Rethinking Rubrics
" While numbers work pretty well for communicating certain kinds of precise information, we have kept words around for their evocative, emotive, associative power. Increased pressure to standardize our reactions to words violates their nature." (Wilson, 2007, pg. 63)
As I was reading the articles for this week, I kept recalling how we've talked a lot about how teachers might have a more subjective view of the students in their class when we think in terms of discipline. We've learned how this holds many barriers for students in the classroom and how this can be problematic at times. But if we think of subjectivity in terms of assessment, rubrics have a way of forcing teachers to think too objectively. This seems to say to students, don't be outspoken and opinionated in a classroom setting, but make sure you bring it in your next essay. Anyone else think they are getting mixed messages here?
"Rubrics were developed to make direct writing assessment palatable to testing companies" (Wilson, 2007, pg 77). While I can understand how rubrics might be necessary when grading a written portion of a standardized test or placement exam, the fact that they are used for all major writing assignments doesn't allow teachers to think subjectively about their students' writing. Teachers work and rework their rubrics over and over again in an attempt to capture all of the feelings their students' writing provides them, and they still feel as if rubrics are too generic. Our students' writing may make us think about more than just what is described in the confines of a rubric. Check out this teacher's thoughts on the topic and why she threw away her rubrics.
Arguments against rubrics:
-rubrics are not very responsive to students' writing
-do not reflect how the teacher truly thinks about writing
-they don't encompass all the questions the teacher wants to ask to push thinking further
-standardized criteria don't capture students nuances
-hard to allow teachers to give more insightful feedback
-too generic
"Unmediated by the rubric, our response gives students the power to think through what effect they want their words to have rather than how their words measure up to the categories on a rubric" (2007, pg. 64). Since we've all dealt with rubrics in this program, think back over how you've interacted or approached the rubric on big assignments in the past. Did you read the rubric before you started writing? Or did you perhaps use it as sort of a checklist after you wrote everything down? Do you feel as if the rubric completely guided your writing? Thinking about my own personal approaches to some of the written assignments in this program, I would say that rubrics typically structured my writing and made me think about what I was going to write based on the rubric's requirements and potentially straying away from some of my initial thought processes.
Recalling some of the feedback I've received on rubrics in the past, there have been many times where my work straddled the line between two points on the grading scale. I can see how teachers might have struggled to pinpoint exactly what their observations mean, especially if my writing didn't quite fit the mold of one grading column. It can also be frustrating to receive a graded rubric with minimal feedback or commentary and little direction or questioning about where to go next.
In The View From Somewhere, Maja Wilson makes a case for more conversational assessment when grading students' writing because good conversation requires us to respond. When we use dialogue to respond to our student's perspective, our own personal perspective changes as we learn how the student feels and what they perceive as meaningful or valuable information. When we think of writing we often think of it objectively; as in, students need to hit the major tenets or writing: ideas, organization, voice, word choice, fluency, and mechanics. Wilson mentions the "6+1 trait giant Ruth Culham" when referencing how comments on rubrics that are based on these major tenets/traits cannot be responsive or helpful (2007).
Students need specific feedback if they are going to think about pushing themselves further in their writing. While I'm not personally a fan of confrontation, disagreeing with someone often leads me to look into a subject or viewpoint a little further and gain more knowledge on a subject.
Does this hold true for you as well? Think about how many different times books have been read and interpreted differently among different people. (Just think about the Bible, for example.) How many times have you read something, maybe the same thing multiple times, and found different meaning than you had discovered before? Providing students with feedback that provokes thought or questions them a little more can help them respond and/or rework their writing to gain more insight into something they might not have thought of before. (i.e. the example with Wilson and Maria on pg 64)."Disagreement leads to its own insight, and we should teach students to look for the meaning and purpose behind different readers' differing perspectives. In this process, they develop their perceptions and invest in their work" (Wilson, 2007, pg. 65).
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| Accurate representation of me throwing rubrics away. |
Where do you stand when thinking about using rubrics to grade writing assignments?
Do you feel that rubrics can be modified to provide tailored feedback?
