rubric for online assignment

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• AACU VALUE Rubrics

Using rubrics

A rubric is a type of scoring guide that assesses and articulates specific components and expectations for an assignment. Rubrics can be used for a variety of assignments: research papers, group projects, portfolios, and presentations.  

Why use rubrics? 

Rubrics help instructors: 

• Assess assignments consistently from student-to-student. 
• Save time in grading, both short-term and long-term. 
• Give timely, effective feedback and promote student learning in a sustainable way. 
• Clarify expectations and components of an assignment for both students and course teaching assistants (TAs). 
• Refine teaching methods by evaluating rubric results. 

Rubrics help students: 

• Understand expectations and components of an assignment. 
• Become more aware of their learning process and progress. 
• Improve work through timely and detailed feedback. 

Considerations for using rubrics 

When developing rubrics consider the following:

• Although it takes time to build a rubric, time will be saved in the long run as grading and providing feedback on student work will become more streamlined.  
• A rubric can be a fillable pdf that can easily be emailed to students. 
• They can be used for oral presentations. 
• They are a great tool to evaluate teamwork and individual contribution to group tasks. 
• Rubrics facilitate peer-review by setting evaluation standards. Have students use the rubric to provide peer assessment on various drafts. 
• Students can use them for self-assessment to improve personal performance and learning. Encourage students to use the rubrics to assess their own work. 
• Motivate students to improve their work by using rubric feedback to resubmit their work incorporating the feedback. 

Getting Started with Rubrics 

• Start small by creating one rubric for one assignment in a semester.  
• Ask colleagues if they have developed rubrics for similar assignments or adapt rubrics that are available online. For example, the  AACU has rubrics  for topics such as written and oral communication, critical thinking, and creative thinking. RubiStar helps you to develop your rubric based on templates.  
• Examine an assignment for your course. Outline the elements or critical attributes to be evaluated (these attributes must be objectively measurable). 
• Create an evaluative range for performance quality under each element; for instance, “excellent,” “good,” “unsatisfactory.” 
• Avoid using subjective or vague criteria such as “interesting” or “creative.” Instead, outline objective indicators that would fall under these categories. 
• The criteria must clearly differentiate one performance level from another. 
• Assign a numerical scale to each level. 
• Give a draft of the rubric to your colleagues and/or TAs for feedback. 
• Train students to use your rubric and solicit feedback. This will help you judge whether the rubric is clear to them and will identify any weaknesses. 
• Rework the rubric based on the feedback. 

Rubrics for Assignments in Online Courses

A rubric is one of the most popular grading and assessment tools.

Here are five benefits to having rubrics as a central part of an online course:

• Goals – Due to the lack of external motivation in an asynchronous course, it is important for students to have established goals in order to remain motivated. A rubric explains exactly what their goals should be
• Expectations – In addition to goals, students need to know what is expected of them. A clear rubric creates an understanding between the instructors and students and minimizes miscommunication between them.
• Grading Consistency – Because online students are not communing in one classroom, some online courses may have larger enrollment numbers than their brick-and-mortar counterparts. Consequently, there may be more than one grader for any given assignment. A set rubric guarantees consistency and fairness for all students.
• Detailed Feedback – A strong, objective based learning assignment should enable a student to know what concept areas he has mastered and where he needs to improve. Since a rubric outlines why a student received a specific grade, that personalized feedback can guide him to do better on the next assignment and in the course in general.
• Online Discussions – A major component of most online courses is the discussion board. While it is meant to mimic the class and conversation of a traditional learning environment, it is also a graded assignment. Rubrics can reign in the subjective nature of a adding to a discussion board as well as grading it by providing guidelines for the students and the instructor.

