I would like to start off saying sorry that the blog is being put up so late this week.
Now for rubrics and the sugar high from all the cookies. I have always found it hard to come up with a rubric. The problem is ever mind is different as well as everyone's taste. The cookies were a great example of how different a rubric could turn out about one subject. Some people in the class like hard cookies, others liked them soft. When it comes to writing rubrics some people have different things they are looking for. As a history teacher the most important thing in my mind with writing is the content of the paper. If the information in the paper is incorrect than there is something wrong with the research. I have never been the best writer, so to me being grammatically correct is not the most important thing as long as it is easy to read. One the other hand the English major in the class would say that grammar and style is more important content. In my mind it is hard to make a general rubric that can be used by other teachers because each teacher has certain things they are particular with.
This event happened in my special education class a few
weeks ago. We were in groups trying to write one part of rubric but could not
get anywhere. Each person in the group had a different idea of what sentence
structure required to be considered a 4 on the rubric. It was not that any one
of us was right or wrong but that we have a different background and different
beliefs.
Rubrics are hard! And for all the reasons you stated. It is hard to evaluate everyone on the same scale and it's hard for everyone to evaluate equally. As a history teacher, I think you'll have some flexibility since, like you said, the content will be most important. I would guess that a kid could express their understanding of how WWI got kicked of equally as well with a paper or a video, play, or comic strip! Maybe more so. It may still be difficult but I'm sure you'll be able to find a method to grade all your students fairly.
ReplyDeleteHi Jodi,
ReplyDeleteWhen I created a rubric for another Education class, I thought that I had done a great job with being clear and writing it in a way that was student and teacher directed. But when it was given back to me with tons of comments, I learned that rubrics are always open for question. When you create rubrics, you have to be open for the possibility for both soft and hard cookies. I think rubrics are very biased towards the people or person who wrote them. In the cookie exercise I remember saying how their favorite cookie scored the lowest based off the rubric they were given. Rubrics are hard and they take a while to get them down. I would not say that I am a master of rubrics after the cookie class, but it has opened my eyes up to where improvement could be made in the rubrics I create!