Aisling and Kristina,
You are right on track. Consistency is essential.
Nice job.
Aisling,
Bet the rubrics you develop do work well with your discipline. Keep up the good work in helping students understand the expectations and reaching for the learning objectives. Thanks!
Kristina, I completely agree with you that it is very important to uphold a high level of objectivity and reliabilty.
Very important to maintain consistency
AISLING
I teach science subjects so I really liked the idea of using rubrics as it defines what is needed for each assignment up front. It provides a fair system of grading that the student is aware of from the start.
Task-specific rubrics . I think it will provide my students with guidelines on what kind of performances is expected from them.
I Think it is very important to define those necessary expectations in a class from the very start so the students understand what is needed to get a good grade.
Deborah,
Excellent. The rubrics with excellent criteria are the key.
Thanks!
It is important to use rubrics because it gives the students the expectations and also provides the student with more feedback. The grading will also be more consistent for students and instructors will have an easier time providing effective feedback.
Deb
Daron,
You are right. The more we lose the F2F component, the more we need to think carefully about our communication with students. The rubric is a communication tool to help students understand the expectations as well. Thanks!
John ,
Love the phrase "foundation of expectations." That says it all. We have to all be on the same page with expectations so the students can do the work and we can help them succeed. I like your model answers approach. Thanks!
Dr. Crews, I feel like the rubric is important for us as online instructors because we do not get face to face time to explain the grades and assignments. When we use the rubric they can see what we expect when we may not be immediately available for discussion. I believe there are fewer questions on grade issues as well when they see exactly what is needed by the student.
Rubrics provide a foudation for expectations which is especially critical in an online distance education environment. The rubric must be explained to the students, specifically what are you looking for as the instrcutor, and then the assignmetns submitted must be graded according to those rubric expectations. I have seen many of my colleagues explicitly tell the students in their Live Chats what they expect and then grade the assignments subjectively on criteria not explained, or as compared to other student work. I have found that developing a "model answer" beforehand helps me provide better feedback and consistency in my grading of papers.
Michael ,
"Effective" is the key word. We have to work at it to get the criteria and objectives in the rubric so we can help our students improve. Thanks!
Hello Dr. Crews,
When we instructors create effective rubrics, they not only create assessment criteria, they integrate those criteria with the course objectives. In addition we provide our students with a means to evaluate their own learning.
Sincerely,
Michael Luzius
Christina,
You're right. The time and effort to create a viable rubric is well worth it. Also, you'll be able to use the rubric over and over again with a few tweaks and may even be able to adjust the same rubric for another course or project. That's a time saver too.
Thanks!
Despite the initial time investment in creating a rubric, I use rubrics extensively for several reasons:
*It decreases time spent in the midst of grading during the session. With so many assignments to grade, efficient use of time is critical.
*Rubrics standardize grading. As a student, I often felt that my instructors scored students by completely different standards on the same assignment. Grades seemed random with no consistency. How can a student hope to improve when the criteria is random? In this way, rubrics also help instructors clarify for themselves what they want to see out of an assignment and remain consistent.
*For the students, rubrics make great checklists! Before starting the assignment, while completing the assignment, and then before submitting it. The students can look at the grading rubric and check off each item to be sure they completed the assignment. In this way, the student knows what to do and what to expect. For the instructor, grading students who do the assignment correctly is always easier than the alternative. So rubrics are a win-win situation.
michael,
You are right. Effective rubrics should help reduce questions from the students and help them meet the clear objectives that I hope are in the rubric itself. Thanks!
michael,
Right on! The expectations you (through the rubric) set are essential to setting the stage for the learning environment. We have to help them strive to meet the objectives and standards, but they have to do the work. Thanks!
Rubrics are very helpful for many reasons. Improving the rubrics over time is essential for both the students and instructor because it leave less "gray area' for questions, dispute over grading and presents students with clear objectives.
Rubrics are set of criteria or scoring guide that describe level of performance or understanding. It is important to provide students with expectations about what is required, assessed, standards to be met, and information about where students are in relation to where they need to be or progress they have made.
robert,
It's interesting that you have seen the top performing students use the rubrics to their advantage. Smart students. ;-) Thanks!
Rubrics are a must in the online environment. They set clear expectations for work and eliminate for the most part student’s complaints about being unfairly graded. I have incorporated grading rubrics with great success as part of my assignment checklists. Students that utilize them are always in the top performing part of the class.
