Using Scoring Guides vs. Rubrics
The Scoring Guide for Student Products is intended to be used as a scoring guide, not
as a rubric. Although scoring guides and rubrics are related, they
are not identical. The two are complementary in function:
- A scoring guide is designed to help set and raise the bar of
student achievement
- A rubric is designed to measure each student's performance vis-a-vis
that bar.
Rubrics are important tools for teachers and students to share.
They are designed by teachers as guides for grading student work.
Teachers should build rubrics with the help of their students before
the students begin their assigned work. Students are then prepared
for the standards that will be used in assessing their work. In
that capacity, rubrics are also teaching tools in that they guide
students in learning the most important elements necessary for their
ultimate success.
Scoring guides are different. Assessment specialists design them
for teachers and for other evaluators. The function of the guides
is threefold:
- To help teachers and evaluators evaluate student learning in
a completely objective way based on predetermined standards that
go beyond the local expectations of individual teachers or schools.
- To identify and assess not only student learning but also instructional
design. Consider the following hypothetical example: A high percentage
of students in a school score very low on an indicator designed
to measure their use of technology in making oral presentations.
However, those same students score very high on indicators designed
to measure their vocal presentations and the design, content,
and research they employed in communicating. That particular disparity
would serve as an important indicator to a school or school system
to analyze its integration of technology into instruction. The
pattern could indicate that the school needs to update its technological
equipment, software, or wiring. Or the pattern could indicate
that teachers need additional training in the design and use of
existing technology.
- To serve as models for teachers in developing their own rubrics
for a wide variety of assessment purposes. When rubrics are well
constructed, they serve as valuable learning tools for students;
poorly designed rubrics do not help students. Successful teachers
often teach-not merely show-students how to apply rubrics in scoring
their own and one another's work. By teaching students how you,
the teacher, evaluate the success of their work, you provide them
with the same tool to evaluate their own work. Knowing what that
tool is and understanding how you use it can help students become
better learners. Teachers may base their own rubrics on the Scoring
Guide for Student Products with the confidence that they
are well-designed models. Students' familiarity with the format
will better enable them to prepare their work to be scored and
ensure them greater success in producing high-quality work.
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