I went to a faculty breakfast this morning at which we discussed grading rubrics in our classes. I use grading rubrics, primarily because my department expects them, and my students demand them. I don't like them. They have lowered my grades (someone else said the same thing this morning), which is probably a good thing. But the thing I don't like is that they make me nit-picky. I can tell the difference between an A- and a B+ paper. But I can't tell the difference between a 91 and a 92. With a rubric, you may lose points for every little thing and get "dinged" down to a 91, when it was really an A- paper, and I normally would have given you a 92. It would take me less time to give an A- and write some comments as to why. Ok, maybe it just feels like it would take less time.
Despite my complaints, it's probably the way of the future, so I should probably just live with it.
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
Grading Rubrics
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1 comment:
Rubrics offer prescriptive guidance to students. It outlines the content and relative weight of all elements of an assignment.
Departments also expect them because grading has become litigious. You might know (and most of us do) what a B- paper is, but in a litigious environment of students and their helicopter parents complaining at every turn, we are expected to explain and justify what made it a B- paper.
Keep your chin up!
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