Rubrics: Assessment and Learning Tools

Teaching and learning cannot exist without assessment. There are many different forms of it. Formal and informal assessment are well known, while terms of formative and summative assessment are used by professionals only. This response concentrates on one tool for grading student's performance which is called "rubric". Rubric is not a new concept and it can be considered inappropriate topic to discuss in this blog, but I found a new type of rubric which teachers can find valuable.

After reading two short articles about several types of rubrics, I decided to summarise them in this response. Banow (2015) in his blog post "Single-Point Rubrics: Exceeding Expectations" compares analytic and single-point rubrics and expresses his attitude towards them. He describes a long process of creating an analytic rubric and compares that to quite easy way of developing a single-point rubric. In addition, the author includes in his post a video called "Assessment Using Rubrics" by Dr. Michelle Prytula (2013) which is a really valuable sourse of information about advantages of using rubrics for both teachers and learners. Another article under consideration is called "Know Your Terms: Holistic, Analytic, and Single-Point Rubrics" by Gonzalez (2014) where the author compares three types of rubrics and expresses ger preferences.

Summarizing information from two articles and the video, I would like to describe advantages and disadvantages for all three types of rubrics below.

Holistic Rubrics

Advantages:

• easy for the teacher;
• needs little time to create;
• fast to grade as a teacher chooses only one holistic score to the whole work.

Disadvantages:

• does not provide proper feedback to students;
• not clear reasons for grading so student cannot get explanation.

Analytic Rubrics

Advantages:

• clearer picture for students;
• no need to explain everything to student.

Disadvantages:

• a lot of time to create;
• difficult to formulate satisfactory criteria;
• students do not usually read it all.

Single-Point Rubrics

Advantages:

• less language that analytic rubric;
• open-ended areas of concern and excellence;
• students are more likely to read it;
• less time to create.

Disadvantage:

• can include much writing while grading if there are a lot of areas to improve.

Conclusion

There are a lot of variations on these three basic types and they are all useful and necessary for particular situation. However, what all scientists mention is that single-point rubric is the most valuable type of rubric to assess students' performance.

The first time I faced this rubric was five days ago. Therefore, I can claim that single-point rubric is quite new concept in Kazakhstan. That is the reason why it is worth talking about and using in evryday classes.

References:

Banow, Ryan. (2015). Single-Point Rubrics: Exceeding Expectations. Retrieved from: http://words.usask.ca/gmcte/author/rnb024/ 

Gonzalez, Jennifer. (2014). Know Your Terms: Hoilstic, Analytic, and Single-Point Rubrics. Retrieved from: http://www.cultofpedagogy.com/holistic-analytic-single-point-rubrics/ 

Prytula, Michelle. (2013). Assessment Using Rubrics. Retrieved from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jKFvrN-KL_w 

Townsend, Brendan. (2015). What is a Rubric? An Evaluation Form from Simple (Holistic) to Highly Complex (Analytic). Retrieved from: http://slideplayer.com/slide/8457865/