Design and Deliver a Rubric

Choosing an authentic assessment task for each example is fairly obvious - you have the students reposition a patient, format a document, and write an essay. But, what do you put on the rubric? Let's take the first example: Safely reposition a patient in bed.

You need to ask yourself some questions:

• Is this a yes/no competency or are there different degrees of quality of achievement? If so, what is the difference between an outstanding demonstration, a good demonstration, and a merely satisfactory demonstration? What would lead to a fail?
• What if the students need to ask you questions during the demonstration?
• What if they do something incorrectly or make a mistake, but can tell you what they did wrong?
• Do they need to complete the demonstration under pressure (like on practicum or in an exam setting), or can they do it at home with a family member and video it?
• How many times do they need to demonstrate correct repositioning to be considered proficient?

Let's examine another outcome: Students will organize and articulate a written argument. 

You have them submit an essay. But what goes on the rubric? Ask yourself a few key questions, such as:

• What course is this - Introduction to College Writing, Communications, or upper level Political Theory? Context matters when it comes to building a rubric. This is why you can't just find a general essay-writing rubric off the internet!! The level and focus of the course will impact how you build the rubric.
• What is most important - evidence that students have conducted research, clear sentences, organized ideas, whether the argument is convincible, correct formatting of references and layout, or evidence that the student "knows" a lot about the topic? The trouble is that in many cases, such as this one (an essay), the task can't easily be reduced down to independent component parts. For example, clear sentences and the organization of ideas influence the strength of the argument, so if you score poorly on one, you are likely to score poorly on the other. When you break a task apart, you can't help but end up with unfair redundancies in the rubric. This is likely something you'll need to consider.
• Do they need to write the essay under exam conditions or can they write it over time at home?
• What if they don't complete the essay, but submit a detailed, correctly formatted annotated bibliography and an outline of a convincing argument, presented as a set of well reasoning bullet points?

These questions are best considered collaboratively - with your fellow instructors, and with your students. This level of interrogation, if done up front, will make rubric-building smoother, even for straight-forward, well-aligned assessments. 

When assessment doesn't closely align with outcomes

Not all outcomes are quite as easily demonstrable as the ones given above. In this case, you need put assessment tasks in front of students that aim to reveal, hint at, or suggest they have met the outcomes. Consider these outcomes:

• Students will demonstrate understanding of the impact the Indian Act has on unceded territory in BC. 
• Students will work cooperatively and act with professionalism.
• Students will develop appreciation of literature and literary movements. 

Ask yourself these questions:

What task (or set of tasks) will reliably reveal achievement of each of these outcomes? Does every student need to do the same task, or are there multiple ways to demonstrate achievement? How might you break apart "understanding", "cooperation and professionalism", and "appreciation" (from the examples above) into observable criteria? The answers to these questions will not only help you design an effective assessment task, but they will also guide your decisions around what criteria to put on the rubric.

KEY TAKEAWAY - Before you launch into the rubric design, interrogate the goals and purposes of your assessment tasks.