gp essay marking rubrics

• Published by: Tutor City
• April 17, 2023

A-Level General Paper – The Full Guide to Junior College H1 GP

As an A-Level student, you are required to take some compulsory subjects that you must excel in. One of these subjects is General Paper (GP), and you will study it at the Junior College (JC) level. The key to excelling in this subject is knowing what to expect and how to study for it.

So, if you want to know more about H1 GP in JC, you have come to the right place. Here is a full guide that will help you understand the syllabus so that you can score well in this subject without any issues.

A Brief Glimpse Into H1 GP

The first thing you need to understand is why this subject is compulsory for students. The primary aim of having a GP is to boost your general knowledge, develop critical thinking skills, boost communication skills, and much more. When you study this subject, these key areas are important to focus on to score well.

You will also need to have a solid foundation in English if you want to do well in this examination. That is because you have to create arguments in this language to showcase your understanding of the subject. By the time you are done, you will have a high level of understanding of current affairs and be able to communicate your knowledge fluently.

Here are some aims that you will achieve after studying for GP:

• Evaluating and analyzing various topics
• Making observations between trends
• Formulating arguments based on critical thinking
• Comprehending texts in their entirety
• Using good English to demonstrate your knowledge
• Presenting information in a clear yet concise manner

So, make sure that you are working on these skills while studying for your GP examination. As long as you can develop these skills, you will ace the exam without any issues.

All You Need To Know About GP Paper 1

There will be two examinations you will have to give in this subject, which includes Paper 1 and 2. Paper 1 is a writing examination that comprises fifty marks, with thirty marks for content and twenty marks for language. The paper will last for an hour and thirty minutes.

There will be twelve questions in this paper, and each of them will cover a unique topic. You will also be expected to write a discursive or argumentative essay in this paper. Keep in mind that usually, the essay question will have a quote or statement that you will have to respond to through writing an essay.

The essay will have to showcase your unique perspectives and ideas while drawing examples from the real world. Some examples of the topics can include marriage, culture, social media, politics, society, law, and much more. Make sure you read up on the relevant issues in society and culture.

How You Can Score Well In GP 1

Now that you know what to expect in GP 1, you might be wondering what you can do to score great marks. Well, here are some tips you can follow that will allow you to ensure a good score:

1. Take The Time To Learn About Current Affairs

You have to know what is happening around you to score well in the GP. That is why you should read up on current affairs through social media, newspapers, TV, and much more. It will help you create a broad perspective and understanding of what is happening around you.

While it is good to read the opinion of others on news stories, it is also just as important to have your own opinion. This is why you should always read current affairs with a critical lens. It will help you develop the writing and critical thinking skills you need to do well in the examination.

2. Create Different Arguments And Issues On Different Topics

Whenever you are reading the news and current affairs, it is important to have your own thoughts regarding it. This is why you should take the time to create a list of different issues and arguments you can present about a certain topic. These arguments will help you to think about current affairs in a new light.

You can look up different arguments online, but make sure that what you present stays true to how you think. When you add your authentic touch to the writing, it will convey to the examiners marking your paper.

3. Have A Solid English Foundation

The GP is also a test of your English language skills, which is why your foundation needs to be solid. You need to practice your English language skills by reading more, communicating more, and boosting your vocabulary. If you think you lack in this regard, then you can always hire a private tutor to help you with your language skills.

They will help you practice these skills so that you don't have any issues communicating your viewpoint during the paper. You can think of GP as an English-language paper with some additional changes. This is why having a strong foundation in English is incredibly important.

All You Need To Know About GP 2

GP two consists of comprehension and summary writing. The paper consists of fifty marks, with thirty-five marks for content and fifteen marks for language. It will last for an hour and thirty minutes so that you have ample time to complete the exam.

The paper will require you to answer short questions, which will consist of seventeen marks. These questions usually test students' understanding of vocabulary and inferred and literal meaning of texts. Besides that, you will also have to answer a summary and an application question.

These questions will ask you to bring your critical thinking and analysis skills to light. It will help you answer your questions well without any issues. Once you are familiar with the examination format, you can follow guidelines to help you excel.

How You Can Score Well In GP 2

Here are some important guidelines you can follow to score well in GP 2:

1. Attempt Past Papers

Practice makes perfect, and you will need a lot of it to score well in GP 2 because it will require you to showcase your critical thinking and analysis skills. This is why it is incredibly important to keep practicing the past papers. These will give you insight into what you can expect during the examination and how you can time everything.

Besides that, it will also provide you practice with applying your critical thinking skills during the exam. Make sure you stimulate the same conditions as the examination while attempting so you can work on doing well. It will also help you deal with the time and pressure in an appropriate manner.

2. Practice Writing A Summary

You will have to practice your summary writing skills if you want to score well on this exam. You can practice this part of the examination to excel in it when you are giving paper 2. You will have to write a summary between 130 and 150 words.

Keep in mind that most people don’t do too well in this because they can’t get their point across in a concise manner. So, practicing this part will help you get your point across without making the summary too long. Make sure that you keep practicing this till you get it right.

3. Analyze Every Argument You Witness

Paper 2 requires you to showcase your critical thinking skills, which means you have to develop coherent arguments. It is a skill to do this well, which is why you can analyze various arguments you see in newspapers and other sources. You can make it a daily practice to read one article and analyze it in a critical manner.

By the end of the year, you will have had good practice in this domain. Even ten minutes a day can add up to a lot at the end of the year. This is why you can make it a point to read current affairs daily and analyze and evaluate arguments.

Resources To Help You Ace The GP Exam

It is always great to invest in resources that will help you ace the exam without any issues. There are many resources for GP, including books, applications, and more. Here are some of these resources to help you study well for this examination:

1. A-Level General Paper: Understanding Singapore Issues

It is crucial to understand the issues in your country first before moving on to global affairs. This is why this book is an excellent resource that will help you understand issues, develop analytical skills, and much more. It explores a broad range of themes and issues in detail so that you can be cognizant of them.

The guidebook will help you handle various GP essays that are relevant to papers 1 and 2. It will be a great investment for your examination. So, make sure that you get this book if you want to begin understanding local issues.

2. A-Level General Paper: Understanding Global Issues

The GP examination doesn't just focus on local issues but also global issues. This book can help you understand the prevalent issues in the global world with examples and statistics so that you can learn more. It covers around eighteen exam themes and topics that you can explore with this book.

The author has provided an introduction before each topic so that you can explore them in detail. The key is to use this book as a guide and then do your own research to develop arguments around various issues. So, make sure that you also purchase this to complement the book mentioned before.

3. A-Level General Paper: Mastering Short Questions

All of us have certain weak areas that we need to work on in examinations. If you think you are weak in comprehension and short questions, then you need this book in your life. It has all the techniques you need to answer short questions well.