If it is a requirement that we use them in our classroom, do you think it is enough to change the wording or language to fit the feedback we want to convey to our students?
Have you seen any examples of teachers or classrooms that do not use rubrics?
How can we assess students' writing if we don't provide a rubric?
Emma Quintin
Resources:
Wilson, M. (2007). The view from somewhere. Educational Leadership, 65(4), 76-80.
Wilson, M. (2007). Why I won't be using rubrics to respond to students' writing. English Journal, 62-66.
https://www.scholastic.com/teachers/articles/teaching-content/61-traits-writing/
Emma, thank you for all the great questions to ponder. Where do I stand on using rubrics to grade writing assignments? This is a fabulous question, as I am bewildered. At some points, I have felt “rubrics will save my life,” and others times, “rubrics have ruined the educations system.” I like this statement from Maja Wilson’s Why I Won’t Be Using Rubrics to Respond to Students’ Writing “By accepting the standardized responses inherent in rubrics, we undermine the power assessment must be a conversation” (Wilson, 2007, pg. 66). It seems that a rubric has become an easy out for grading a paper so, it seems objective. The underlying problem is they can be subjective because of who designed them and what they are deciding to evaulate at this time although rubrics do not seem to be culturally sustaining for the students in our diverse classrooms. Where or where do I use a rubric? So, for me, the bottom line will be, Yes, I will use a rubric, but I would like to limit them as much as possible. I think that providing an assessment as a conversation for elementary students will develop a better understanding of the process of writing. When done right, the teacher is on the same level as the student having a conversation about their writing.
ReplyDeleteOn the contrary, the student will receive a rubric with no explanation of what was wrong with their writing. This only gives the student more questions which will go unanswered, and thus, their writing will not improve. I think there is a place for rubrics, but it must very carefully.
Jay, your comment about how students receive rubrics back with no explanation of what was wrong with the writing reminded me of this quote from the blog Emma linked to. The author says about struggling writers who score low in all categories, that if they "were emotionless robots, then the rubric might help them identify their many problem areas and start tackling them." We all know this is not the case--students have feelings and get discouraged by a multitude of low scores. I think the key is conversation with the writer--either through writing notes/questions/observations/feelings on the drafts turned in or in writing conferences with students. I hope that as a teacher I can go beyond simply assigning writing a number and engage in that vital conversation with students.
DeleteJay and Rachel, I definitely agree that rubrics can hinder building strong writers, especially for students with low scores, and how that affects their confidence. Rubrics are also frustrating when receiving a middle ground score, especially if there is no feedback or guidance. If rubrics are solely used as a way to quantify the quality of a writing assignment, then I agree that they miss the point of writing. Wilson mentions how rubrics photocopied from photocopied books are unresponsive and generic, "but even the rubrics I create for specific assignments and revise on a regular basis aren't responsive enough. Student writing never fails to surprise me" (Wilson, 2007, pg. 62). Writing is supposed to draw out emotional responses, whether that is through conversation or disagreements, feedback that draws out dialogue would seem to help students more than a generic rubric. When everyone is given a structure for writing and grading, it becomes the focal point in the assignment, and there may be ideas lost in the process. I hope that I can also use rubrics sparingly in my classroom as well!
DeleteEmma, I think I've had similar experiences with rubrics. I use them as a guide to what I should write about at the expense of some ideas or paths I originally wanted to include/take. In reflecting on my experience with rubrics for writing assignments from high school into college, I have come to the conclusion that they actually hinder students' writing ability. As Wilson says, they only represent a small portion of what makes good writing: "voice, wording, sentence fluency, conventions, content, organization, and presentation" (2007, p. 62-63). A paper can excel in all those categories and still only be a mediocre paper. I turned in a lot of 'A' papers in high school, but still considered myself a weak writer. It wasn't until I got to college and took a freshman composition class that I realized how much more there was to writing than a rubric's checklist. My professor didn't use rubrics and the class setup fostered conversations about writing. The class was split into groups of 4 or 5 and we had writing conferences for every paper with the same people for the whole semester. Although it wasn't the professor giving feedback in this case, the conversations we had about writing and the opportunity we had to share why we wrote a certain way strengthened my writing in new ways. When the professor did grade our paper, he simply wrote comments on it as he was reading. This method was more personal and as a student I felt that the professor had actually read the paper and responded to it instead of simply circling a number on a rubric.
