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Rubrics | Opinion | Rubrics - Opinion

Opinion – Rubric

Read Time 2 mins | Mar 25, 2020 11:15:42 PM | Written by: Toolbox

  What Is a Rubric?

A rubric is a scoring tool that lists the criteria for a piece of work, or “what counts” (for example, purpose, organization, details, voice, and mechanics are often what count in a piece of writing); it also articulates gradations of quality for each criterion, from excellent to poor. The term defies a dictionary definition, but it seems to have established itself, so I continue to use it (learnweb.harvard.edu). Rubrics have a large appeal for educators and their students. They identify a set of criteria, offer score points, and provide descriptors for all content area work. In addition, they can take the subjectivity out of grading or scoring by offering a consistent approach to assessing the work. A well-created rubric is a tool for learning and for assessing. Students like rubrics because they know exactly what they have to do to earn a high score. It also allows the teacher and student to come together and provide specific feedback based on a learning objective. Teachers like them because it cuts down on lengthy narrative comments. Parents like them because they know exactly what their child needs to do in order to be successful.In order for a rubric to be usable it needs to match the instruction taking place! For this reason, we designed genre specific rubrics. The link below is used for opinion writing. The rubric breaks down the skills of opinion writing and gives a score of 1-4 for each component. What I love is that I can use just one section of the rubric during the year as I instruct, or I can use it as a whole when we are creating process pieces or when I give an assessment. These rubrics are also aligned to the standards so I know I am teaching with fidelity to those standards.

Commenting on and Grading Student Writing

To learn more about how to maximize the feedback you give your students without putting an undue burden on your time, click on items in the list below.

• Focusing your commenting energies

Handling grammar

• Using a grading sheet
• Citation Information

Focus your Commenting Energy

No matter how much you want to improve student writing, remember that students can only take in so much information about a paper at one time. Particularly because writing is such an egocentric activity, writers tend to feel overloaded quickly by excessively detailed feedback about their writing.

Moreover, because most writing can be considered work in progress (because students will continue to think about the content and presentation of their papers even if they don't actively revise), commenting exhaustively on every feature of a draft is counter-productive. Too many comments can make student writers feel as if the teacher is taking control of the paper and cutting off productive avenues for revision.

Focusing your energy when commenting achieves two main goals:

• It leaves students in control of their writing so that they can consider revising--or at least learning from the experience of having written the paper.
• It gives teachers a sense of tackling the most important elements of a paper rather than getting bogged down in detail that might just get ignored by the student.

Typically, we recommend that teachers comment discursively on the one or two most important features of a paper, determined either by your criteria for the assignment or by the seriousness of the effect on a reader of a given paper.

If you assign write-to-learn tasks, you won't want to mark any grammatical flaws because the writing is designed to be impromptu and informal. If you assign more polished pieces, especially those that adhere to disciplinary conventions, then we suggest putting the burden of proofreading squarely where it belongs--on the writer.

You don't need to be an expert in grammar to assign and respond effectively to writing assignments. Click on the list below to read some points to consider as you design your assignments and grading criteria:

Don't Edit Writing to Learn

Editing write-to-learn (WTL) responses is counterproductive. This kind of writing must be informal for students to reap the benefits of thinking through ideas and questioning what they understand and what confuses them. Moreover, most WTL activities are impromptu. By asking students to summarize a key point in the three minutes at the end of class, you get students to focus on ideas. They don't need to edit for spelling and sentence punctuation, and if you mark those errors on their WTL writing, students shift their focus from ideas to form. In other words, marking errors on WTL pieces distracts students from the main goal--learning.

Make Students Responsible for Polishing Their Drafts

Formal drafts do need to be edited, but not necessarily by the teacher. The most efficient way to make sure students edit for as many grammatical and stylistic flaws as they can find is to base a large portion of the grade on how easy the paper is to read. If you get a badly edited piece, you can just hand it back and tell the student you'll grade it when the errors are gone. Or you can take 20-30% off the content grade. Students get the message very quickly and turn in remarkably clean writing.

If a student continues to have problems editing a paper, you can suggest visiting the Writing Center to get some one-on-one help with a writing consultant.