Here are three great online resources to assist you in making rubrics for your online class:

• RubiStar – This is a free online tool which allows you to customize rubrics for any course or assignment. It provides users with a general rubric which can be personalized through its easy-to-use user interface. Users can also select customized rubrics which were created by other instructors.
• Rubrics for Online Course – This website, powered by Northern Arizona University, provides examples of rubrics which are specialized for online courses. These provide a fantastic framework for instructors when they are creating rubrics for their classes.
• Blackboard Rubrics – This LMS allows instructors to create rubrics inside of the course and directly attach it to any assignment. Instead of attaching a rubric from a different source, such as a PDF, an instructor can fill out the rubric online while he is grading the assignment. The rubric is automatically shown to the student, all within the LMS, so that he knows where to improve. Blackboard also provides instructions and a tutorial explain how rubrics work and how to best use them in the LMS.

Reference herein to any specific commercial products, process, or service by trade name, trademark, manufacturer, or otherwise, does not constitute or imply an endorsement, recommendation, or favoring by Touro College.

Rubrics – More than Just Assessment by Dr. Renee Aitkin on  Online Learning Consortium

Grading Rubrics and Online Assignments by Melissa Venable on OnlineCollege.org

Grading and Performance Rubrics by Carnegie Mellon University

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Creating and using rubrics for assessment, in this section, tools and ideas for creating your rubrics.

Many of these rubrics grew out of a long-term commitment to building alternative assessments in our Instructional Design , and Math Specialist  and Teaching and Assessing Writing online courses.

What's New?

Video Conferencing Rubric

Our Top Five Rubrics

• Online Discussion
• Video Project
• Middle School/High School Group Work
• Elementary Teamwork

Quick Links to Rubrics

• Discussion, Teamwork, and Group Work Rubrics  
• ePortfolio and Web Page Rubrics  
• Concept Map and Graphic Organizer Rubric  
• Video and Multimedia Project Rubrics  
• Math and Science Rubrics  
• Virtual Simulations and Games Rubric  
• Research Process Rubrics  
• Writing Rubrics  
• Rubrics for Primary Grades  
• Presentation Rubrics  

Tools for Creating Your Rubrics

Presentation rubrics.

Video Conferencing Rubric Maggie Rouman's rubric assesses real-time sessions to foster community, present topics, and enhance learning.  

Podcast Rubric Ann Bell's rubric helps students assess what makes a good podcast. 

PowerPoint Rubric 10 performance categories

Oral Presentation Rubric  (Word doc)

VoiceThread Participation Rubric  (pdf) Michelle Pacansky-Brock's general formative assessment is used when students view a mini video lecture/presentation. Contributions are rated on originality, comprehension, and clarity.

Oral Presentation Checklist 4Teachers.org provides an online tool to customize the checklist for your grade level

Effective Project Presentations Buck Institute for Education (BIE) rubric for high school presentations

Poster Rubric

Speaking and Writing Rubrics  bilingual education (English and Spanish) Spanish Partial-Immersion Program Rubrics for Writing and Speaking in English and Spanish for Grades 1-5

Social Media Project Rubrics

Wiki Rubric Criteria for assessing individual and group Wiki contributions.

Blog Rubric Assess individual blog entries, including comments on peers' blogs.

Twitter Rubric Assess learning during social networking instructional assignments.

Discussion, Teamwork, and Group Work Rubrics

Online Discussion Board Rubric Criteria for assessing the ability to share perspectives, refine thoughts through the writing process, and participate in a meaningful discussion Primary Grade Self-Evaluation Teamwork Rubric  (PDF) Features of a sandwich to graphically show the criteria

Upper Elementary Teamwork Rubric Karen Franker's rubric includes six defined criteria for assessing the team and individual responsibility

Middle School/High School Collaboration Rubric Six defined criteria for collaboration with strong performance descriptors

ePortfolio and Web Page Rubrics

These rubrics are related to our Instructional Design courses.

e-Portfolio Rubric Electronic portfolio rubric created by Joan Vandervelde includes 7 categories with 4 levels of achievement

Web Page Rubric Joan Vandervelde's rubric details 9 categories for evaluating a web page

CyberFair Peer Review Student Web Page Rubric Online feedback form for CyberFair Project.