ReplyDeleteRachel, as I was reading your personal experiences, they made me think back on my high school and college writing courses too! I remember one teacher in high school who was incredibly particular about the mechanics of an essay. She used to tell us to never begin a sentence with "I believe" or "I think", and in her words, "because you're writing the paper, we already can see that you think or you believe something!" Mrs. Malacarne was also very very particular about "be" verbs, as in, there could only be 3 in your essay. I don't remember using rubrics in her class and she often wrote comments on the paper as well, and I do recall them being helpful, as they made me gain strength in word choice and fluency. There are definitely some places for rubrics, especially if they are required by a school, but when it comes to writing, I agree that commentary and dialogue would benefit students so much more.
DeleteRachel, I do the opposite of you. I write the assignment first and then go back and use the rubric as a checklist. I wonder if this has anything to do with the fact that I didn’t use rubrics growing up and was used to just writing based on the guidelines my teachers gave us. In another one of my classes, I was frustrated because, I missed a point on one section of the rubric that wasn’t even relevant to me. The section was about drawing on current teaching experiences. That’s a little tough considering I’m not currently a teacher! The other section was about relating the response to the readings. In my opinion, name dropping the reading and incorporating quotes doesn’t mean that I’ve understood or read the reading. I’d much rather incorporate ideas from the reading into my writing in a more natural way. I honestly felt like this was just an excuse for the teacher to give fewer As. Can you tell I’m not a fan of rubrics?
DeleteYour composition class sounds like my kind of class. I’d love to have a similar setup in my future class, where we have time to share feedback. I think you make a good point about having the opportunity to explain the rationale behind your piece of writing. Sometimes as students we do assignments just for the sake of turning something in to get a grade. However, when given opportunities to reflect on the assignment, we might realize that we have more to say than we first realized.
Addy, I am the same way. I am not a fan of rubrics and just refer to them in the end to make sure that I have all the points needed. However, to be honest, I rarely change my papers after I am done writing them. And Rachel, I really like your point on how personal those meeting and comments were for you. I think this goes back to those connections (are we surprised) and having students feel valued for what they are producing. I think a generic rubric at the end of the assignment does not reflect individuality and can make some students feel constricted to only write what will give them an A.
DeleteAddy, I also struggle with the ideas that we always have to include quotes and references to the readings just to do it. Often times the questions were meant to answer and relate our experiences to don’t line up with what I read so I have to search for a quote that I can somehow morph into making sense with my overall point. I’m not sure this is actually a very productive use of time or way of teaching/grading. It’s interesting to hear that you write first and then go back and check your writing with the rubric. I am the opposite where as I read through the rubric first so that I can tailor my work to what I’ll specifically be graded on. As much as professors say they want you to engage with the material in a personal way and it’s more about you learning something or engaging with the material than checking off a checklist, you better believe the moment you miss or leave out something on that rubric (whether it seems relevant or not) you’re getting docked. “The standardized criteria didn’t capture the nuances of students’ writing“ (Wilson, 2007, p. 63). My biggest struggle with writing rubrics from my experience is being asked to relate something to your personal experience and then being docked points for your personal engagement with the material. How a person’s experiences relate to what their learning is very subject and sometimes not 100% relevant, so to tell someone that the way it personally impacted them or your personal experience is wrong or not what you expected seems subjective, unhelpful, and detrimental to the overall point of an assignment.