Think of Yourself First as a Reader

Some teachers think that basing 20-30% of the grade on grammatical and stylistic matters is unfair unless they mark all the flaws. We approach this issue from the perspective of readers. If you review a textbook and find editing mistakes, you don't label each one and send the text back to the publisher. No, you just stop reading and don't adopt the textbook. Readers who are not teachers just don't keep reading is a text that is too confusing or if errors are too distracting. Readers who are teachers are perfectly justified in simply noting with an X in the margin where a sentence gets too confusing or where mistaken punctuation leads the reader astray. Students are resourceful (they can get help from an on-campus writing center office or a writing center website) and will figure out the problem once a reader points out where the text stumbles. That's really all it takes.

Use Peer Editing

Perhaps the most helpful tool in getting clean, readable papers from students is the peer editing session. Most students are better editors of someone else's paper than proofreaders of their own, so having students exchange papers and look for flaws helps them find many more glitches than they'll find on their own.

View More about Student Peer Review

Try a Time-Saving Shortcut

If you feel compelled to mark grammatical and stylistic flaws, work out a shorthand for yourself and give students a handout explaining your marks. Most teachers can get by with one symbol for a sentence that gets derailed or confused, another for faulty punctuation of all sorts, and a third for inaccurate words (spelling or meaning). Save your time and energy for commenting on substance rather than form.

Sample Policies on Grading Grammar versus Content

Outdoor Resources 1XX (excerpts)

(Although we don't recommend assigning points for errors (because then you have to mark and count them all), this teacher was clear about expectations.)

Your paper should contain from 1,500 to 2,000 words, or about five to seven pages. The paper must be typewritten, double spaced, and bound. Neatness is essential.

A Check List of Points to Consider:

I. Mechanics

Neatness. Is your report clean, neatly organized, with a look of professional pride about it?

Spelling. Two points will be deducted for each misspelled word.

Grammar and punctuation. Five points will be deducted for each sentence which uses improper grammar or punctuation.

Outline. Did you follow the course outline?

Form. Is your paper in the proper form?

Bibliography. Are the references properly cited?

Binding. Use a cover binding with a secure clasp.

II. Content . . . .

Use a grading sheet

Grading comment sheets or checksheets give teachers and students two advantages over free-form grading:

• Grading sheets of some sort assure that teachers will give students feedback about all the major criteria they set out on the assignment sheet. Even if you decide to use a simple checksheet that ranks students' performance on each criterion on a 1-10 scale, students will be able to see quickly where their strengths and weaknesses are as writers for this assignment.
• Grading sheets, particularly checksheets, typically save teachers time. Even composition teachers don't comment exhaustively about each criterion for each assignment; so, too, disciplinary teachers should be aware that they can comment at some length on just one or two points (typically the major strength and the major weakness) and then rely on the checksheet to fill in for less crucial areas of the paper. If students are concerned about getting more feedback than the checksheet provides, you can encourage them to come to your office hours or send you an e-mail query.

Resource: Sample Grading Sheets

Four sample grading sheets are provided:

• Introductory Composition
• Science Project

Sample Grading Sheet

Composition 1xx Grading Sheet

Grade for essay: ___________

Revision Instructions:

Sample Report Evaluation

Name: _________________

Subject: _________________

__ total points

DETAILED REPORT EVALUATION

Title page:

Table of contents:

Bibliography:

Information page:

Oral presentation:

Sample Evaluation of Written Report

Evaluation of Written Report

Sample Science Project Checksheet

Science Project checksheet

GENERAL 50 POINTS

1. Correct form (15)

Reference list (3)

Citation of sources(2)

Mechanics (order, table of contents, list of tables, list of figures, cover) (5)

2. Composition skills (10)

Spelling (5)

Grammar (5)

3. Log book used to record experimental data, ideas, etc. (10)

4. Abstract (10)

5. Acknowledgments (5)

TOTAL GENERAL: _________

EXHIBIT 50 EXTRA CREDIT POINTS

1. Summarized project well (30)

Problem and hypothesis easy to understand (5)

Experimental method clearly stated (10)

Results summarized in graphs/tables (10)

Conclusion presented (5)

2. Eye appeal (10)

Neat lettering (3)

Pleasing placement of parts (2)

Good use of color (3)

Sturdiness (2)

3. Creativity (10)

TOTAL EXHIBIT POINTS: _______

TOTAL PROJECT: ______

Resource: Sample grading criteria

General Grading Criteria: Composition 1xx

Writing Center

• What to Read
• Managing Time to Read
• Retain What You Read
• How to Read and Understand a Rubric
• How to Read a Journal Article
• How to Take Notes
• Schedule Time For Success
• Choosing a Topic
• Researching Your Topic with OneSearch
• Searching Effectively
• NoteTaking for Research
• Organize Your Writing
• Using Resources
• Plagiarism This link opens in a new window
• Revising and Editing
• Writing Examples
• Graduate Writing Resources
• APA Formatting and Style (7th ed.) for Student Papers This link opens in a new window
• Grammarly - your writing assistant
• Brainfuse Online Tutoring - Writing

What is a Rubric?