Besides that, it provides examples of different questions along with an analysis of trends and patterns. You can see this book as the perfect guide to master answering short questions without any issues. So, if you are weak in this regard, make sure you invest in this book.

4. A-Level General Paper: Model Essays By Themes (Volume 2)

Every paper in the GP examination contains content and language sections that you need to answer. The Model Essays by Themes book has thirty model GP essays divided into various themes. It includes pointers for language and content skills while also covering popular themes that show up in the examination.

Because of this, it is a great book to get if you want to work on these skills. Once you do, you will be extremely confident in acing your Paper 1 without any issues.

5. GP Study Magazine

Finally, GP Study Magazine is an application that you will find on Google Play Store. It has been designed to help students study for the GP examination with ease. You will find GP articles and essays on every topic under the sun so that you have all the important content you need.

Besides that, you can also use this application as a learning supplement because it includes data, videos, infographics, figures, and more. You can use this application regardless of where you are to help you study without any barriers.

Final Words

That was your complete guide to JC H1 GP in Singapore and what you can do to score well in this examination. The subject comes with a learning curve, which is why you will have to practice a lot to score well. If you need some help, we recommend that you get a private GP tutor for your needs.

Private tutors and GP tuition centres are well-versed in the subject, and they have the knowledge to help you excel by working on your strengths and weaknesses. So, make sure that you follow these guidelines and make the right choices to ace this exam with flying colors.

Tutor City's blog focuses on balancing informative and relevant content, never at the expense of providing an enriching read.  We want our readers to expand their horizons by learning more and find meaning to what they learn. Resident author - Mr Wee Ben Sen, has a wealth of experience in crafting articles to provide valuable insights in the field of private education. Ben Sen has also been running Tutor City, a leading home tuition agency in Singapore since 2010.

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Rubric Best Practices, Examples, and Templates

A rubric is a scoring tool that identifies the different criteria relevant to an assignment, assessment, or learning outcome and states the possible levels of achievement in a specific, clear, and objective way. Use rubrics to assess project-based student work including essays, group projects, creative endeavors, and oral presentations.

Rubrics can help instructors communicate expectations to students and assess student work fairly, consistently and efficiently. Rubrics can provide students with informative feedback on their strengths and weaknesses so that they can reflect on their performance and work on areas that need improvement.

How to Get Started

Best practices, moodle how-to guides.

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Step 1: Analyze the assignment

The first step in the rubric creation process is to analyze the assignment or assessment for which you are creating a rubric. To do this, consider the following questions:

• What is the purpose of the assignment and your feedback? What do you want students to demonstrate through the completion of this assignment (i.e. what are the learning objectives measured by it)? Is it a summative assessment, or will students use the feedback to create an improved product?
• Does the assignment break down into different or smaller tasks? Are these tasks equally important as the main assignment?
• What would an “excellent” assignment look like? An “acceptable” assignment? One that still needs major work?
• How detailed do you want the feedback you give students to be? Do you want/need to give them a grade?

Step 2: Decide what kind of rubric you will use

Types of rubrics: holistic, analytic/descriptive, single-point

Holistic Rubric. A holistic rubric includes all the criteria (such as clarity, organization, mechanics, etc.) to be considered together and included in a single evaluation. With a holistic rubric, the rater or grader assigns a single score based on an overall judgment of the student’s work, using descriptions of each performance level to assign the score.

Advantages of holistic rubrics:

• Can p lace an emphasis on what learners can demonstrate rather than what they cannot
• Save grader time by minimizing the number of evaluations to be made for each student
• Can be used consistently across raters, provided they have all been trained

Disadvantages of holistic rubrics:

• Provide less specific feedback than analytic/descriptive rubrics
• Can be difficult to choose a score when a student’s work is at varying levels across the criteria
• Any weighting of c riteria cannot be indicated in the rubric

Analytic/Descriptive Rubric . An analytic or descriptive rubric often takes the form of a table with the criteria listed in the left column and with levels of performance listed across the top row. Each cell contains a description of what the specified criterion looks like at a given level of performance. Each of the criteria is scored individually.

Advantages of analytic rubrics:

• Provide detailed feedback on areas of strength or weakness
• Each criterion can be weighted to reflect its relative importance

Disadvantages of analytic rubrics:

• More time-consuming to create and use than a holistic rubric
• May not be used consistently across raters unless the cells are well defined
• May result in giving less personalized feedback

Single-Point Rubric . A single-point rubric is breaks down the components of an assignment into different criteria, but instead of describing different levels of performance, only the “proficient” level is described. Feedback space is provided for instructors to give individualized comments to help students improve and/or show where they excelled beyond the proficiency descriptors.

Advantages of single-point rubrics:

• Easier to create than an analytic/descriptive rubric
• Perhaps more likely that students will read the descriptors
• Areas of concern and excellence are open-ended
• May removes a focus on the grade/points
• May increase student creativity in project-based assignments

Disadvantage of analytic rubrics: Requires more work for instructors writing feedback

Step 3 (Optional): Look for templates and examples.

You might Google, “Rubric for persuasive essay at the college level” and see if there are any publicly available examples to start from. Ask your colleagues if they have used a rubric for a similar assignment. Some examples are also available at the end of this article. These rubrics can be a great starting point for you, but consider steps 3, 4, and 5 below to ensure that the rubric matches your assignment description, learning objectives and expectations.

Step 4: Define the assignment criteria

Make a list of the knowledge and skills are you measuring with the assignment/assessment Refer to your stated learning objectives, the assignment instructions, past examples of student work, etc. for help.

  Helpful strategies for defining grading criteria:

• Collaborate with co-instructors, teaching assistants, and other colleagues
• Brainstorm and discuss with students
• Can they be observed and measured?
• Are they important and essential?
• Are they distinct from other criteria?
• Are they phrased in precise, unambiguous language?
• Revise the criteria as needed
• Consider whether some are more important than others, and how you will weight them.

Step 5: Design the rating scale

Most ratings scales include between 3 and 5 levels. Consider the following questions when designing your rating scale:

• Given what students are able to demonstrate in this assignment/assessment, what are the possible levels of achievement?
• How many levels would you like to include (more levels means more detailed descriptions)
• Will you use numbers and/or descriptive labels for each level of performance? (for example 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 and/or Exceeds expectations, Accomplished, Proficient, Developing, Beginning, etc.)
• Don’t use too many columns, and recognize that some criteria can have more columns that others . The rubric needs to be comprehensible and organized. Pick the right amount of columns so that the criteria flow logically and naturally across levels.

