Welcome to My Workshop

If you're like me, you've probably grappled with the task of assigning the right score for a student's essay, presentation, or book project. Rubrics have helped me score complex work products such as these quickly and fairly.

A rubric is a scale that describes various levels of proficiency for a learning performance. Here's the way I use a rubric. First, I carefully read the essay. Then, after studying the rubric's descriptions, I match my impressions of the work to the rubric level that best describes it. Because it provides such explanations, a rubric makes it possible for me to determine a score for a complex task such as "Describe the ways the main character changed and give reasons for those changes."

In this workshop you'll see examples of rubrics and try your hand at scoring students' work. I believe you'll find, as I did, that rubrics offer a more precise and thorough way to evaluate and explain the ratings to ourselves, our students and their parents. Throughout the workshop, you can ask a question or share a problem or a successful experience with your colleagues by clicking on Ask a Question on the left.

	In Part 1, I will introduce and provide various examples of rubric assessments.

	In Part 2, you will practice using rubrics for scoring student work.

	Part 3 will guide you through the process of planning a rubric assessment for your class — perhaps to assess a report on Thomas Edison, a presentation comparing two Harry Potter books, or even a diorama of a scene in Narnia.

	Here you'll find my final comments on the workshop, as well as a printable certificate of completion.