• What is a rubric?
• S'more Rubric example
• How do I read a rubric?
• In D2L, where can I find the rubric for my discussion, assignment, or paper?

An instructor uses a "rubric" to grade papers and projects where there are no 'right or wrong' answers (Roell, 2019, para. 3). The rubric lists the requirements or "criteria"   for the assignment and describes how students will be graded on each criteria. Students check to see whether they have met the criteria before submitting their assignments (Utah Education Network, n.d.).   Have you made an excellent S'more? Check out the rubric on the next tab!

Roell, K. (2019, February 25).  What is a rubric?  https://www.thoughtco.com/what-is-a-rubric-p2-3212064

Utah Education Network. (n.d.). Rubric tool .  https://www.uen.org/rubric/know.shtml

Discussions : You will find a link to the Discussion Rubric directly below each Discussion.

Assignments or papers:, on the assignment page, look for a "scoring guide" or  a link to a "rubric"  following the assignment directions., in some courses, such as en1300 composition ii and en3050 technical communications, you will find the paper rubric or "research paper requirements" under the link in the left colum: course materials or course resources page..

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Rubric Design

Main navigation, articulating your assessment values.

Reading, commenting on, and then assigning a grade to a piece of student writing requires intense attention and difficult judgment calls. Some faculty dread “the stack.” Students may share the faculty’s dim view of writing assessment, perceiving it as highly subjective. They wonder why one faculty member values evidence and correctness before all else, while another seeks a vaguely defined originality.

Writing rubrics can help address the concerns of both faculty and students by making writing assessment more efficient, consistent, and public. Whether it is called a grading rubric, a grading sheet, or a scoring guide, a writing assignment rubric lists criteria by which the writing is graded.

Why create a writing rubric?

• It makes your tacit rhetorical knowledge explicit
• It articulates community- and discipline-specific standards of excellence
• It links the grade you give the assignment to the criteria
• It can make your grading more efficient, consistent, and fair as you can read and comment with your criteria in mind
• It can help you reverse engineer your course: once you have the rubrics created, you can align your readings, activities, and lectures with the rubrics to set your students up for success
• It can help your students produce writing that you look forward to reading

How to create a writing rubric

Create a rubric at the same time you create the assignment. It will help you explain to the students what your goals are for the assignment.

• Consider your purpose: do you need a rubric that addresses the standards for all the writing in the course? Or do you need to address the writing requirements and standards for just one assignment?  Task-specific rubrics are written to help teachers assess individual assignments or genres, whereas generic rubrics are written to help teachers assess multiple assignments.
• Begin by listing the important qualities of the writing that will be produced in response to a particular assignment. It may be helpful to have several examples of excellent versions of the assignment in front of you: what writing elements do they all have in common? Among other things, these may include features of the argument, such as a main claim or thesis; use and presentation of sources, including visuals; and formatting guidelines such as the requirement of a works cited.
• Then consider how the criteria will be weighted in grading. Perhaps all criteria are equally important, or perhaps there are two or three that all students must achieve to earn a passing grade. Decide what best fits the class and requirements of the assignment.

Consider involving students in Steps 2 and 3. A class session devoted to developing a rubric can provoke many important discussions about the ways the features of the language serve the purpose of the writing. And when students themselves work to describe the writing they are expected to produce, they are more likely to achieve it.

At this point, you will need to decide if you want to create a holistic or an analytic rubric. There is much debate about these two approaches to assessment.

Comparing Holistic and Analytic Rubrics

Holistic scoring .

Holistic scoring aims to rate overall proficiency in a given student writing sample. It is often used in large-scale writing program assessment and impromptu classroom writing for diagnostic purposes.

General tenets to holistic scoring:

• Responding to drafts is part of evaluation
• Responses do not focus on grammar and mechanics during drafting and there is little correction
• Marginal comments are kept to 2-3 per page with summative comments at end
• End commentary attends to students’ overall performance across learning objectives as articulated in the assignment
• Response language aims to foster students’ self-assessment

Holistic rubrics emphasize what students do well and generally increase efficiency; they may also be more valid because scoring includes authentic, personal reaction of the reader. But holistic sores won’t tell a student how they’ve progressed relative to previous assignments and may be rater-dependent, reducing reliability. (For a summary of advantages and disadvantages of holistic scoring, see Becker, 2011, p. 116.)