DeleteI don’t think I’ll be likely to use rubrics on writing assignments because, as Wilson states, “comments on a rubric don’t help good writers become better since […][they] don’t create conversation” (2007, p. 65). As the article you included mentioned, they also don’t help students who are struggling. Giving up rubrics on writing assignments doesn’t seem like a sacrifice to me. I honestly don’t recall having any teachers before this program who used rubrics. Or, if they did, we weren’t aware of them. I can’t imagine having rubrics for any of my screenwriting classes. They would have severely limited feedback. The majority of my teachers would give extensive feedback, with notes written on each page. If they had used a traditional rubric, I doubt I would have received such insightful feedback. Additionally, these notes opened up dialogue in the classroom. Whenever we’d get pages or notes back, we’d have time for each of us to discuss the notes we’d received and respond to them. This reminded me of the responses to Craig’s work (p. 65). Unless you’re writing exclusively for yourself, it’s important to see how people respond to your writing. If you’re writing a business email, you need to have an awareness of tone. If you’re writing a letter to the editor, you need to understand how persuasive your piece is given who you're trying to persuade. All of these forms of writing are written with an intended audience.
ReplyDeleteWhile I do think rubrics can be modified to provide tailored feedback, this seems like more work to me than giving individualized feedback without the rubric. Unless you modify the rubric on a case by case basis, it can’t really be tailored to the individual writer. If I am required to use them, I think I’d consider reading the piece first and making notes regardless of whether they fit neatly into the designated rubric. At the end of the day, I'm going to give my students the notes they need to help them improve as writers, even if the note doesn't correspond to a given section of the rubric.
Addy, I appreciate how passionate you are about this topic, because I think you make some valuable points! How can rubrics really provide students with the tailored feedback they need to expand their writing? If we get hung up on the structure of an essay (basic 5 paragraph structure), students will end up just writing to appease the guidelines. Honestly, I don't remember my professors using rubrics on writing assignments before this program either! I remember seeing rubrics before this program, but so many major writing assignments I had in my Public Relations courses in college were broken into multiple drafts so teachers or peers could provide us with feedback. However, I can see myself using rubrics to check off whether students are hitting some of those major writing tenets, fluency, voice, mechanics, just because those are also important to think about when writing!
DeleteI'm really surprised that the two of you haven't really experienced a lot of rubrics in your schooling. For me, all I remember are rubrics. Grad, undergrad, high school, middle school, elementary school, rubrics upon rubrics upon rubrics for everything! Addy I love your comment "While I do think rubrics can be modified to provide tailored feedback, this seems like more work to me than giving individualized feedback without the rubric." If you give clear directions and expectations from the beginning, and then give tailored feedback in writing as well as in person and actually having a conversation, there isn't a need for rubrics. Rubrics just emphasize standardized testing and getting grades rather than actually teaching students to think and learn.
DeleteWill, rubrics weren't a thing when I was in high school or during my early college years. It's interesting that they have become the new "norm". My first instances with rubrics came when I returned to college in 2016. Since then, I use them as more of a check-list after I have written according to teacher guidelines. However, I do feel that even when I use the rubric after I write, it is still limiting - guiding whether or not my writing has all the essential ingredients without much else.
DeleteAddy, I definitely agree that modifying rubrics to provide detailed, individualized feedback seems exhausting. I feel like our lit lesson group ran into this issue - as we created the rubric, a began looking at student work, it felt....lacking. So, we revised to include some details found in some of the students' writing. But then it didn't include what some other students' wrote. Our rubric would only be individualized if we created a separate one for each student. So why not just provide meaningful feedback?
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DeleteEveryone on this conversation. I initially wrote about how I would tailor my rubrics to help provide a conversation for specific feedback. Now I'm a little worried about how much time and trouble it could cause and wonder like Addy said to just provide personal feedback for each student. In school, I never used rubrics. It wasn't until this program where i was introduced to them. Emma asked if we would use the rubric before writing or write and then use the rubric. I would always write then make sure I was using the rubric and make adjustments if needed. I believe if rubrics were more of a thing in my school, I would of definitely tailored my writing towards the rubric. This worries me a little more and think that my personal thoughts or feelings might not be exposed when writing for a rubric. All this information and thoughts of our peers has definitely given me something to think about before I start to teach my own classroom.
