Developing Effective Discourse:
           An Ongoing Discussion

Electronic Peer Review and Revision
Using Blackboard's Discussion Board

Getting Started: Write your rough draft. Save it as a .rtf or .doc file. Important: Be careful to have no control characters (!, @, #, $, %, ^, &, *, +) in the title.

Prepare to participate in peer review. Review the section on peer review and the mechanics of doing it online.

Jing Tutorials:

• Doing peer review
• Writing peer reviews using Microsoft Word.
• Peer review on Blackboard using the blogging tool
• Peer review using the discussion board.

A. Deposit: paper on Blackboard for peer review. Your iteration of the course may use the Discussion Board or the Blogging Tool. Before doing this the first time, watch the Jing tutorials on how to do that. Important: Be careful to have no control characters (!, @, #, $, %, ^, &, *, +) in either the subject line on Blackboard or the file name of any document you submit. These could break the entire function for the class, and will result in an automatic zero for the assignment.

B. Claim: Now, go pick up someone's paper for peer review, preferencing people who do not already have two peer reviewers. Make sure you claim the paper, so more than one other reader won't come along and pick it up as well.

1. Go to the proper Discussion Board for the assignment.
2. Select material that has been submitted and not yet commented on by two of your classmates.
3. Post your intent to review, so that people do not all review the same work. Quickly open it and make sure it is readable. (If it isn't, email the author immediately so that he or she can fix the problem and re-post the document.) You need make no other comments at this point.

C. Review. Step 1

1. Read the piece out loud to get a sense of how it flows, marking places where the language is particularly interesting or effective, where it does not make clear sense, areas where you would like more detail, strategic areas where it does not yet fully prove its point or win the reader over, mechanical errors, etc. Keep the specific assignment in mind as well as what you know about what makes good business and professional writing.
2. Select something positive to point out. This could be anything from a striking word or expression to a vivid image or a meaningful concept.  Begin your entry at the bottom of the page with a comment on one strong feature of the paper.

Review. Step 2:  Go back and work through the piece again, this time reading silently.

1. Individual comments: When reading the material in Word*, leave your cursor where you had an issue with the text. Pull down the 'Insert' menu and choose "Comment." Type your comment in the colored entry area that appears. Then, just move your cursor out of the comment area and go on.  Here's where you note specific words, punctuation, phrases, sentences that do or do not work well.
2. Specific comments: Go back to the bottom of the page. Make a note of information you would like to have had in more detail, didn't understand, seemed to need to be reordered, was particularly effective, etc.  Comments such as "that stinks" or "everything was great" are not useful. Here's where you manage the 'big picture' issues.  Was the strategy smart?  Was the tone too informal, personal, stilted?  Why do you feel that way, and upon what evidence?
3. Make sure to sign your name.  Always take responsibility for your comments.  Once you are functioning as a professional, you will have to.  Save the work as a .doc in Word, or as .rtf or .txt files.
4. Submit your peer review of the work as a reply to the original Discussion Board entry.

Employing Microsoft Word to manage multiple draft rounds.

Use the discussion board to post your material as attachments in doc or rtf format.  Classmates and/or the professor reads it and posts comments via Microsoft Word's Insert menu -> Comment feature.  Note: it is wise to maintain separate files for each draft so that you can, if you wish, go back to an earlier version if you finally decide it was the superior strategy.

Never send a copy of the reviewed material to your professor. It is full of the peer review comments that are of no interest in final draft. The final draft represents only material that you would be willing to provide to others as a completed, well polished document.

D. Return the Work

Peer Reviewers post the reviewed paper back to the original writer who then writes the second draft.

E. Thank your reviewer

F. Revise and Submit

Prepare the clean copy of your final draft, correct any grammatical errors that you recognize and post it via Blackboard's submission process, email it to the professor, or print the physical document as appropriate.  Make sure you save this copy under a different name on your computer. If, for any reason, your document is lost or damaged, you want to be able to retrieve this specific version.  Always back up your work in clearly seperated form so that your newest version is clearly marked.

 ____________________________________________

* You can use any number of word processing programs, or do the work in Rich Text Format (.rtf) I will discuss the way to make this work in Microsoft Work, simply because it is currently the most widely available software, and the one used in your labs across campus. [back]

See also

• Peer Review  
• Reviewing Rough Drafts

[top]

Dr. Bonnie Duncan
2004; Last edited June 15, 2007
bduncan@millersville.edu
1-717-871-2080
English Department
Millersville University
Millersville, PA 17551

Other Contacts:
Millersville Information Technology Help Desk:
1-717-871-2371, 1-800-509-9605

Blackboard Help Desk:
Help Desk # for B'board
1-866-334-9174