Here is an example of a partial holistic rubric:

Summary meets all the criteria. The writer understands the article thoroughly. The main points in the article appear in the summary with all main points proportionately developed. The summary should be as comprehensive as possible and should be as comprehensive as possible and should read smoothly, with appropriate transitions between ideas. Sentences should be clear, without vagueness or ambiguity and without grammatical or mechanical errors.

A complete holistic rubric for a research paper (authored by Jonah Willihnganz) can be  downloaded here.

Analytic Scoring

Analytic scoring makes explicit the contribution to the final grade of each element of writing. For example, an instructor may choose to give 30 points for an essay whose ideas are sufficiently complex, that marshals good reasons in support of a thesis, and whose argument is logical; and 20 points for well-constructed sentences and careful copy editing.

General tenets to analytic scoring:

• Reflect emphases in your teaching and communicate the learning goals for the course
• Emphasize student performance across criterion, which are established as central to the assignment in advance, usually on an assignment sheet
• Typically take a quantitative approach, providing a scaled set of points for each criterion
• Make the analytic framework available to students before they write  

Advantages of an analytic rubric include ease of training raters and improved reliability. Meanwhile, writers often can more easily diagnose the strengths and weaknesses of their work. But analytic rubrics can be time-consuming to produce, and raters may judge the writing holistically anyway. Moreover, many readers believe that writing traits cannot be separated. (For a summary of the advantages and disadvantages of analytic scoring, see Becker, 2011, p. 115.)

For example, a partial analytic rubric for a single trait, “addresses a significant issue”:

• Excellent: Elegantly establishes the current problem, why it matters, to whom
• Above Average: Identifies the problem; explains why it matters and to whom
• Competent: Describes topic but relevance unclear or cursory
• Developing: Unclear issue and relevance

A  complete analytic rubric for a research paper can be downloaded here.  In WIM courses, this language should be revised to name specific disciplinary conventions.

Whichever type of rubric you write, your goal is to avoid pushing students into prescriptive formulas and limiting thinking (e.g., “each paragraph has five sentences”). By carefully describing the writing you want to read, you give students a clear target, and, as Ed White puts it, “describe the ongoing work of the class” (75).

Writing rubrics contribute meaningfully to the teaching of writing. Think of them as a coaching aide. In class and in conferences, you can use the language of the rubric to help you move past generic statements about what makes good writing good to statements about what constitutes success on the assignment and in the genre or discourse community. The rubric articulates what you are asking students to produce on the page; once that work is accomplished, you can turn your attention to explaining how students can achieve it.

Works Cited

Becker, Anthony.  “Examining Rubrics Used to Measure Writing Performance in U.S. Intensive English Programs.”   The CATESOL Journal  22.1 (2010/2011):113-30. Web.

White, Edward M.  Teaching and Assessing Writing . Proquest Info and Learning, 1985. Print.

Further Resources

CCCC Committee on Assessment. “Writing Assessment: A Position Statement.” November 2006 (Revised March 2009). Conference on College Composition and Communication. Web.

Gallagher, Chris W. “Assess Locally, Validate Globally: Heuristics for Validating Local Writing Assessments.” Writing Program Administration 34.1 (2010): 10-32. Web.

Huot, Brian.  (Re)Articulating Writing Assessment for Teaching and Learning.  Logan: Utah State UP, 2002. Print.

Kelly-Reilly, Diane, and Peggy O’Neil, eds. Journal of Writing Assessment. Web.

McKee, Heidi A., and Dànielle Nicole DeVoss DeVoss, Eds. Digital Writing Assessment & Evaluation. Logan, UT: Computers and Composition Digital Press/Utah State University Press, 2013. Web.

O’Neill, Peggy, Cindy Moore, and Brian Huot.  A Guide to College Writing Assessment . Logan: Utah State UP, 2009. Print.

Sommers, Nancy.  Responding to Student Writers . Macmillan Higher Education, 2013.

Straub, Richard. “Responding, Really Responding to Other Students’ Writing.” The Subject is Writing: Essays by Teachers and Students. Ed. Wendy Bishop. Boynton/Cook, 1999. Web.

White, Edward M., and Cassie A. Wright.  Assigning, Responding, Evaluating: A Writing Teacher’s Guide . 5th ed. Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2015. Print.