Foundations and Assessment of Education/Edition 1/Assessment Table of Contents/Assessment Chapter 4: Grading/Article 2 Reader Responses

Using Rubrics to Promote Thinking and Learning

Reader Responses
I can see now after reading this article that rubrics are useful in assignments. Even if they are the latest trend they could be a stepping stone to the next best thing so we should embrace any tool that can show its usefulness. I did not think elementary students would be capable of using rubrics but obviously they can. This is also useful for parents when they are checking their children's work.Jnemo001 (talk) 03:13, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

I have not had much interaction with rubrics, but I can see how they can be beneficial to a student's assessment. I agree that a rubric can show a student where their weaknesses and strengths are and help them to improve in that area. Rubrics give the student a clear understanding of what is expected of them. I think using rubrics are a very good way to assess students and students to assess themselves. Rubrics will be one assessment that I will be using as a future teacher.Msmhobbs04 (talk) 14:01, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

This article was very informative and beneficial for me as a future teacher. When I was in school I was never given a rubric with an assignment. I did not even know what a rubric was until recently. This article really explain the importance of using one. It helps teachers teach and helps them to evaluate students work. After reading this article, I believe it is a great idea to use them. It absolutely shows the student what is expected of them on an assignment and the rubric makes it easy for teacher to explain the assignment. I definitely agree that if you can master writing rubrics they would benefit the student. Grading is an important aspect of feedback and if you can make it easier on the student to know why they will receive a certain grade it can really motivate them to do better. Aferg006 (talk) 02:05, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

Rubrics and grading…something teachers need to evaluate thoroughly to ensure students are meeting standards for assignments and for the state. I really enjoyed both of these articles. Although, I do not see grades returning to a 4-point scale as mentioned in the first article, the argument itself was persuasive and engaging. There is definitely something to be said about simply giving students zeros and then brushing their incompletes under the rug. It seems a failure to students to just accept when they haven’t attempted to do their work. They are not learning anything from receiving those zeros, except for potentially failing the subject or even the school year. Without having any work to evaluate, teachers are unable to determine where students are in their learning journeys. Maybe a particular student needed a little extra help. Maybe they had something stressful happen at home. Students should be given a chance to finish their assignments, even if they have missed the deadline. I understand that life has deadlines, but in this case, it is more important to leave students with content comprehension than life’s lessons. They should be allowed a grade reduction up to a certain allotted time. The second article about creating instructional rubrics provided a more elaborate, more precise way of assessing students. Although rubrics may just be the current trend in grading, they do provide informative feedback to students. As I have learned, feedback is critical to a successful education and makes for better adjusted students. When given with assignments, rubrics provide students with detailed descriptions of teacher expectations. Students are more capable and more in control of their final grades. They know what the teacher is looking for and do not have to guess; which is an earlier, backwards model of instruction. Now…I would like to practice creating these rubrics. I think there should be classes and workshops (which I’m sure there are and I’m not there yet) specifically dealing with ways to create accurate assessments.

Rubrics are very beneficial to both students and teachers. They offer clear expectations about the assignment and how the work will be graded when turned in. I also think this is great for cooperative earning based classrooms that are doing group projects and assessing other students, like our class. If there are clear distinctive expectations for the work there are no excuses in not having the required criteria. I did get the feeling in the article that there was a movement to rubrics and that may cause traditional teachers to have a hard time incorporating this in their teaching habits but I again think that they will find the students to better have a grasp on what they are required to do. I understood that girl in the article that cried about her grade, I felt terrible for her and sometimes in college that is how I have felt when I have received grades on assignments. If both sides know clearly what the rubric is like, I think that there would be less frustrated students and better grades!!!! Jnewh001 (talk) 17:15, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

I enjoyed reading this article about rubrics. I especially liked the diagram of the instructional rubric Ms. Andrade offered. It was very easy to read and was more specific than general in criteria. This is definitely the type of rubric I would like to use as a teacher. Rubrics are about scoring and giving feedback, which are very important to students and teachers alike. The more specific feedback one can give, the better understanding it will have for the writer.Scarlett1 (talk) 23:30, 21 June 2009 (UTC)