DeleteGreat post, Emma! The readings made me reflect a lot on my past experiences with rubrics in school. In high school and college, I found myself usually be given a rubric for papers or projects, but I would rarely look at them unless they were gone over in class. I did not rely on those criteria to determine what was needed in my papers - and when I got the paper returned, I would most often only look at the grade and move on. I do not remember every looking at the feedback because to me, what was the point if I was not going to turn it in again? I think even now in these classes I find myself not reflecting on the paper after I wrote it and just looked to the grade.
ReplyDeleteIn Maja Wilon's article, she speaks about times that she reflected with students multiple times in the writing process instead of using a rubric at the end. "Comments on a rubric don’t help good writers become better, since even the most carefully chosen complimentary comments don’t create conversation about the author’s intent and the words’ effect," (Wilson, p. 65). The feedback I was given on papers growing up did not help me or advance my writing. The times when we would have drafts, peer editing and teacher conferences were when I appreciated the extra time and extra feedback in order to create the best work I could. I think going forward into being an educator, I will not have an end rubric on certain projects or work because they do not benefit all the students in the classroom -- there is no equity there. I will be more diligent in the process of the students creating their work rather than when they are already done and moved on.
Thanks Tori! I appreciate how you recognize that rubrics were not necessary for your success in writing, and how this will look in your classroom! I think that it is important to reflect on our past experiences and take that into account when thinking about the students in our classroom. The way I have treated rubrics in this program is to use them almost as a checklist. I glance at them at the beginning to see what is necessary to include in my paper but then I just started writing based on the outline I've already planned out. But I will say that if I didn't have a rubric to look at beforehand, I also wouldn't have the rubric's guidelines in the back of my mind. Some of my papers may have turned out a little differently without a rubric. I also think that feedback left on final papers always leaves me frustrated because they would have helped me tap into deeper thought processes when I was writing the paper. I always wish I would have had opportunities to get feedback on papers before the final assignment!
DeleteTori, I feel the same way about rubrics. First, I do not recall using rubrics in any schooling before my undergraduate degree, maybe not until this program. Then, for the most part, I would write my essay and then backfill with some critical information that the rubric was asking to be covered. I admire people that can review a rubric, then create an outline of critical questions on which they build their writing. So, these students spend time deciphering what the teacher is thinking before writing their report. Which to me is they are not writing the own story or understanding but seeking the teachers desired understanding.
ReplyDeleteJust like you, I would review the grade and maybe look at the feedback. Not that I do not care, but if I cannot change this grade, then it has little relevance. I might read half of the feedbacks to gain an understanding of where the professor would like my writing to go for improvements, but then again. That is only my understanding; it becomes the professors desired to understand. Which in the ends means I am writing only what the professor thinks is important and relevant.
I hope that when I used a rubric within the class that I will take the time to review it before the lesson so, the students can seek out my answers as they are learning from the lesson. This would give them a fair chance of earning all the points. This is my ideal world!
Great post Emma! I remember last semester we read a similar article about the use of rubrics in classrooms. When I think about that article and Maja Wilson's article and then I think about rubrics, I think "Are they really that terrible?" The more I reflect and think about them, I'm like "yeah they really are." But then I think, "Why, in every class I've ever had, in 20 years of schooling, has there been a rubric?" My experience has been very similar to yours, rubrics have structured my writing. My parents have always told me "give them what they want" when it comes to school. I've always structured my writing or any assignment I've done to the rubric. I was planning on pulling Wilson's quote "Disagreement leads to its own insight, and we should teach students to look for the meaning and purpose behind different readers' differing perspectives. In this process, they develop their perceptions and invest in their work" (Wilson, 2007, pg. 65) and then I kept reading your blog and you did as well. I think it's so important to teach students how to give and receive peer feedback. Having multiple perspectives and feedback gives the writer so many opportunities to enhance their writing or stand firm in their writing, like Craig did in the article.
ReplyDeleteFrom my experience in school, what helped me the most was when teachers would give detailed feedback on my writing either on the page or face to face. Whenever a rubric was used and even if there were comments on the rubric, I would take it as feedback to move to the next scale of the rubric, not to improve my writing. The only positive aspect of rubrics to me is that it gives me specific directions, when most of the time the directions are unclear. I think we can get rid of rubrics if we give clear and detailed directions for the assignment, rather than the rubric having the directions in it.
