"Death by Landscape" is one of the most frequently assigned stories from Atwood's "Wilderness Tips," and it produces a predictable range of student essays. Some retell the summer camp trip and Lucy's disappearance in careful detail, while others build an argument about memory, guilt, and the way Lois relates to the paintings on her apartment walls. Teachers need a grading method that clearly separates those two kinds of writing.

The story's structure is part of what makes it good for assessment. Atwood frames the camp events through an adult Lois, so a strong essay has to deal with time, with what the character has chosen not to say, and with how objects in the present point back to the past. Students who ignore the framing usually produce plot summaries, which is a useful diagnostic for what to teach next.

Before grading, write down two or three arguments you consider well supported, such as Lois's lifelong silence, the role of the Canadian wilderness as something that swallows people, or the way friendship and class tension shape her feelings about Lucy. These are not the only acceptable thesis statements, but they give you a benchmark. When a student argues something unexpected, you can compare its evidence to your benchmarks and score it fairly.

Separate summary from analysis in your scoring

A common problem with this story is that students believe retelling the disappearance counts as evidence. Your rubric should say clearly that plot points support a claim only when the student explains what they reveal about Lois's perspective or the story's themes. A useful margin note is simply "so what?" placed beside any paragraph that describes events without interpreting them.

• Does the thesis make a claim about meaning rather than listing events?
• Are the paintings and the apartment setting used as evidence of Lois's inner life?
• Does the essay acknowledge the gap between what Lois tells and what she withholds?
• Are quotations explained rather than left to speak for themselves?
• Does the conclusion say something new instead of repeating the introduction?

Reward careful reading of structure and silence

The best student essays notice how much of this story depends on what is left unsaid. A paper that traces the moments where Lois deflects, skips ahead, or describes a painting instead of a feeling shows real engagement with narrative technique. Give these papers credit in the analysis category even when their prose is less polished, because noticing absence is harder than noticing presence.

Be careful not to penalize students for sympathetic readings of Lois or of Lucy that differ from yours. Atwood leaves the central mystery unresolved, so any essay that claims certainty about what happened on the cliff deserves a gentle challenge about evidence. Comments such as "what in the text allows you to be this certain?" teach disciplined reading without shutting down interpretation.

Give feedback that sends students back to the text

Strong feedback on this story names a specific passage and asks the student to look at it again. For example, you might point to a paragraph that mentions Lois's paintings and ask how the description of landscape differs from the description of people. That kind of prompt produces better revisions than a general instruction to add more analysis.

When class sizes make that level of detail hard, drafting comments with an AI feedback tool that follows your rubric can save significant time. You still review each comment, but you start from a structured draft instead of a blank margin. The result is feedback that is more specific across all thirty papers, not just the first five.

Turn graded essays into a revision cycle

Essays on a story this layered often improve dramatically on a second attempt. Ask students to revise only one body paragraph, replacing summary with analysis and adding one new piece of evidence from a different part of the story. The narrow focus makes revision manageable and gives you a clear way to measure growth.

Keep a record of which comments you repeated most across the class. If you wrote about unexplained quotations on twenty papers, that is a lesson plan for next week. Grading data from one story then informs how students approach the next text in the unit.