2.1 Types of assignment
There is a wide range of assignment types that students may be asked to produce during their university studies. Some assignments might require them to write single-sentence responses, while others might ask them to write an extended response of 600, 800 or even 2000 words.
In this video three Open University tutors talk about the assignments students are required to complete for the courses they teach:
Download this video clip.Video player: swe_1_wk3_vid_writing_tasks.mp4
Skip transcript
Transcript
Zoe Doye
The level 1 Technology course has a range of different sorts of writing which it asks students to do in their assignments. That may range from a very basic answer to a slightly more involved piece of writing, I would say a paragraph, and then following onto that, to a short essay which, with an introduction, a conclusion and perhaps three paragraphs. And then, perhaps not so much on the level 1 courses that I teach but certainly coming on to the level 2 courses, the more extended essays.
Chris Lee
In my course, in the introduction to social science, they would start with a rather short observation piece which is partly description but has to be linked to concepts. Then there are pieces which involve some statistical matter, and I think sometimes for students for whom English isn't their first language, that's an easier piece because describing the statistics is for some reason not quite so complicated perhaps. Then we have a report writing piece.
Darron Board
The courses that I teach, students sometimes they might be writing a summary, they might be asked to write an analysis, a business analysis for example; they might be asked to write short answers, traditional style essays, and then with essays, they are going to have essays which require them to do different things.
Interactive feature not available in single page view (see it in standard view).