Yes, Will! "I think it's so important to teach students how to give and receive peer feedback." I completely agree with you! And it's equally important to stress HOW to give feedback! We can certainly learn from each other and the questions that our writing draws out of one another. I think when I remember how I received grades in high school a college, it was either direct comments on the assignment, or it was given through a graded rubric I only saw when I received my grade back. It was a tool the teacher used to help them grade my work, but it was not given to us beforehand, because we would usually receive very detailed instructions for the assignment or project. I think this kind of goes along with what you are saying about the "clear and detailed directions", and this is just as important! Providing students with instructions or questions to help guide their thinking or at least help them narrow down what they want to write about can be helpful as well! Questions as directions can also allow for student's own personality and opinions push through, which is the most valuable way to assess their writing, I think. As Wilson mentions, "writing rubrics to include risk-taking or promise didn't help matter much since not every paper needed to meet all of my values about writing" (2007, pg. 63). So if we think about this a little more, rubrics try to fit all students into one mold when it comes to writing and that just isn't a fair assessment of their writing!
DeleteWill, I relate to your comment so much. This quote also really stood out to me with the idea that we are all unique readers and writers with differing perspectives. I find it so much more important to embrace these differences and look at texts and assignments through differing lenses as opposed to giving people what they want to hear or what on person deems as correct. Most often times when I receive comments on a rubric it doesn’t truly teach me anything on how to improve or do better next time unless it’s something specific that was left out. However, if you tell me my opinions, thoughts, interpretations aren’t what you wanted but don’t give me a clear example of how it could be better or different that isn’t really teaching me anything. I think these rules and guidelines in rubrics take away from authentic responses from students and causes them to worry more about the grade than how they are actually interacting with the content and themes. Just because you can follow instructions and give a teacher what they want to hear doesn’t ,ean you really got anything from the assignment.
DeleteEmma, great post! You bring up so many great points – sooo, I apologize in advance… You discuss how Wilson “makes a case for more conversational assessment when grading students' writing because good conversation requires us to respond..”
ReplyDeleteThe idea of giving up rubrics in favor of responsive assessment/grading/feedback sounds fantastic and I want to implement a more human response type of approach to teaching, and grading students’ writing. I believe this is far more effective in not only helping students increase/improve their abilities as writers, but also inspiring/encouraging and maintaining students’ engagement with writing. When rubrics are used solely to grade all assignments, it can become so restrictive and mechanical for the students. As teachers, there is no room for subjectivity, like you said. We cannot necessarily reward students for creativity, uniqueness, critical thinking, etc. (or possibily even high quality writing) if the aspect/part of their writing does not follow…or is not specifically defined/stated on the rubric – as the teacher sees it. You speak to this when you mention, “I would say that rubrics typically structured my writing and made me think about what I was going to write based on the rubric's requirements and potentially straying away from some of my initial thought processes.” And If you had written your initial thoughts, very well/high quality writing (obviously ;P..), you may have missed the mark (what was on the rubric) and been deducted, not rewarded for your work?! This is an issue. Although I do think, it is important for students and people in general to be able to follow directions/instructions given to them… but, in frequent/high doses, completely relying on this suggests to students that must act, think, do, be a certain way/thing/etc. and strips them of their individuality.
But then, what if the teacher is not the strongest writer and not necessarily confident in his/her abilities to assess and provide immediate feedback without a rubric, then using a rubric would be logical, right? However, what if that same teacher wanted to use a more responsive type method... what type of guidelines or more flexible assessment tool might he/she develop -- to have a blueprint/a guide/some type of fall back, without it being so rigid that it "trapped" his/her thinking? OR what if it’s required? I honestly do not know exactly how/what yet, but I do think it’s possible... You mentioned, “When we use dialogue to respond to our student's perspective, our own personal perspective changes as we learn how the student feels and what they perceive as meaningful or valuable information”. Communicating, gaining understanding, being flexible, open, and adjusting to our students needs and work, rather than the students adjusting and conforming to our restrictions and thinking, is vital.
