Assessment Rubrics

Rubrics are great tools for teachers and students. They help teachers to “define the quality of completed assignments” and students to “critique and revise their own assignments before handing them in” (Shelly, Gunter, & Gunter, 2010, p. 396).

Stevens and Levi (2005) define a rubric as a ”Scoring tool that lays out the specific expectations for an assignment” (p. 3). To accomplish this task, rubrics “divide an assignment into its component parts and provide a detailed description” of acceptable or unacceptable performance levels for them (Stevens & Levi, 2005, p. 3).

Writing good rubrics require diligent study and practice. As an activity, I was assigned to design a rubric for a previously developed project. In a precious assignment, I had designed an extra credit “digital storytelling” project for a unit in my college freshmen preparatory algebra course. In this assignment, I was assigned to design a rubric to assess that project.

Although I had designed few rubrics—primarily for math and visual arts—before, I found designing this rubric somewhat challenging. In this assignment, I had to examine my own sample project—which I have provided for the students as a reference—as I was designing the rubric.

To design this rubric, I considered a maximum points (21) and the designated criteria. After careful considerations, I finalized on three major categories: “Content,” “Duration and Quality,” and “Format and Timely Submission.”

To view my sample rubric, please click here.

References

Shelly, G. B., Gunter, G. A., Gunter, R. E. (2010). Integrating technology and digital media in the classroom. (6th ed.). Boston: Course Technology.

Stevens, D. D. & Levi, A. (2005). Introduction to rubric. Sterling, Virginia: Stylus Publishing.