Criteria, levels, descriptors in pedagogy

 Criteria for assessing student achievement in general education determine

general approaches which help to identify the level of students` achievement
while studying. Moreover, criteria establish a correspondence between the
required knowledge, skills and abilities of students and the score in
accordance with the levels of academic achievement. The last ones are
defined by the State Standard. There are such levels: below basic, at basic, at
proficient, and at advanced. Also different subject curriculums are created in
accordance with educational inclination of the educational institution and
have three levels of proficiency: standard, core, and specialized. For example,
in accordance with European Council for Modern Languages, there are such
international levels of foreign language proficiency: Breakthrough, Waystage,
Threshold, Vantage, Effective, and Mastery. Each of these levels has its own
descriptors which are based on different criteria, for instance:
 characteristics of the answer: correctness, logic, validity, integrity;
quality of knowledge;
 formation of general educational and subject competencies;
 level of mastery of mental operations: the ability to analyze, synthesize,
compare, classify, summarize, draw conclusions etc;
 ability to identify problems and solve them, formulate hypotheses;
 independence of evaluative judgments.

The reference to the studied material: Методика навчання іноземних мов і

культур / За ред. Ніколаєвої С.Ю. – К: Ленвіт, 2013. – 442 с.

Works that I found to be related to the topic:

“Defining characteristics of educational competencies” by Mark Albanese and

George Mejicano. This article attempts to identify the characteristics that define a
competency and proposes criteria that can be applied to distinguish between
competencies, goals, objectives and outcomes. They propose 5 criteria which can be
used to define learner`s competency.

“Teaching and assessing writing skills” by Luis Alberto Lázaro, Universidad de Alcalá.
In this work, scholar established criteria in order to understand what each descriptor
of level of knowledge represents. These criteria could be arranged in holistic scales
(general descriptions of writing ability) or analytic scales, which separate the aspects
of writing into different units. The scholar provided such example of holistic scale for
writing ability:
5 - Constructs grammatically correct sentences and phrases and shows full mastery
of appropriate vocabulary. Text is organized coherently. Correct spelling at all times.
Excellent content and presentation. Message is wholly relevant.

4 - In general, grammatically correct sentences and phrases but some errors which
do not effect understanding. Does not use appropriate vocabulary at all times. Some
difficulties with organization of text. Some errors in spelling. Good content and
presentation. Message is mostly relevant.

3 - Grammatical errors and use of vocabulary affects understanding as does

organization of text. Many errors in spelling. Satisfactory content and presentation.
Message is not always relevant.

2 - Text understood with difficulty due to inaccurate grammar and inappropriate use
of vocabulary. Poor content and presentation. Message generally lacks relevancy.

1 - Impossible to understand text due to frequency of grammatical errors and

incoherence of organization. Poor spelling. Message irrelevant.