Round Robin Exercise for Clarifying Focus
This works well at about the midway point of the semester, when students are accustomed to having other students read their work and they are more aware of the benefit of a clearly stated project. It's a good exercise to use when starting a rough draft revision day in the computer lab.

Have the students come in and create a document with their thesis statement/argument/project focus typed at the top. Often, this is enough to point out to some of them that they really don't have an adequate focus for their project. Once everyone has a thesis at the top of a document, have everyone shift to the terminal to the right. The students then read the thesis in front of them and comment on it or paraphrase it, adding their initials afterwards. This should only take two minutes at the most. Have them all shift again until everyone has commented on the original statement and the initial writer is back in place. In the remaining time, have the students work individually on their papers based on the comments received. They might want to concentrate on their first paragraphs or rework their papers entirely.

Working with the Difference between Summary and Analysis
by Barbara Hamilton

In a lab session run soon after classroom discussion on the importance of analyzing rather than summarizing, have the students come in, call up their rough draft of the next paper, and switch terminals with a partner. Have the readers add their names to the top of the documents as reviewers, then read through the papers once. On their second reading, direct them to use the highlighting function to identify all quotations in yellow. Then they should highlight all places in the paper where the writer is merely repeating ideas from the text in red. Anything they identify as analysis should be highlighted in green. The reviewer should then save the document on the writer's disk as a separate document.

This color analysis works well through visual impact to show the writers whether they have balanced their content well. In looking at a sea of yellow or a pool of red, it becomes immediately obvious to students that they have strung together too many quotations with little discussion between them, or if they are merely summarizing rather than saying anything original. The disagreements that will arise between writer and reviewer as to whether the reviewer has accurately defined summary and analysis are sometimes hairy but always productive to both parties.

Targeted revision
by Rebecca Hartman

This exercise 'forces' students to work on revision. It also may give them insights into the usefulness of reading and responding to instructor and/or peer comments. (It can also give instructors good feedback on how students are interpreting comments on their papers.)

Students are told to select one critical paragraph that instructor and/or peer has commented upon and brainstorm on possible revisions the night before class. (For 100/100r students, it is critical that they bring this brainstorming in writing to class.)

Students create the paragraph on a blank screen. Below the paragraph, in a contrasting font, they summarize the comments and note what they think should be done to effectively revise the paragraph. An important component here is for them to clearly state how such revision will strengthen their overall paper. (I usually ask them to underline this statement.)

Students then spend a significant part of the class period (30 minutes +) on targeted revision of their paragraph, on screen. During this time, the instructor can give individual attention to students.

This exercise can go a couple of ways. Sometimes it is very productive to let students work on this the entire class period. (Some will finish one paragraph and then choose another one to revise. Let them go for it!) Other times, students can really only work on one paragraph. With remaining time, it's useful to have them print their work, exchange it with a peer, who then will comment upon and critique the revision. (Sometimes you can make this exchange quite successful by pairing students based on skills. Thus, a student who has done a good job of revision to improve quotation interpretation can exchange with a student who is struggling with this skill.)

"Traditional" Peer-Revision Day, Lab-Style
If you are still getting accustomed to being in the computer lab, you can easily adapt your usual peer-revision sheets for lab use. Have the students call up their rough draft and then switch terminals with another member of their peer revision group. Have the reviewers type in their names at the top of the documents as commentors or reviewers. Where they would normally make marginal comments, they type their comments in italics, bold, brackets, a different color, or in a text box as close as possible to the passage in question. Caution them against changing spelling or punctuation on the writer's draft. Instead, encourage them to write a note at the end like "You need to look in the handbook and review how to use commas." "Check your spelling." If you have given numbered comments on a peer-revision handout, have them answer those at the end of the draft. When they are done commenting, have them save the new document as a separate file (RD2comments.doc), using the Save As function so they don't cancel out the writer's original draft. Repeat with the other member of the revision group. As always, have the group members discuss each paper and set of comments once the revision work is done.