Step 6: Write descriptions for each level of the rating scale

Artificial Intelligence tools like Chat GPT have proven to be useful tools for creating a rubric. You will want to engineer your prompt that you provide the AI assistant to ensure you get what you want. For example, you might provide the assignment description, the criteria you feel are important, and the number of levels of performance you want in your prompt. Use the results as a starting point, and adjust the descriptions as needed.

Building a rubric from scratch

For a single-point rubric , describe what would be considered “proficient,” i.e. B-level work, and provide that description. You might also include suggestions for students outside of the actual rubric about how they might surpass proficient-level work.

For analytic and holistic rubrics , c reate statements of expected performance at each level of the rubric.

• Consider what descriptor is appropriate for each criteria, e.g., presence vs absence, complete vs incomplete, many vs none, major vs minor, consistent vs inconsistent, always vs never. If you have an indicator described in one level, it will need to be described in each level.
• You might start with the top/exemplary level. What does it look like when a student has achieved excellence for each/every criterion? Then, look at the “bottom” level. What does it look like when a student has not achieved the learning goals in any way? Then, complete the in-between levels.
• For an analytic rubric , do this for each particular criterion of the rubric so that every cell in the table is filled. These descriptions help students understand your expectations and their performance in regard to those expectations.

Well-written descriptions:

• Describe observable and measurable behavior
• Use parallel language across the scale
• Indicate the degree to which the standards are met

Step 7: Create your rubric

Create your rubric in a table or spreadsheet in Word, Google Docs, Sheets, etc., and then transfer it by typing it into Moodle. You can also use online tools to create the rubric, but you will still have to type the criteria, indicators, levels, etc., into Moodle. Rubric creators: Rubistar , iRubric

Step 8: Pilot-test your rubric

Prior to implementing your rubric on a live course, obtain feedback from:

• Teacher assistants

Try out your new rubric on a sample of student work. After you pilot-test your rubric, analyze the results to consider its effectiveness and revise accordingly.

• Limit the rubric to a single page for reading and grading ease
• Use parallel language . Use similar language and syntax/wording from column to column. Make sure that the rubric can be easily read from left to right or vice versa.
• Use student-friendly language . Make sure the language is learning-level appropriate. If you use academic language or concepts, you will need to teach those concepts.
• Share and discuss the rubric with your students . Students should understand that the rubric is there to help them learn, reflect, and self-assess. If students use a rubric, they will understand the expectations and their relevance to learning.
• Consider scalability and reusability of rubrics. Create rubric templates that you can alter as needed for multiple assignments.
• Maximize the descriptiveness of your language. Avoid words like “good” and “excellent.” For example, instead of saying, “uses excellent sources,” you might describe what makes a resource excellent so that students will know. You might also consider reducing the reliance on quantity, such as a number of allowable misspelled words. Focus instead, for example, on how distracting any spelling errors are.

Example of an analytic rubric for a final paper

Example of a holistic rubric for a final paper

Single-Point Rubric

More examples:

• Single Point Rubric Template ( variation )
• Analytic Rubric Template make a copy to edit
• A Rubric for Rubrics
• Bank of Online Discussion Rubrics in different formats
• Mathematical Presentations Descriptive Rubric
• Math Proof Assessment Rubric
• Kansas State Sample Rubrics
• Design Single Point Rubric

Technology Tools: Rubrics in Moodle

• Moodle Docs: Rubrics
• Moodle Docs: Grading Guide (use for single-point rubrics)

Tools with rubrics (other than Moodle)

• Google Assignments
• Turnitin Assignments: Rubric or Grading Form

Other resources

• DePaul University (n.d.). Rubrics .
• Gonzalez, J. (2014). Know your terms: Holistic, Analytic, and Single-Point Rubrics . Cult of Pedagogy.
• Goodrich, H. (1996). Understanding rubrics . Teaching for Authentic Student Performance, 54 (4), 14-17. Retrieved from   
• Miller, A. (2012). Tame the beast: tips for designing and using rubrics.
• Ragupathi, K., Lee, A. (2020). Beyond Fairness and Consistency in Grading: The Role of Rubrics in Higher Education. In: Sanger, C., Gleason, N. (eds) Diversity and Inclusion in Global Higher Education. Palgrave Macmillan, Singapore.

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[A Levels] What is the GP rubric/marking scheme

Hi guys, does anyone know the marking scheme for General Paper? For example I know that Paper 1 is 30 Content/20 Language but does anyone know the further breakdown in table for each component (i.e. 20-15 Tactful and accurate language, 15-10 Good language with occasional misuse) etc. Thanks in advance :)

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How to use the rubric

• Read through the assignment rubric alongside the assignment task instructions.
• Make a note of anything that is not clear and ask your lecturers or tutors for clarification.
• While you are doing your assignment, keep referring to the rubric to make sure you are on track.
• Before you hand in your assignment, have another look at the rubric to make a judgement of your work and make changes if needed.

How to learn from feedback

When you get your assignment back, it is very tempting to just look at the mark or grade and ignore any  written feedback .

Look at the marks on the rubric to understand the feedback given for your assignment. It can sometimes feel challenging to read comments that are critical of your work, especially when you believe that you have put a lot of effort into the assignment. Feedback can be very useful to you as it:

• Enables you to build on what you have done correctly.
• Helps you to identify where you went wrong.
• Identifies where you need to make improvements so that you can do better next time.

If you need to clarify any feedback you have been given, be proactive and contact your lecturer. Most lecturers have office hours where you can see them to discuss any course-related issues. Discuss the feedback with them so that you understand what you might need to improve for your next assignment.

Can I get feedback before I submit my assignment?

Some courses provide an opportunity for peer review or lecturer feedback prior to submission of the assignment. This is a way of getting early feedback so that you can improve the assignment before you hand it in. In most cases you will be guided in this process by your lecturer through your Canvas course page.

Related topics

• Analysing questions
• Key study skills

See all available workshops .

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What are rubrics and how do they affect student learning?

Rubrics are scoring criteria for grading or marking student assessment. When shared before assessment, rubrics communicate to students how they will be evaluated and how they should demonstrate their knowledge and to understand their own score. As pedagogy continues to transform, It’s important to consider the history of rubrics as a context for this pedagogical moment.

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Rubrics are guidelines for student assessments, often used as scoring criteria for grading and marking student work. They are best made clear to students before an assessment; effective rubrics give students transparency into how they will be evaluated, how they should demonstrate their knowledge, what to expect on tests and assignments, and provide next steps in learning.

Rubrics also clarify any marking or grading outcomes, helping students understand why they received their particular score or grade. A good rubric promotes student learning .

In sum, rubrics make clear what counts, what defines excellent work, and uphold grading consistency so that students can succeed and learn in alignment with course expectations; they define the performance instead of judging. Rubrics, just like assessments, are best when designed to connect to learning and outcomes.

