Benefits of Using Rubrics for Assessment

Teaching seniors can be a high maintenance job because they are overly concerned with their grade. Of course, they want to earn acceptance into their dream school, they want to compete for the large scholarship fund, and their time management skills are divided among school, home, sports, and a job.  These traits cause seniors to become anxious to get the assignments and to ask for the quickest and least painful activity to be completed, activities like a college application essay. Students love a rubric because they know, if they have each criteria within their essay, they will earn a good grade. However, the importance of rubrics depends if it is created correctly and used seldom, students will not rely on them as much and be more successful in college courses such as English 101.

                My school district designed the importance of rubrics in a spiralbound book five years ago.  When the district was creating the book, I was chosen to participate as an ELA middle school teacher with the local community college professors of English. The professors were disgruntled about high school students wanting a rubric for each essay. They stated that the students would read the rubric and check off each item and demand that the teacher honor their completed work.  The students did not understand that the rubric was only viewed as a guide and not a roadmap for every essay. What was missing in the essay? A voice, techniques specific to that type of essay, and details. 

Assigning A College Application Essay

                When I assigned the essay, I posted it on Google Classroom as an assignment. Attached to the assignment was the district’s designed rubric for writing narratives.  There were five areas on the rubric:  intro, structural development: organization & cohesion, conclusion, language style & conventions, and skill focus-narrative techniques (Sensory, Imagery, Dialogue, Pacing, P.O.V. Elements of Lit, Figurative Language, Voice/Style).  Each area worked together to create a cohesive narrative essay.  Students needed clarity in writing a narrative for a college essay.  I kept reassuring them that this was a narrative to display their personality, strengths, and weaknesses.

1. I wrote an example of a narrative essay about two girls “Barely making it” throughout their childhood. One experience was running to the corner store to buy gum before the school bus came, and another experience was riding bikes along a thinly paved road.  At the end of the story, the two girls graduated from high school and hugged. While they hugged, one said, “We made it.”  The kids loved the story, and they thought it was real. I had to reveal to the students it was just a figment of my imagination. 
2. Next, I instructed students to write their hook and introduction using my narrative as a guide.  I listed several hook strategies and had students practice writing a hook. A few students wanted to take the reader on the long road of vagueness. It was as if they did not want the reader to know what the essay was about until the second paragraph. I had to redirect their focus.  It is okay to provide some ambiguity, but the characters and significance of the event should be addressed within the first paragraph.

The Importance of Rubrics

1. When I introduced the rubric, I specifically focused on areas that I witnessed the students having trouble with.  Those areas were the introduction, structural development: organization & cohesion, and narrative techniques.  I reinforced the need to have a great hook and suggested students write about their magnet (I work at an award-winning art middle/high school).  Students were to engage the reader, present a well-developed situation, and introduce a narrator. 
2. I instructed students that the essay needed one focus and needed to be organized. I explained to the students to focus their attention on one event or one time when they overcame failure.  My lectures worked because many students focused on one event.  For example, I recently received one essay that started with a student having gastro issues as a preschool student to earning several awards for their art this spring.  I privately commented to the student to pick one event and write a story on it. A few students wrote about their audition experience at the school. They gave great details and imagery about how their hands were sweaty as they walked down the hall of the unfamiliar school as a sixth-grader. 
3. The last area I gave a vast amount of focus to was the narrative techniques. Students had to incorporate dialogue, sensory detail, and imagery into the essay.  While writing their body paragraphs, students had to include a dialogue within their piece. Students had to follow the six steps to writing dialogue from my district lead teacher’s video.  Providing these traits within the essay gives it a richness and the experience of being in the writer’s shoes.  

Results Using the Rubric

                The importance of rubrics assisted me to grade the essay fairly and quickly.  I was able to check off areas where the students performed well.  When I began grading, I deducted one point if they had 5 or fewer grammar errors.  If a student did not use one or two narrative techniques, I deducted points.  As I was grading the essay, I noticed that most students earned a “B” or higher grade. The students that earned a “C” had poor grammar, lack of focus, and limited narrative techniques.

I also wrote personal comments on each essay (I know, the English teacher in me). The students valued the comments, and several students asked to redo the essay.  Unfortunately, I stated no because that was the purpose of the peer editing process, and the students that were asking were the ones who had skipped that process. Overall, I enjoyed teaching writing to the students and liked the use of the rubric.  Students had a criterion for how the essay was to be completed, and they knew how they were going to be graded.  Would I use a rubric for the next essay? Yes, I would, but I also feel that students need to write an essay independently of a rubric.

What are your thoughts on writing an essay with a rubric? Would you use a rubric for every major essay? Tell me in the comment section below.