Concept Map and Graphic Organizer Rubric

Graphic Organizer and Mind Map Rubric   Concept map diagram rubric to assess a visual storyboard of a final project or to chart a flow of work and ideas by Karen Franker

Storyboard Rubric Concept map and/or storyboard specification of instructional sequencing and messaging details.

Video and Multimedia Project Rubrics

These rubrics are related to our Elearning and Online Teaching course and flipped classroom  course.

Video Project Rubric   Joan Vandervelde lists criteria for video production and editing

Multimedia Project Rubric   Rubric developed by Caroline McCullen, Jamie McKenzie, and Terrie Gray

Virtual Simulations and Games Rubric

Assessing Student Learning in Virtual Simulations and Serious Games A grading rubric created by Ann Bell with 6 performance criteria

Research Process Rubrics

Research Process Rubric - Elementary Karen Franker's rubric to assess planning, gathering, organizing and citing information in grades 3-5

Research Process Rubric - Middle School Karen Franker's rubric assesses performance with the research process

Rubric for Research Process   Joyce Valenza's rubric assesses 5 research performance areas for high school students

Research Process Reflection Joyce Valenza's Question Brainstormer encourages students to ask focus questions and reflect on the research process

Academic Research Writing and APA Formatting Rubric Kay Lehmann's rubric for high school or college level

Writing Rubrics

These rubrics are related to our Teaching and Assessing Writing courses .

Student-Friendly Writing Rubric

Samples of Student Writing, Scored With a 6+1 Trait Rubric An extensive archive of assessment materials associated with the  6-Traits assessment  approach.

NWREL's Six Traits of Writing Rubric English and Spanish versions of the 6-Traits of Writing Rubric and other rubrics for listening, public speaking, and reading

Writing Rubrics K-12 - Opinion/Argument, Narrative, and Informative/Explanatory

Research Paper Rubric   (Word doc)

Rubric for Scoring Effective Writing  (Word doc)

Persuasive Essay Rubric  (Word document)

Reflective Writing Rubric  (PDF)

Reflection Paper Rubric (PDF)

Historical Fiction Essay Rubric  (pdf) Blake Green's history class rubric.

Rubrics for Middle School Includes invention report, book talk, persuasive essay,  and autobiographical event essay

Autobiographical Rubric (PDF)

Math and Science Rubrics

These rubrics are related to our Math Specialist courses .

Math Rubrics 4 levels of math understanding with performance criteria

NCTM Math Standard Rubric  (pdf) Performance criteria for problem-solving reasoning and proof communication connections representation

Science Rubric  (pdf) Performance criteria for the use of scientific tools, science reasoning and strategies, science concepts and use of data and communication Scientific Report Rubric Easy to modify for any kind of high school research report

Physics Project Rubric A good example of a performance rubric tuned a specific project. Easy to adapt to other subjects.

Rubrics for Primary Grades

Kindergarten Rubrics Assess literacy development

Kindergarten Rubrics Evaluates communication, fine muscle development, emergent reading and writing, large muscle development, math development, creative arts, personal development, and work habits, play, and social skills.

Primary Grade Self-Evaluation Teamwork Rubric  (PDF) Features a sandwich to graphically show when all criteria are met

Third Grade Venn Diagram Rubric

These tools are explored in our e-learning course .

Rubistar Choose a topic and create a new rubric based on a template. Save and edit your rubric online.

Rubric Template Insert the task and criteria into this template.

Rubric Template  (Word doc) Word document template to download and modify to meet authentic assessment needs (University of West Florida).

Quick Rubric

iRubric  develop rubrics and access them from anywhere

Single-Point Rubric  (Word doc)

Rubric Generator Build your own grading rubrics online by filling out a form. You can include a graphic and print the rubric.

Readings about Authentic Assessment Helpful background information about rubric design and implementation in the classroom.