Notable pedagogist, Thomas R. Guskey, states , “Interest in rubrics surged during the 1990s as educators turned their focus to documenting student achievement of specific learning standards . Today, rubrics for describing and assessing student performance can be found at every level of education, from preschool and kindergarten to graduate and professional school.”

The history of rubrics follows the proliferation of compulsory education and learning standards. An increasing emphasis on formative assessment has further encouraged the adoption of rubrics within secondary and higher education classrooms, both in North America and East Asia ( Ragupathi & Lee, 2020 ).

Rubrics set evaluation standards that can promote fair grading practices, even across a teaching team. In the case of standardized exams, they uphold consistent marking across an even wider swath of students and graders. They are “multidimensional sets of scoring guidelines that can be used to provide consistency in evaluating student work. They spell out scoring criteria so that multiple teachers, using the same rubric for a student's essay, for example, would arrive at the same score or grade” ( Edutopia, 2018 ).

Furthermore, when students understand rubrics ahead of assessment, they understand how they will be evaluated.

In sum, effective rubrics can:

• Measure higher-order skills or evaluate complex tasks
• Clarify learning goals
• Align students to your expectations
• Foster self-learning and self-improvement in students
• Aid students in self-assessment
• Inspire better student performance
• Improve feedback to students
• Result in faster and easier scoring of assessments
• Enable more accurate, unbiased, and consistent scoring
• Reduce regrading requests from students
• Provide feedback to faculty and staff ( Suskie, 2009 , Wolf & Stevens, 2007 ).

What do effective rubrics look like? They’re more than just a checklist, but rather guidelines that focus on skills that demonstrate learning.

According to Susan M. Brookhart , there are two essential components of effective rubrics:

• Criteria that relates to the learning (and not “the tasks” )
• Performance level descriptions against a continuum of quality.

Researchers recommend two or more performance criteria with distinct, clear, and meaningful labels ( Brookhart, 2018 ) along with 3-5 quality or performance levels ( Popham, 2000 ; Suskie, 2009 ).

An example of five performance levels might look like this:

• Far Below Expectations
• Below Expectations
• Meets Expectations
• Exceeds Expectations
• Demonstrates Excellence

Criteria should center around learning, not tasks. “Appropriate criteria,” according to Brookhart’ s 2018 research , “are the key to effective rubrics. Trivial or surface-level criteria will not draw learning goals for students as clearly as substantive criteria. Students will try to produce what is expected of them.”

For example, examples of criteria might look like the following:

• The thesis sentence is present with strong analytical components and supported by the rest of the essay
• The thesis sentence is present with analytical components and supported by the rest of the essay
• Thesis sentence is present, albeit more summary than analysis, and supported by the rest of the essay
• Thesis sentence is present but not supported by the rest of the essay
• Not present

There are two main types of rubrics for evaluating student work: holistic and analytic rubrics . Each has its strengths with regard to how educators can approach evaluation of student learning. A third type of rubric is the checklist, which contains no performance descriptions, and is solely composed of criteria.

Holistic rubrics focus on the overall product or performance rather than the components. For instance, instead of dividing essay evaluation into an evaluation of thesis, supporting arguments, structure, and so forth and so on, holistic rubrics look at the entire efficacy of the essay itself. Hence, holistic rubrics would have criteria that describe competency levels of essay writing in a single scale, from “essay does not successfully argue its point with no supporting arguments and consistent writing errors” to “essay introduces original ideas with strong supporting arguments and technical writing excellence.”

A holistic rubric produces a single score based on a judgment of overall student work.

Holistic rubrics are used when missteps can be tolerated, and the focus is on general quality and what the learner can do rather than what they cannot do ( Chase, 1999 ). Oftentimes, holistic rubrics can be used when student skills are more advanced. They can also save time because there are fewer components and decisions to consider.

Because they focus on the generalized quality of student work, it may be more challenging to provide feedback on specific components. This may be challenging when, for example, a student’s work is at varying levels—for example, if an essay has original ideas, analysis, and supporting arguments but has many syntactical errors. Additionally, because holistic rubrics tend towards sweeping descriptions, scoring may be susceptible to subjectivity.

Analytic rubrics provide levels of performance for multiple criteria, with scores for separate and individual components of student work; they assess work in multiple dimensions. Analytic rubrics also provide descriptions for each of these performance levels so students know what is expected of them ( Mertler, 2001 ). Additionally, criterion can be weighted differently to reflect the importance of each component.

Because they are more comprehensive and examine different components of student work, they take more time to develop. And unless the description for each criteria is well defined, scoring may be inconsistent.

With checklist rubrics, there are only two performance levels (yes/no, present/absent, pass/fail, etc.). And a useful checklist usually has many criteria. They do enable faster grading, and a checklist provides ample clarity for students. Checklists enable an all-or-nothing approach, which is helpful at certain stages of learning. For instance, if a student is learning to write an essay, a checklist is an effective way for students to understand what they need to provide.

Oftentimes, a checklist can be converted into an analytic rubric.

Checklists are long, and may be time-consuming to create. When students are no longer new to a topic, checklists don’t provide the nuanced feedback necessary to move from conscious incompetence to conscious competence. In other words, checklists aren’t as helpful when students are “most of the way” towards competence.

A rubric is most often structured like a matrix with two main components: criteria (usually listed on the left side) and the performance descriptions (listed across the top).

Rubric development involves several steps:

• Define the purpose of an assessment
• Establish evaluation criteria
• Determine performance levels
• Provide descriptions for each performance level

Is an assignment measuring the presence of criteria or the quality of criteria?

Consider the student stage of learning in this step. When students are just beginning to write an essay or engage in geometry theorems, they are in early stages of learning. Students learning a new concept or skill may benefit from a binary approach towards whether criteria is present or not.

Students in more advanced stages of learning may benefit from being measured by a spectrum of quality.

Analytic and holistic rubrics measure the quality of criteria. Checklists or checklist rubrics measure the presence of criteria.

When developing rubrics, select the most important criteria in evaluating student work. Part of establishing criteria is asking yourself questions about what you want to identify in student work. For instance, why are you giving students this assignment? What are the characteristics of good student work? What specific skills do you want demonstrated in the assessment?

By asking yourself questions about the purpose of the assessment and how it aligns to learning objectives, you can then decide the 3-8 criteria that shows what you want students to achieve.

Determine what the performance levels should be and how many. There are usually 3-5 performance levels (qualitative), and oftentimes they are associated with scores or points (quantitative). You may want to begin with the anchors (best and worst), first before exploring how many levels you want in between. Students can often be confused by the “fuzzy” middle, so it is important to make each level distinct.

