Text evidence is the skill teachers ask for most and see least often. Students know they are supposed to include quotations, so they add a few, usually copied from the first chapters. Whether those quotations actually prove anything is a separate matter.

Holes is friendly to this skill because its chapters are short and easy to revisit. A student can find a specific moment in a few minutes and reread it. That makes it realistic to expect precise evidence instead of vague references to "the part where Stanley digs."

The most common weakness is what teachers call the dropped quote. The student pastes a line into the paragraph with no introduction and no explanation, and expects it to speak for itself. The reader is left to guess why it was included.

Grading this well means separating three things: whether the evidence is accurate, whether it is relevant, and whether it is explained. A student can earn full marks on the first and nothing on the third. Your rubric should make that visible.

Teach a Repeatable Evidence Routine

Give students a routine they can use every time. Introduce the moment, present the evidence, explain what it shows, then link it back to the claim. A four-part routine is easy to remember and easy to grade.

• Introduce: set up the scene in one short phrase, such as when Stanley first sees the Warden
• Present: include a short quotation or a precise paraphrase, with the chapter noted if required
• Explain: say what the evidence reveals about a character, event, or idea
• Link: tie the explanation back to the main claim of the paragraph
• Vary: use a different kind of evidence, such as dialogue or action, in the next paragraph

Grade the Explanation Harder Than the Quote

It is tempting to count quotations, but counting rewards quantity over thought. Weight the explanation more heavily than the presence of evidence. A student with two well-explained quotes should outscore one with five unexplained ones.

Consider marking the explanation sentences directly. A small check next to each sentence that interprets the evidence gives students a visual sense of how much of their essay is analysis. Many will notice the gaps without further prompting.

Address Accuracy Without Being Punitive

Students sometimes attribute a quote to the wrong character or blend events from different chapters. Handle these as accuracy issues to correct, not as failures of understanding. A brief note asking them to recheck the passage works better than a deduction.

Paraphrase counts too, and for younger students it is often a better choice than a clumsy quotation. What matters is that the evidence is traceable to the book. Tell students that up front so they do not force quotations that do not fit.

Scale This Across a Full Class Set

Checking evidence for accuracy, relevance, and explanation across 120 essays takes serious time. Tools like GraideMind can flag where an essay includes evidence without explanation, which helps you focus your own comments where students most need them. You still decide what counts, and you still see every paper.

Over time, the goal is for students to internalize the routine so that feedback on evidence becomes lighter. When most essays already include the four parts, your comments can shift to deeper questions. That is when class discussion gets more interesting too.