative comments. I know a lot of times when I edit an essay I’ll highlight something and will say “good job” without actually saying what’s good about it. My criticism would be much more effective if I specified exactly what I liked or didn’t like about something.

By: Alexander Ford

Alexander Ford — Sun, 28 Jan 2018 23:51:41 +0000

I think the video on peer review brought up many good points and guidelines to follow when conducting our own peer reviews. In my opinion, the most important point brought up by the video was to focus on the global before the local. This makes sense logically because the reader must read through the entire paper before just jumping in to edit. Furthermore, I feel like this method of peer review was never really covered in the English classes I have had beforehand. I will try to keep this new method of review in mind as I edit my group members bios.

By: Katie

Katie — Sun, 28 Jan 2018 21:07:49 +0000

I’m an editor for a history research journal, so I’ve spent a lot of time editing papers. The end note paragraph, the global review before local revisions–these are staples to the work that I’ve done before. Especially the latter, because why fix sentence grammar if the backbone of the piece isn’t quite there yet?

Something I haven’t heard before was the positive comments. In past English classes, something done well was denoted by a symbol, perhaps a check or an underlined “good”. But I really like the idea of explaining WHY you’re saying something was done well. The whole point of a paper is to make it better, so if the author did something well, why not tell them what exactly it was so they can reproduce those results throughout their work. Loved this idea!

By: Cassie Bienert

Cassie Bienert — Sun, 28 Jan 2018 18:22:53 +0000

This video gave a great outline on how to be successful at peer review. It reminded me of some of the articles we read about emailing in earlier. Daily Discussion Posts – the ones about sending emails with a positive tone even when trying to tell someone what to do. Peer review is a form of communication, and communication should be positive in order to maintain efficiency and productivity. I personally avoid people editing my draft because I hate reading what I did wrong (I understand this is not a good trait to have). So I agree that it is important to have positive comments and a summary endnote. I understand about the local vs global editing, but I think I will still correct spelling and grammar as I read through it.

By: Omar Saadeh

Omar Saadeh — Sun, 28 Jan 2018 01:27:50 +0000

I do remember that for English 1105 and 1106, we had to peer review our classmates draft essays every once in a while and I would get great constructive criticism that usually built a C paper to a B paper. Peer commenting, as mentioned, could be either positive or negative, but one must be able to elaborate on why the content was good or bad. When I peer review others essays, I would definitely point out everything that needs attention in order for the person at the other end to be happy with final results. Everyone has their own critique style but goals and needs will be met at the end of the day.