According to notable researcher Susan Brookhart, it is important to be clear and thorough in performance descriptions, which also prompt student learning. Brookhart states, “If the criterion is simply having or counting something in their work (e.g., “has 5 paragraphs”), students need not pay attention to the quality of what their work has. If the criterion is substantive (e.g., “states a compelling thesis”), attention to quality becomes part of the work” ( Brookhart, 2018 ).

For holistic rubrics, it is critical to write thorough and clear narrative descriptions of each criterion, particularly because they have to be comprehensive in describing the whole product.

For analytic rubrics, each criterion needs a description of performance level.

Language should be neutral and as objective as possible, avoiding subjective words like “interesting.” Instead, outline objective indicators like “new idea that analyzes instead of summarizes.”

Finally, consider evaluating your own rubric.

Depaul University’s Teaching Commons suggests the following questions to ask when evaluating a rubric:

• Does the rubric relate to the outcome(s) being measured?
• Does it cover important criteria for student performance?
• Does the top end of the rubric reflect excellence?
• Are the criteria and scales well-defined?
• Can the rubric be applied consistently by different scorers?

These two terms are often used interchangeably, but it is helpful to distinguish their differences. Rubrics are used to communicate student performance and expectations on assessments. Scales, on the other hand, describe how a student has progressed in their learning journey relative to stated learning goals ( University of Maryland Baltimore ).

“Rubrics with criteria that are about the task—with descriptions of performance that amount to checklists for directions—assess compliance and not learning. Rubrics with counts instead of quality descriptions assess the existence of something and not its quality,” according to Brookhart ( 2013 ).

Confusing learning outcomes with tasks can result in using rubrics as a checklist, which are often binary (e.g., “yes/no”) in nature. But rubrics that are more descriptive and reflect higher-order thinking provide students with action items, uphold assessment with integrity, and improve learning outcomes.

Rubrics that do not align to learning goals can also limit learning. Ensure that rubrics focus on core learning goals and are in alignment with course expectations. For example, if formatting margins on an essay is not a course objective but is included in rubrics, the efficacy of that rubric may be compromised. Students may confuse what it is they should do with what it is they should learn; when this occurs, once the students complete a task, they may feel their learning has ended instead of seeing learning as a continuum.

Other misperceptions include confusing rubrics with evaluative rating scales. Rating scales are useful for grading, and involve evaluations across a scale without description (e.g., 1-5, always/sometimes/never or A-F). While rating scales are useful for grading, they don’t offer students a description of quality that they can utilize as they navigate learning.

While effective rubrics can foster learning, they can be limited in scope. If, according to Angelo State University’s Instruction Design , “educators use the rubric to tell students what to put in an assignment, then that may be all they put. It may also be all that they learn.”

Wolf and Stevens, state that rubrics have more advantages than disadvantages but “If poorly designed they can actually diminish the learning process. Rubrics can act as a straitjacket, preventing creations other than those envisioned by the rubric-maker from unfolding. (“If it is not on the rubric, it must not be important or possible.”) The challenge then is to create a rubric that makes clear what is valued in the performance or product—without constraining or diminishing them” ( Wolf & Stevens, 2007 ).

Effective rubrics also take a lot of time to develop.

The formative feedback process, a core element of student-teacher communication, begins with setting expectations. Rubrics are “one way to make learning expectations explicit for learners” (Brookhart, 2018 ). These clear and explicit expectations help students see what learning looks like so that they can then absorb feedback in alignment with those learning goals.

Jay McTighe specifies that effective rubrics do the following:

• Clearly define criteria for judging student performance based on targeted standards/outcomes
• Promote more consistent evaluation of student performance
• Help clarify instructional goals and serve as teaching targets
• Provide specific feedback to learners and teachers
• Help students focus on the important dimensions of a product or performance
• Enable criterion-based evaluation and standards-based grading
• Support student self- and peer-assessment ( McTighe, 2016 ).

Rubrics give students a greater chance of achieving a clear and defined target. They guide curriculum planning and uphold accurate assessments with integrity. Effective rubrics enable self-assessment and self-directed student learning.

Effective rubrics support the student learning journey. Additionally, rubrics have the potential to advance the learning of historically marginalized students. According to Wolf and Stevens, “An often unrecognized benefit of rubrics is that they can make learning expectations or assumptions about the tasks themselves more explicit ( Andrade & Ying, 2005 ). In academic environments [sic] we often operate on unstated cultural assumptions about the expectations for student performance and behavior and presume that all students share those same understandings” ( 2007, p. 13 ). In other words, rubrics make explicit what may be too nuanced for first generation students or English learners to access.

Rubrics are, in essence, not only part of assessment but also a teaching and learning junction with the potential to increase student learning outcomes and uphold integrity. When students feel supported, their love of learning increases into a lifelong journey.

Rubric Design

Main navigation, articulating your assessment values.

Reading, commenting on, and then assigning a grade to a piece of student writing requires intense attention and difficult judgment calls. Some faculty dread “the stack.” Students may share the faculty’s dim view of writing assessment, perceiving it as highly subjective. They wonder why one faculty member values evidence and correctness before all else, while another seeks a vaguely defined originality.

Writing rubrics can help address the concerns of both faculty and students by making writing assessment more efficient, consistent, and public. Whether it is called a grading rubric, a grading sheet, or a scoring guide, a writing assignment rubric lists criteria by which the writing is graded.

Why create a writing rubric?

• It makes your tacit rhetorical knowledge explicit
• It articulates community- and discipline-specific standards of excellence
• It links the grade you give the assignment to the criteria
• It can make your grading more efficient, consistent, and fair as you can read and comment with your criteria in mind
• It can help you reverse engineer your course: once you have the rubrics created, you can align your readings, activities, and lectures with the rubrics to set your students up for success
• It can help your students produce writing that you look forward to reading

How to create a writing rubric

Create a rubric at the same time you create the assignment. It will help you explain to the students what your goals are for the assignment.

• Consider your purpose: do you need a rubric that addresses the standards for all the writing in the course? Or do you need to address the writing requirements and standards for just one assignment?  Task-specific rubrics are written to help teachers assess individual assignments or genres, whereas generic rubrics are written to help teachers assess multiple assignments.
• Begin by listing the important qualities of the writing that will be produced in response to a particular assignment. It may be helpful to have several examples of excellent versions of the assignment in front of you: what writing elements do they all have in common? Among other things, these may include features of the argument, such as a main claim or thesis; use and presentation of sources, including visuals; and formatting guidelines such as the requirement of a works cited.
• Then consider how the criteria will be weighted in grading. Perhaps all criteria are equally important, or perhaps there are two or three that all students must achieve to earn a passing grade. Decide what best fits the class and requirements of the assignment.

Consider involving students in Steps 2 and 3. A class session devoted to developing a rubric can provoke many important discussions about the ways the features of the language serve the purpose of the writing. And when students themselves work to describe the writing they are expected to produce, they are more likely to achieve it.

