In a brilliant planning move, I scheduled papers to arrive from all three pf my classes--a haul that could've been as high as 101 papers, but after add-drop and no-shows left me with something like 84 in all.

I have always been of the school that believes that commenting is the best one-on-one teaching I can do (a quote I've stolen from good friend Erin Sadlack). If this is true though, we have some real evidence abaout how calss size affects teaching, and it's not just about the classroom dynamic.

My 18 comp. papers went pretty much as usual, since it's an assignment I've taught several times before, and the commenting is almost automatic--and they are therefore more substantive, because the act of diagnosis is all the easier.

The Lit papers are another case altogether. Since there are 65 of them, and it's a new assignment (and from a teaching standpoint, new material), I'm finding that the diagnosis is trickier, and some of the really poor papers (more than a couple <2-page papers for a 4-6 page assignment) are not getting the kind of attention that they might because of both the temptation to take the shorter papers as a reprieve, and the need to get onto the next paper, one with more heft and therefore more required energy to grade.

End comments are therefore not getting the usual 3/4 page of handwritten feedback, except in extraordinary cases, and I fear that the least-skilled students are going to have a harder time learning those necessary skills. My recourse? The venerable "For the next paper, let's talk about x as you plan your draft." The upside about this tactic is that it could generate a bit more traffic in my often desoalte office hours. The downside is that either there will be too much traffic to manage (which happens a lot) or that students will not show up, and not get any of that guidance. The latter problem is theirs and not mine, but I still feel the loss.

Anyway, time spent blogging this dilemma is time not spent commenting, and a half-graded close reading of Tintern Abbey, and a half-eaten sandwich await my attention.