Work Sample & Commentary: Hands

Work Sample & Commentary: Hands

The task
Students were asked to write a reflective essay about their career goals.

Circumstances of performance This sample of student work was produced under the following conditions:
alone	in a group
in class	as homework
with teacher feedback	with peer feedback
timed	opportunity for revision

What the work shows

f Writing: The student produces a reflective essay that:
•	engages the reader by establishing a context, creating a persona, and otherwise developing reader interest;
•	analyzes a condition or situation of significance;
•	develops a commonplace, concrete occasion as the basis for the reflection, e.g., personal observation or experience;
•	creates an organizing structure appropriate to purpose and audience;
•	uses a variety of writing strategies, such as concrete details, comparing and contrasting, naming, describing, creating a scenario;
•	provides a sense of closure to the writing.

This work sample illustrates a standard-setting performance for the following parts of the standards:

f	Writing: Produce a reflective essay.
a	Conventions: Demonstrate an understanding of the rules of the English language.

The work immediately engages the reader by creating the persona of a serious, sensitive, articulate student, at the same time establishing the work’s theme: the making of a writer-doctor.

Click to Enlarge

The work analyzes in detail the demands of a conscientious student’s life.
The reflections are grounded in common-place occurrences, such as learning to ride a bicycle.

The student organized the work chronologically, tracing her personal history by describing her hands’ activity in each major stage of her development.

The student employs a variety of writing strategies, such as:
including an appropriate quotation;
using vivid imagery to describe her own hands; and
using concrete details to create a sketch of the hospital volunteer’s life.

The final paragraph brings a sense of closure to the reflective essay by predicting the student’s hands’ roles in high school graduation, professional school, and eventually, medical practice.

a Conventions, Grammar, and Usage of the English Language: The student independently and habitually demonstrates an understanding of the rules of the English language in written and oral work, and selects the structures and features of language appropriate to the purpose, audience, and context of the work. The student demonstrates control of:
• grammar;
• paragraph structure;
• punctuation;
• sentence construction;
• spelling;
• usage.

In almost error free writing, the student demonstrates fluency with the conventions of spelling, punctuation (e.g., the correct use of the semi-colon in the last paragraph), capitalization, syntax, grammar, and usage.

The student incorporated a variety of writing techniques to enhance the narrative. For example, the student used:
quotation marks around the metaphors others have used for her hands, e.g., “brain surgeon hands,” and “basketball player hands”;
synecdoche, e.g., using the titles of two ballets (without quotation marks) to represent ballet; and
adjectives, adverbs, and verbs which act as personifications of her hands, e.g., “plunged,” and “wriggling.”

There are some errors in the work, for example, “knew” in the second sentence should be “know.” However, these do not detract from the overall quality of the work.

Click to Enlarge