At this point, you will need to decide if you want to create a holistic or an analytic rubric. There is much debate about these two approaches to assessment.

Comparing Holistic and Analytic Rubrics

Holistic scoring .

Holistic scoring aims to rate overall proficiency in a given student writing sample. It is often used in large-scale writing program assessment and impromptu classroom writing for diagnostic purposes.

General tenets to holistic scoring:

• Responding to drafts is part of evaluation
• Responses do not focus on grammar and mechanics during drafting and there is little correction
• Marginal comments are kept to 2-3 per page with summative comments at end
• End commentary attends to students’ overall performance across learning objectives as articulated in the assignment
• Response language aims to foster students’ self-assessment

Holistic rubrics emphasize what students do well and generally increase efficiency; they may also be more valid because scoring includes authentic, personal reaction of the reader. But holistic sores won’t tell a student how they’ve progressed relative to previous assignments and may be rater-dependent, reducing reliability. (For a summary of advantages and disadvantages of holistic scoring, see Becker, 2011, p. 116.)

Here is an example of a partial holistic rubric:

Summary meets all the criteria. The writer understands the article thoroughly. The main points in the article appear in the summary with all main points proportionately developed. The summary should be as comprehensive as possible and should be as comprehensive as possible and should read smoothly, with appropriate transitions between ideas. Sentences should be clear, without vagueness or ambiguity and without grammatical or mechanical errors.

A complete holistic rubric for a research paper (authored by Jonah Willihnganz) can be  downloaded here.

Analytic Scoring

Analytic scoring makes explicit the contribution to the final grade of each element of writing. For example, an instructor may choose to give 30 points for an essay whose ideas are sufficiently complex, that marshals good reasons in support of a thesis, and whose argument is logical; and 20 points for well-constructed sentences and careful copy editing.

General tenets to analytic scoring:

• Reflect emphases in your teaching and communicate the learning goals for the course
• Emphasize student performance across criterion, which are established as central to the assignment in advance, usually on an assignment sheet
• Typically take a quantitative approach, providing a scaled set of points for each criterion
• Make the analytic framework available to students before they write  

Advantages of an analytic rubric include ease of training raters and improved reliability. Meanwhile, writers often can more easily diagnose the strengths and weaknesses of their work. But analytic rubrics can be time-consuming to produce, and raters may judge the writing holistically anyway. Moreover, many readers believe that writing traits cannot be separated. (For a summary of the advantages and disadvantages of analytic scoring, see Becker, 2011, p. 115.)

For example, a partial analytic rubric for a single trait, “addresses a significant issue”:

• Excellent: Elegantly establishes the current problem, why it matters, to whom
• Above Average: Identifies the problem; explains why it matters and to whom
• Competent: Describes topic but relevance unclear or cursory
• Developing: Unclear issue and relevance

A  complete analytic rubric for a research paper can be downloaded here.  In WIM courses, this language should be revised to name specific disciplinary conventions.

Whichever type of rubric you write, your goal is to avoid pushing students into prescriptive formulas and limiting thinking (e.g., “each paragraph has five sentences”). By carefully describing the writing you want to read, you give students a clear target, and, as Ed White puts it, “describe the ongoing work of the class” (75).

Writing rubrics contribute meaningfully to the teaching of writing. Think of them as a coaching aide. In class and in conferences, you can use the language of the rubric to help you move past generic statements about what makes good writing good to statements about what constitutes success on the assignment and in the genre or discourse community. The rubric articulates what you are asking students to produce on the page; once that work is accomplished, you can turn your attention to explaining how students can achieve it.

Works Cited

Becker, Anthony.  “Examining Rubrics Used to Measure Writing Performance in U.S. Intensive English Programs.”   The CATESOL Journal  22.1 (2010/2011):113-30. Web.

White, Edward M.  Teaching and Assessing Writing . Proquest Info and Learning, 1985. Print.

Further Resources

CCCC Committee on Assessment. “Writing Assessment: A Position Statement.” November 2006 (Revised March 2009). Conference on College Composition and Communication. Web.

Gallagher, Chris W. “Assess Locally, Validate Globally: Heuristics for Validating Local Writing Assessments.” Writing Program Administration 34.1 (2010): 10-32. Web.

Huot, Brian.  (Re)Articulating Writing Assessment for Teaching and Learning.  Logan: Utah State UP, 2002. Print.

Kelly-Reilly, Diane, and Peggy O’Neil, eds. Journal of Writing Assessment. Web.

McKee, Heidi A., and Dànielle Nicole DeVoss DeVoss, Eds. Digital Writing Assessment & Evaluation. Logan, UT: Computers and Composition Digital Press/Utah State University Press, 2013. Web.

O’Neill, Peggy, Cindy Moore, and Brian Huot.  A Guide to College Writing Assessment . Logan: Utah State UP, 2009. Print.

Sommers, Nancy.  Responding to Student Writers . Macmillan Higher Education, 2013.

Straub, Richard. “Responding, Really Responding to Other Students’ Writing.” The Subject is Writing: Essays by Teachers and Students. Ed. Wendy Bishop. Boynton/Cook, 1999. Web.

White, Edward M., and Cassie A. Wright.  Assigning, Responding, Evaluating: A Writing Teacher’s Guide . 5th ed. Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2015. Print.

Using ChatGPT to create teaching materials: marking criteria & rubrics

This is the second in a series of blog posts discussing how I’m using ChatGPT to create teaching materials ( see here for part 1 on using it for data simulation and creating MCQs ). For technical context, I have primarily been using GPT4 through a paid subscription to ChatGPT but I also occasionally use Bing Chat on Creative mode (which uses GPT4 under the hood I believe).

For pedagogical context, I am course lead for a large (700 students) first year introductory psychology course. The main substantive piece of coursework students complete in the first semester is a 1500 word essay taking a critical approach to the history of psychology (the questions are focused on things like eugenics, the replication crisis, the pathologisation of LGBTQ people etc., I’ve written about the essay here ).

For marking and feedback, we use Turnitin Feedback Studio. Students receive on-script comments, a general feedback comment, and then a rubric with a rating on six criteria from Excellent (A grade) to Very Poor (G). Our full marking scheme is on a 22-point scale. The rubric doesn’t calculate a score, but the grade and the rubric should align and the marker uses the rubric to help decide the grade, i.e., if the rubric is majority Very Goods, they should be getting some sort of B.

Importantly, the rubric contains descriptions of what each level of attainment should look like. Part of the reason we include a rubric is to provide students with clear assessment criteria before submission, and clear feedback after, but part of the reason is also to help maintain consistency between markers. With 700 students, we have 10-11 markers on the team and using rubrics really helps with alignment. We also use a shared QuickMark comment bank and have multiple marking alignment meetings although that’s not relevant to the current blog.

