How to Build a Rubric
There isn’t one-size-fits-all guidance on how to create a rubric, but there are fundamental questions you’ll want to start with to ensure your rubric is effective. The below approach from Syracuse University breaks rubric construction into four primary stages and pairs well with this downloadable rubric template.
Stage One: Determine the assignment’s purpose
- Consider why you’ve created this particular assignment and what exactly you expect students to learn from it.
Stage Two: Identify the Assignment Dimensions
- Focus on the assignment dimensions as well as the details of the assignment. These dimensions vary according to the course learning objectives, students’ year of study, the assignment itself, and your experience giving and grading the assignment.
- Once you have identified the assignment dimensions, create a description for the highest performance level you expect from students for each dimension. It’s easiest to articulate what is very strong work and what is decidedly not.
Stage Three: Establish Criteria
- Reflect on stages one and two to group similar expectations and results together in what will become the rubric dimensions (e.g., organization, context, analysis, presentation, etc…).
- Remember this is an iterative process. Some performance expectations do not fit neatly into one group. Test it out with colleagues, collect feedback.
Stage Four: Describe Performance Details
- Apply the dimensions and descriptions from stages two and three to the final form of the rubric, using a grid format. Consider using this rubric template.
- Determine the appropriate scale you want to use and label each accordingly.
- Complete the descriptions for the other performance levels in the rubric grid. Since the highest level is already complete, start with the lowest performance level. Once you’ve done the “bookends,” you’ll need to be explicit about what falls in between.
- What constitutes excellent work? “Good enough?” Unacceptable?
Best Practices
- Rubrics should be written in clear language with explicit criteria that describe more/less successful versions of each criterion.
- Students benefit from seeing the assignment rubric before beginning the assignment. Consider reviewing it with them to make sure they understand it.
- Rubrics should align with course learning outcomes. What do you think students will learn from the assignment that will contribute toward their achieving the larger goals of the course?
Additional Resources and Guidance
- Parts of a Rubric, a helpful visual
- How to Adapt a Rubric
- Rubric Examples
- Common Rubric Mistakes (and how to fix them)
Adapted from a wide variety of sources including: Carnegie Mellon, Hunter College, Vanderbilt University, Syracuse University, and Harvard University