This unit uses standardsbased assessment for award of assessment marks. Your assessments will be evaluated solely on the basis of your individual performance.

Language for assessment
All the assessment tasks must be conducted in the language (English and/or Chinese) strictly according to the requirements and instructions. If you’re unsure of which language you’re supposed to write your exercise or test, you must consult your tutor/marker in advance. As for the essay, one may write it in English or in Chinese, but note that there is a difference in the requirement of the length for the essay as shown in the assessment task table above.

Attendance and Participation (10%)
In order to receive a participation mark, you need to attend class online and be punctuate. For FASS guidelines on attendance, please
see the “Attendance” section below. For each class period, you should come prepared by reading for that class period and doing any required written exercises. Possible components of your participation mark:

Reading Short Passages
You may be given a passage to work through before or during the class. In that case, your participation mark will depend on evidence that you made a serious effort to understand the passage, or to actively seek to resolve problems you might have in understanding it. (Serious effort: Full Marks; Attempted but lacked serious effort: Half Marks; Did not attempt: Zero Marks)

Giving Answers to Exercises
If asked to prepare exercises, you may be called upon to give answers out loud during class. You should do so promptly, showing that you are following what is going on and that you prepared the exercise beforehand. (Prompt correct answer: Full Marks; Delayed, incomplete, or incorrect answer: Half Marks; Unable to answer: Zero Marks)

Short Quizzes
Occasionally there will be short quizzes at the beginning of tutorial class on the content of the previous lecture. In that case, your participation mark may depend on how well you did the quiz. (Mostly correct answers: Full Marks; Approximately half correct answers: Half Marks; Only one or two correct answers or arrived too late: Zero Marks)

Other Exercises
For supplementary passages (outside of the textbook), there will be some brief exercises and questions to answer. These will be specifically designed to prepare you for the exams and will be similar in format to exam questions.

In-class Open-book Tests (60% total):

Three 50 minute inclass tests will take place during the semester. Each one is worth 20% of your final mark. The exams will have the following components:
10% Vocabulary and questions about in-class passages
5% Grammar questions
5% Translation of an unfamiliar passage

Specific details of the exam and marking criteria will be discussed in class. Note that for the final translation component, you may consult a dictionary, say 漢典, for words unfamiliar to you. The translation must be written in English.

Essay (30% total)
Over the course of the semester, you will carry out an independent research project leading up to an essay. Here are the stages for developing a topic and the terms of the assignment:
1. You will be asked to choose a person from one of the reading passages in the textbook lessons 9-15 (Shi Kuang, Sunshu Ao, Zeng Shen, Zi Gong, Huizi, Zhuangzi) or a highly focused topic from one of the supplementary passages (please consult with your instructorfor suggestions).
2. Find other classical Chinese texts/passages that mention this person or topic, making sure that you can find passages in at least two different primary other than the one from which the reading was drawn. We will discuss how to do this during class.
3. Assemble the relevant passages and find (or make) translations. Choose the ones that seem most interesting. You may need some help from your instructor at this stage. Tips for doing this will also be discussed during class.
4. Come up with an argument about the passages you have chosen. Develop an argument according to these steps.
a. Come up with a question, something about the sources on your topic that seems interesting or strange.
b. Try to answer your question, making sure the answer is not too obvious.
c. Test for a question/answer that is too obvious: try giving the opposite answer to the question. Would giving that opposite answer make you sound crazy/stupid? If so, the question is too obvious. Example: ‘Was filial piety important to the authors of the Analects and the Classic of Filial Piety?’ (too obvious!)
d. Express your answer to the question in one or two brief sentences. That is your argument.
5. Write an essay using the passages you found as evidence to support for your chosen argument. In writing your essay you should only use sources that were originally written in classical Chinese (no secondary scholarship at all). It is fine to use published translations, of course. However, when quoting you should include the original classical Chinese version of the quote. (You should also cite the translation, if you use it.) The essay is due by 23.59pm Monday 14 November.

NOTE: You can use webpages like the Chinese Text Project to help with your research, but you need to find an actual published source to cite in the essay. The essay should present your own ideas about the primary sources. You should not consult anyone else's ideas for the purpose of this assignment.

Plagiarism

Plagiarism will result in a mark of 0 for the entire assignment at best (including the meeting/proposal component).
Plagiarism means presenting†someone†else’s†ideas†as†your†own. This includes copying OR paraphrasing from any book, article, or
website. For the purposes of this assignment, any material used must be original to you (your own words and ideas) or taken from a source that was originally written in classical Chinese and correctly cited. I take plagiarism very seriously and am extremely skillful at detecting it.