Rubric Mini-lecture

 “Rubrics give well-articulated descriptions of excellent, adequate and insufficient student performance for the specific traits and skills being evaluated. Examining complex tasks and performances by students against these rubrics informs educators of next steps or adaptations to make in improving their teaching. And since rubrics are made public, students can use them to guide their own performance as well – to solicit feedback on works in progress as well as on final products.”[i]

A rubric is a descriptive scoring scheme that is used to guide analysis of student work. Rubrics allow different evaluators to arrive at the same analysis of a student’s effort. It improves the quality of judgment and reduces evaluator subjectivity. It gives flexibility to evaluate fluid situations, (group activities, oral presentations, math or science projects), in a structured manner. Rubrics assist in communication between the evaluator and student. They inform the extent to which expectations for a body of knowledge or skill activity have been met and inform the student when and where improvement is needed[ii].

A Rubric:

1.   Identifies the evaluative criteria to be employed when judging the students response to the task

2.    Describes for each criterion how the person scoring the test is to judge qualitative differences in students’ performance.  It indicates whether evaluative criteria are to be applied holistically or analytically.

There are three kinds of Rubrics:

1.   Particular Trait – defines one or two criteria that are most important for the assessment and ignores irrelevant traits.

2.   Analytic – defines multiple criteria at each level and provides a score for each. An analytic rubric is like a checklist. It describes separate criteria for evaluation and scoring at each level. In addition, separate weights can be added to emphasize relative levels of importance within each level. The effect is three dimensional.

3.   Holistic – merges the criteria in to a comprehensive description of the performance, allowing a blend of criteria in producing the final product. Here, the components are not as important as the product. The rubric is two dimensional to support broader quality judgments.

Analytic and Holistic rubrics can be blended – depending on the content being analyzed and the purpose of the assessment. The danger here is that too much weight might be given to one component or criteria, inadvertently penalizing the student.

Rubrics are best developed after you have defined:

1.   What the student should know, understand or be able to do;

2.   How you, (the teacher), will know that the students understand the material;

3.   You are, (or are able to), testing for what you think you is testing for and the test fairly represents what is being requested of the student’s knowledge or skill for this educational objective.

Rubric Rules:

1.   Make sure the skill to be assessed is significant.

2.   Make certain all the rubric evaluative criteria can be addressed instructionally.

3.   Employ as few evaluative criteria as possible, (3 or 4).

4.   Provide a succinct label for each evaluative criterion.

5.   Match the length of the rubric to your own tolerance for detail.

6.   The author recommends the rubric be terse but provide clarity.[iii]

Rubrics describe performance along a continuum. They should be specific to the assessment and the group of students taking the assessment. The number of levels along the rubric continuum are representative of the level of acceptable performance called for in the test – however too few levels make distinctions murky; too many levels make the rubric cumbersome – to the student and to the evaluator.

The first step is to clearly identify the qualities of student performance that is indicative, demonstrating proficient performance. This is the top level of the scoring criteria. Then it can be decide if the purpose of the assessment lends itself to the analytical or holistic form of rubric. If the analytic form of rubric is chosen, then separate descriptive criteria are required for each level. And there are different scoring schemes required for each level. Holistic rubrics have criteria considered throughout.

After the top level is established, it is wise to define the lowest level – the level of limited understanding. This will, in turn, suggest how the middle level of criteria can be defined.

If greater variety in scoring criteria is desired, comparisons and contrasts can be made between top and bottom levels. This will suggest meaningful distinctions that can be used to expand levels. (It’s better to have fewer, meaningful categories than many confusing categories).

Categories should have descriptions of the work, not judgments of the work. The categories descriptions should be quantifiable. To check, the test could be used by another teacher to evaluate student scores. If there is a difference in the assessment of scores, there is a problem in the descriptions and formulation of the resulting rubric.[iv]

Rubric creation depends upon well defined objectives and well defined expectations of the students’ performance. Involving students in the creation of a rubric gives the students incentive to complete their assigned task to the highest standards. Involving students allows the students to self-evaluate based upon a solid base of knowledge of what is expected of them.

Rubrics allow better communication once student work has been evaluated. Using the rubrics criteria, students can evaluate their work. And teachers can communicate student progress more easily to parents or guardians. They can differentiate for the parents just what is good or bad, expected or lacking in the students work[v].

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© Copyright, Marcia Burrell-Ihlow
State University of New York College at Oswego