But, writing good rubric descriptors is HARD. Getting the balance between the descriptors being specific enough to be useful to students but leaving a little room for pragmatism for markers is incredibly difficult. For example, one year, one of the rubric descriptors allowed no errors in spelling, punctuation or grammar. This seems like an entirely sensible thing to expect of an excellent essay for the writing communication criteria but if you follow it exactly (which is what you want your markers to be able to do for consistency), you end up marking down the best essay you’d ever read if it had a single typo or missing comma, which is stupid. Additionally, I particularly struggle writing the descriptions at the lower end of the criteria (is it just me?) - how do you usefully distinguish “Poor” from “Very poor”? It’s part of our marking scheme so we can and we must but putting it into words takes some effort.

Marking criteria

So, enter ChatGPT. The first thing I did was to see if it could improve the six marking criteria we use. Throughout all assessments on our programme, we group assessment criteria into knowledge & research, evaluation & analysis, and communication so I knew that I needed to keep this grouping.

My first prompt was:

Act as an expert psychology lecturer. Write marking criteria that could be used to assess the below essay questions. There should be six criteria, two about knowledge and research, two about analysis and evaluation and use of evidence, and two about academic communication. Present these in a table. [followed by essay questions]

For comparison, I present the marking criteria ChatGPT created with this relatively simple prompt, and the criteria that we used in 2022, the ones I wrote myself with my muggle brain.

Well bugger me .

To make myself feel better I must highlight that the fuller criteria ChatGPT has produced essentially include the “Excellent” descriptor from the rubric, whereas mine are just the headline criteria. But wow, that’s pretty close.

I then followed this up with a request for the rubric descriptors:

Now write me rubric descriptions for each of these criteria. There should be a description for excellent, very good, good, satisfactory, weak, poor and very poor. Present these in a table.

Me and my expertise are going to the pub.

Evaluation, limitations, and considerations

Ok, with less melodrama, let’s be critical about what it’s produced. It’s definitely not perfect and could not be used out the box without an editor with expertise. Its first attempt has recreated the issue I had previously of requiring perfection for an “Excellent” rating on “Quality of writing”. Again, you’d think it’s a sensible thing to suggest but such is the value of experience. There’s also a bit of an issue specific to our essay questions in that because they cover the history of psychology, the sources necessarily will not all be current. Another sensible suggestion but this needs edited to stop it causing confusion and anxiety.

I could edit these manually or I could try to use ChatGPT to shape its responses further:

Rewrite quality of writing but don’t specify an exact number of errors that are allowed

That’s better. Let’s try fixing the other issue:

Rewrite “Quality and breadth of research sources” to allow historical sources as well as current sources, as relevant to the essay question.

It’s better but I still don’t like it as the balance of historical and current sources that’s right will depend on the essay question they answer. It feels unlikely I’ll get it to get this one right and will edit it myself.

But, as a base from which to start editing this is incredibly helpful. There’s loads of rubric examples out there but the beauty of using ChatGPT is that I’ve been able to shape these examples to make the starting point more relevant to me by giving it the essay questions, the number of criteria I want, and the categories to group them into.

As with my attempts to use it for data simulation and writing MCQs , I’ve simplified the process I underwent here. I used the regenerate option quite a few times and some of them were better than others. The final rubric I use next year is going to be a combination of bits of the old rubric I wrote myself that were working well, along with some edited adaptions from several versions ChatGPT produced, and I’m also going to ask the teaching team to review it before we release it to students.

Which brings me to the point I made in my first blog post about using ChatGPT for teaching which is that I simply don’t see how any of this would be possible or useful without prior expertise and experience.

I’m really glad that I’ve started using it for my own work because it’s given me an insight into how students might use it for assessments and the potential repercussions. Very quickly my focus has changed from “how do we stop them from using it?” or “how do we spot if they’re using it?” to “how do we make sure they first get the prior knowledge and experience they need to use it effectively?”. And not just students, everyone, everywhere, working on any task. In some ways I feel incredibly lucky that this has appeared at this point in my career when have built up the expertise and experience to use it to facilitate my work, whilst being knowledgeable enough to know when not to follow it and to ensure my work never loses my voice and my steer.

Without that prior knowledge and experience guiding me, my overwhelming sense is that everything it produces would look great on the surface but would just be a little bit shit once you started looking at it properly.

How do we convince people of this when they have access to these tools at the start of their journey? No, really, I’m asking, because I don’t think I (or anyone else) know the answer yet.

Emily Nordmann

Senior lecturer in psychology.

I am a teaching-focused Senior lecturer and conduct research into the relationship between learning, student engagement, and technology.

Middle School Argumentative Essay | Graphic Organizer | Rubric | Writing Prompt

What educators are saying

Also included in.

Description

This argumentative essay will grab your middle school students' attention as they write about one of their favorite foods: pizza.

A Slice of Controversy:

It's lunchtime at school and you're faced with a dilemma: should you choose the slice of pizza, with its cheesy goodness and savory sauce, or the boring old salad with its wilted greens and lackluster dressing?

You should obviously pick the veggies. Right?

But what if I told you that pizza could be considered a vegetable?

That's right. Some people believe that because pizza often contains tomato sauce and sometimes even vegetables like mushrooms or peppers, it should be considered a vegetable in school cafeterias.

So, which side of the debate do you fall on?

This resource will help your students . . .

• Develop a thesis statement
• Write logical topic sentences
• Support their claims
• Find credible sources
• Build a logically organized argumentative essay (5-8 paragraphs)
• Self-assess their writing

Rather than starting with an intro and rambling their way through to the conclusion, your students will start with the most important building block of their argument essay: the thesis statement .

From there, they will build their topic sentences and move on to the support/evidence.

Finally, they will finish with an introduction and conclusion that complement the content of their argument.

Individual rubrics are included for each step of the process so your students can check their work as they go and YOU can grade their essays AS they're being written !

What's included in this resource?

• Teacher tips to guide you through the process
• A student handout with a controversial pizza writing prompt
• 13 Fillable student handouts with graphic organizers that build a 5-8-paragraph argumentative essay when put together
• Rubrics for each section of the paper (for student self-assessment and teacher grading )
• A put-it-all-together handout that shows students how to organize their essays
• An evidence tip sheet to help students get started with supporting their claims
• A sample essay for students to reference as they write

Click on the preview to see this fun and engaging argument essay up close!

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15 Helpful Scoring Rubric Examples for All Grades and Subjects

In the end, they actually make grading easier.