You mention that “Teachers work and rework their rubrics over and over again in an attempt to capture all of the feelings their students' writing provides them, and they still feel as if rubrics are too generic.” I agree that with rubrics specifically and only, they’ll never provide enough flexibility or be all-encompassing… I think generating a combination of an assessment / grading tool to guide/support us, the teacher, in order to help us provide better quality feedback, but NOT rigid in that it becomes used specifically for or as the only thing on which the students’ grades hinge and feedback to the student is based. Finding that balance and what works for each of us and best for our students.. maybe the ‘find and create a rubric and stick with it approach would work for some’, but I think reflecting on self, using trial and error, creating/ maintaining and refining our guidelines /tools, and searching for new ideas from variety of sources continuously is essential and would ultimately provide much better quality, effectiveness, and results for us and for our students.
Did you read the rubric before you started writing? Or did you perhaps use it as sort of a checklist after you wrote everything down? Do you feel as if the rubric completely guided your writing?
ReplyDeleteAS a student I never really and still do NOT necessarily enjoy following strict demands of rubrics……… particularly when it comes to those page restrictions, you know?! Can I get an Amen?! …(crickets)… But in all seriousness, as a student I had a love…well more like/hate feeling towards being graded by rubrics. On one hand, rubrics provided some guidance and focused my writing, which I like-ish, but it is something I definitely need. I was never one that could be given a subject/topic (or told just write something on whatever you want), then just jump in and write on it in a focused way without having it sound like the ramblings of a lunatic. Rubrics in a way provided me with a jumping off point and a boundary for which to remain – like on a field or court (sports reference..). Both of these were/are needs of mine…you’ve seen/experienced my writing… BUT At the same time, I hate(d) being confined/restricted to and obligated to address/include every single thing from the rubric [I’m a complicated person…]. Once I got started and had my “boundary” the rubric became a nuisance to me, in a way. I felt stripped of having any creative choice/opportunity. If I went outside of the rubric, deduction… if I didn’t touch on a part, EXACTLY how the teacher had written it in the rubric and wanted or felt I/we should, deduction. This drove me absolutely insane. It made my writing mechanical, robotic, impersonal, and boring. I always enjoyed writing… I’m not a great writer, I’m terrible in terms of the right/appropriate way… or accoriding to the/most rubrics…so in/for school I hated writing and disengaged it class. Instead of enjoyable… it became unenjoyable and stressful. “Rubrics, and their “menu” of generic comments, are clumsy in practice and in theory; they tear at the foundations of the rhetorical heart of writing, reducing student essays and our responses to an exercise in purposelessness.” (Wilson, 2007, p.63). This was exactly how I felt… **is this MY essay, MY writing, MY thoughts, REALLY…or is this what you want me to say, write, think.
Back to my … likes of rubrics as a student – I need(ed) help in terms of a launch point for my writing, as well as some focus… some semblance of boundary … if not BOOM, 45 pages of anything and everything that might kind of…maybe connect to the idea/topic/subject. Ensuring that we know our students and their needs is important here and can be done with guidelines … and does not hinge on rubrics. Having dialogue, conversations, being responsive is the key, but I think we can also provide a handout with suggestions, ideas, etc. to spark the students thought processes that can guide and propel their writing, not restrict/bound them to a checklist of demands that could/does run contrary to the students ideas/thinking. “When we give up rubrics, we’re looking at student’s work through our eyes, not those of the rubric. Unmediatated by the rubric, our responses gives students the power to think through what effect they want their words to have rather than how their words measure up to the categories on a rubric.” (Wilson, p. 64). I think this is absolutely essential.
Austin, I think you bring up many great points! I always kind of struggled with "creative writing" that would say just "write something!" Because I felt as if I would appreciate more structure from detailed instruction over no instruction at all. But you are right, if you are given too much direction, then you do end up asking, "is this what you want me to say, write, think," as you mention above! You are very right about finding the right balance between using rubrics and searching for new resources to help aid in trial and error with what works for our students because ultimately it should be about what works best for them! Maybe they all rely on rubrics as a structural guide or checklist? That should be taken in to account when creating assignments.
