Samantha Jackson

Graduate Portfolio

Standard 2 Reflection:

EDUC 603: Evaluation of Student Learning: Construct a well-written rubric scoring guide for a

given instructional goal or task.

Radford University

Fall 2022
 Evaluation of Student Learning is another class I benefited from during my time at

Radford University. This class has greatly improved my teaching in an area I did not have the

most experience in previously; writing rubrics. This standard states that students should be able

to “Construct a well-written rubric scoring guide for a given instructional goal or task.” I highly

appreciated the topic on creating rubrics for class projects and assignments. In fact, I wish we

had worked on this topic earlier in the course! I had just created a rubric for a group assignment

for one of my own lessons previously. This standard helped me reflect on the rubric I had

created and revise it for this school year. Writing a well-structured rubric is especially important

for teaching any grade level. This has helped me in the classroom in many ways; I have added

rubrics to multiple types of assignments, it has made grading assignments easier, and helps the

students understand what they need to do to get a good grade. These three key points have

assisted me in utilizing rubrics to grade various kinds of assignments for my classes.

The first way this standard has impacted my teaching is that it has inspired me to add

rubrics to assignments I never thought of adding them to previously. Normally, I would only

create a rubric for individual or group projects in class. Now, I add them to vocabulary

assignments, warm-up discussion posts, and even regular fill in the blank assignments. For my

vocabulary, students must copy down the definition and then they get to choose whether they

want to use the vocabulary word in a sentence or they can draw a picture that represents the

vocabulary word. Usually, grading these assignments takes me a long time. I must make sure

their pictures accurately show the vocabulary word and that they are writing a complete sentence

that includes the vocabulary word. After writing feedback on their paper, it takes me at least a

week to grade all their assignments. Now that I created a rubric that I have attached to their

assignment it has helped with the grading as well as the level of work I have received from my

students. An example of this rubric is shown in Artifact 2b in the portfolio. They can clearly see
what I am asking for and I teach many of them to cross things out as they complete them to help

them keep track. Adding rubrics to more than just projects has also increased student success

and has helped make grading easier for me.

Standard two for creating well-written rubrics in my Evaluation of Student Learning has

also impacted my teaching by cutting down on the time needed for me to grade items.

It has made grading many of my assignments so much easier and faster. One-way rubrics have

achieved this is that I can add these rubrics directly to my assignments in my Learning

Management System, Canvas. By adding them to the assignment in Canvas I can click on the

grade they received in each category, and it adds it up for me and it gives them the grade! This

has made grading any assignment faster because I do not have to hand-write individual feedback

on each of the standard for the assignment. I can select it online and leave additional comments

for my students. Utilizing online rubrics has been amazing, and my students really enjoy getting

their assignments back so quickly. Learning this standard has been extremely helpful and given

me extra planning time for my class, which is very helpful. Having a well written rubric is also

extremely helpful to the students as well.

Finally, this standard has also helped my students understand their grades and

requirements for assignments. I have worked with my students to make sure they read their

rubrics on assignments because the rubric will tell them how to get an A on the assignment. I

give them tools to use as they work to complete the assignment. For example, I have them cross

things off in their rubric as they complete that task. When we have group projects, I also have a

group supervisor who goes through the rubric as they work and makes sure the tasks outlined in

the rubric are complete. This can be shown in the Rubric attached for Artifact 2. For this group

project I have the student supervisor check things off in the rubric as they are completed to teach

them this skill. I like to make sure that different students get this role throughout the year, to
help all of them learn this skill. It has helped my students tremendously by giving them a clear

view of what needs to be done. Once the assignments are completed, I use the same rubric to

grade the assignment and give students feedback on what they did well on or what they need to

improve. The rubrics have made this process much faster and cut down on the number of

comments I need to leave on assignments. Thus, making sure students are still getting quality

feedback but it is returned to them in a timely manner.

Overall, learning how to write a clear and well-written rubric in the class Evaluation of

Student Learning has been extremely beneficial to me in the classroom. During the class I was

able to edit a rubric for one of my group projects and I cannot wait to use it this spring. This

standard has caused me to add rubrics to multiple kinds of assignments, made grading easier and

faster, and has helped students better understand their assignments and the grades they receive. I

plan to use this skill to revise the grading rubrics I have made in the past and improve them for

me and my students' benefit. A well written rubric not only helps the teacher grade, but it also

helps the students understand the assignments and what they need to do in order to get a high

score.