When it comes to student assessment and evaluation, there are a lot of methods to consider. In some cases, testing is the best way to assess a student’s knowledge, and the answers are either right or wrong. But often, assessing a student’s performance is much less clear-cut. In these situations, a scoring rubric is often the way to go, especially if you’re using standards-based grading . Here’s what you need to know about this useful tool, along with lots of rubric examples to get you started.

What is a scoring rubric?

In the United States, a rubric is a guide that lays out the performance expectations for an assignment. It helps students understand what’s required of them, and guides teachers through the evaluation process. (Note that in other countries, the term “rubric” may instead refer to the set of instructions at the beginning of an exam. To avoid confusion, some people use the term “scoring rubric” instead.)

A rubric generally has three parts:

• Performance criteria: These are the various aspects on which the assignment will be evaluated. They should align with the desired learning outcomes for the assignment.
• Rating scale: This could be a number system (often 1 to 4) or words like “exceeds expectations, meets expectations, below expectations,” etc.
• Indicators: These describe the qualities needed to earn a specific rating for each of the performance criteria. The level of detail may vary depending on the assignment and the purpose of the rubric itself.

Rubrics take more time to develop up front, but they help ensure more consistent assessment, especially when the skills being assessed are more subjective. A well-developed rubric can actually save teachers a lot of time when it comes to grading. What’s more, sharing your scoring rubric with students in advance often helps improve performance . This way, students have a clear picture of what’s expected of them and what they need to do to achieve a specific grade or performance rating.

Learn more about why and how to use a rubric here.

Types of Rubric

There are three basic rubric categories, each with its own purpose.

Holistic Rubric

Source: Cambrian College

This type of rubric combines all the scoring criteria in a single scale. They’re quick to create and use, but they have drawbacks. If a student’s work spans different levels, it can be difficult to decide which score to assign. They also make it harder to provide feedback on specific aspects.

Traditional letter grades are a type of holistic rubric. So are the popular “hamburger rubric” and “ cupcake rubric ” examples. Learn more about holistic rubrics here.

Analytic Rubric

Source: University of Nebraska

Analytic rubrics are much more complex and generally take a great deal more time up front to design. They include specific details of the expected learning outcomes, and descriptions of what criteria are required to meet various performance ratings in each. Each rating is assigned a point value, and the total number of points earned determines the overall grade for the assignment.

Though they’re more time-intensive to create, analytic rubrics actually save time while grading. Teachers can simply circle or highlight any relevant phrases in each rating, and add a comment or two if needed. They also help ensure consistency in grading, and make it much easier for students to understand what’s expected of them.

Learn more about analytic rubrics here.

Developmental Rubric

Source: Deb’s Data Digest

A developmental rubric is a type of analytic rubric, but it’s used to assess progress along the way rather than determining a final score on an assignment. The details in these rubrics help students understand their achievements, as well as highlight the specific skills they still need to improve.

Developmental rubrics are essentially a subset of analytic rubrics. They leave off the point values, though, and focus instead on giving feedback using the criteria and indicators of performance.

Learn how to use developmental rubrics here.

Ready to create your own rubrics? Find general tips on designing rubrics here. Then, check out these examples across all grades and subjects to inspire you.

Elementary School Rubric Examples

These elementary school rubric examples come from real teachers who use them with their students. Adapt them to fit your needs and grade level.

Reading Fluency Rubric

You can use this one as an analytic rubric by counting up points to earn a final score, or just to provide developmental feedback. There’s a second rubric page available specifically to assess prosody (reading with expression).

Learn more: Teacher Thrive

Reading Comprehension Rubric

The nice thing about this rubric is that you can use it at any grade level, for any text. If you like this style, you can get a reading fluency rubric here too.

Learn more: Pawprints Resource Center

Written Response Rubric

Rubrics aren’t just for huge projects. They can also help kids work on very specific skills, like this one for improving written responses on assessments.

Learn more: Dianna Radcliffe: Teaching Upper Elementary and More

Interactive Notebook Rubric

If you use interactive notebooks as a learning tool , this rubric can help kids stay on track and meet your expectations.

Learn more: Classroom Nook

Project Rubric

Use this simple rubric as it is, or tweak it to include more specific indicators for the project you have in mind.

Learn more: Tales of a Title One Teacher

Behavior Rubric

Developmental rubrics are perfect for assessing behavior and helping students identify opportunities for improvement. Send these home regularly to keep parents in the loop.

Learn more: Teachers.net Gazette

Middle School Rubric Examples

In middle school, use rubrics to offer detailed feedback on projects, presentations, and more. Be sure to share them with students in advance, and encourage them to use them as they work so they’ll know if they’re meeting expectations.

Argumentative Writing Rubric

Argumentative writing is a part of language arts, social studies, science, and more. That makes this rubric especially useful.

Learn more: Dr. Caitlyn Tucker

Role-Play Rubric

Role-plays can be really useful when teaching social and critical thinking skills, but it’s hard to assess them. Try a rubric like this one to evaluate and provide useful feedback.

Learn more: A Question of Influence

Art Project Rubric

Art is one of those subjects where grading can feel very subjective. Bring some objectivity to the process with a rubric like this.

Source: Art Ed Guru

Diorama Project Rubric

You can use diorama projects in almost any subject, and they’re a great chance to encourage creativity. Simplify the grading process and help kids know how to make their projects shine with this scoring rubric.

Learn more: Historyourstory.com

Oral Presentation Rubric

Rubrics are terrific for grading presentations, since you can include a variety of skills and other criteria. Consider letting students use a rubric like this to offer peer feedback too.

Learn more: Bright Hub Education

High School Rubric Examples

In high school, it’s important to include your grading rubrics when you give assignments like presentations, research projects, or essays. Kids who go on to college will definitely encounter rubrics, so helping them become familiar with them now will help in the future.

Presentation Rubric

Analyze a student’s presentation both for content and communication skills with a rubric like this one. If needed, create a separate one for content knowledge with even more criteria and indicators.

Learn more: Michael A. Pena Jr.

Debate Rubric

Debate is a valuable learning tool that encourages critical thinking and oral communication skills. This rubric can help you assess those skills objectively.

Learn more: Education World

Project-Based Learning Rubric

Implementing project-based learning can be time-intensive, but the payoffs are worth it. Try this rubric to make student expectations clear and end-of-project assessment easier.

Learn more: Free Technology for Teachers

100-Point Essay Rubric

Need an easy way to convert a scoring rubric to a letter grade? This example for essay writing earns students a final score out of 100 points.

Learn more: Learn for Your Life

Drama Performance Rubric

If you’re unsure how to grade a student’s participation and performance in drama class, consider this example. It offers lots of objective criteria and indicators to evaluate.

Learn more: Chase March

How do you use rubrics in your classroom? Come share your thoughts and exchange ideas in the WeAreTeachers HELPLINE group on Facebook .

Plus, 25 of the best alternative assessment ideas ..

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