DeleteEmma, great post, and definitely thought provoking - I'm wondering, even now, if I will be using rubrics in my classroom. I think you mentioned in response to someone else that you can see yourself using rubrics to check off if they are "hitting the major writing tenets". YES. But beyond this...probably not. I want to give my students the "gift of human response" in the form of real feedback, and not just with a "one and done" mentality (Wilson, p. 63). Meaning, I want to provide an opportunity for revision. What struck me about Wilson's article was the idea of conversational feedback. The examples she provided were feedback that led to meaningful revision - not just a "you could do this & this, but the rest is pretty good" without a chance to put the feedback into action. That's life! If I'm truly learning, feedback goes hand in hand with the opportunity to improve myself. Many times, teachers hand back a paper with a rubric attached and call the process complete. This strips the full learning experience from the student.
ReplyDeleteYes, Priscilla, I think that allowing space for revision is so necessary. Wilson also mentions how they use multiple drafts to gather information about how the student is progressing in their writing and then they come together to decide a grade at the end. That might be how I envision major writing assignments happening in my classroom. That way the students have that opportunity to get feedback from me before they get a final grade on the paper, and you're so right, it has to be meaningful feedback! The example Wilson gave in the article also gave me insight into what that looks like, and I think as long as we provide purposeful feedback, the students will be inspired to rework their paper or challenge us and leave their what they originally wrote.
DeleteEmma, I also envision using a conversational/dialogue approach to assessing big writing assignments that takes place over a span of time until both myself and the student are happy with their work. Even though you may not have much to say about something until you have studied it for a while, you could still generate drafts and build onto them as your knowledge base grows on the subject. This approach would create more meaningful feedback and more opportunity to share it.
DeleteHey Emma, I enjoyed your post. When it comes to rubrics, I have mixed feelings. As a student, it’s hard at least for me in the past, to get clear understanding of why I received the grade I did. Generally, the most beneficial feedback has been a conversation. I can look back to the first semester when I received my feedback on a rubric. It didn’t help me much until I asked a question through canvas which led to a conversation. I believe specific feedback is very limited when we just use the rubric. On page 63, Maja Wilson states “While a small amount of standardization is necessary for communication, readers and writers depend on the evocative, associative qualities of language to make reading an intensely meaningful, personal experience.” I really like this quote because it mentions of how a small amount of standardization is required for communication but then it is up to us as teachers to provide the specific feedback that can reach the minds of our readers and writers.
ReplyDeleteWhen you asked if I can see myself using rubrics, I will say yes but it will mainly be used as a guide for information and flow for my students. Like how I mentioned before I see myself using specific feedback in any form to make sure my students understand why their writing is graded the way it is. I haven’t really thought about modifying rubrics to contain tailored feedback. This is something that I will definitely look in to and ask my mentor teaching about. I’m going to teach 6th grade English, and rubrics will definitely be addressed before I start the semester.
Culturally relevant assessment systems utilize conversation and dialogue. Usually I write my paper and then look at the rubric to use it a checklist, but sometimes I forget! Guess what happens then? I like to let my writing come naturally after reading what is expected for the assignment. I feel like otherwise my writing is stilted. I really like the idea of assessment taking the form of collaboration with feedback that pushes you forward rather than punishing you for work you have already completed. Feedback should let you know, “where each suggestion is coming from” (Wilson, 2008, p.79). I also like the idea of multiple drafts that are assigned a point value for completion that way it satisfies the need for a grade while also allowing the student and teacher share a dialogue that focuses on strengthening writing. Also, agreeing a a few select pieces to be worked on until both teacher and student are happy with the quality is another collaborative assessment strategy. Just like reading a book many times will be a different experience each time, so will revisiting written pieces. It gives students the, “power to think through what effects they want their words to have rather than how their words measure up to a rubric” (p.64). This also develops the writing of struggling writers as well as those accustomed to getting A’s for their writing.
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