for Performance Assessment

Give you the tools to design a rubric -Will need to assess a performance, 9 week assessment -Show how assessment can help teaching & learning

Rubrics 101 What is a rubric? Purposes Advantages Parts Samples

Designing a Rubric (walkthrough the steps) Begin with standards (TEKS, national) Think about evidence Design a performance task Write the rubric Evaluate

Handouts Web page s/rubric.htm s/rubric.htm Each other and me Time

Desired Outcomes/Standards Instruction Assessment

A rubric is a scoring tool that lists the criteria for a piece of work, or “what counts” and clearly defines gradations of quality for each criterion, from excellent to poor.

How will the work be judged? What’s the difference between good work and weaker work? How can we make sure our scores are valid? How can performers and judges focus their preparation on excellence?

A rubric is an authentic assessment tool which is particularly useful in assessing criteria which are complex and subjective.

Collaboration Soccer Video camera work

Authentic assessment corresponds as closely as possible to real world experience. It was originally developed in the arts and apprenticeship systems, where assessment has always been based on performance.

The instructor observes the student in the process of working on something real, provides feedback, monitors the student's use of the feedback, and adjusts instruction and evaluation accordingly. Authentic assessment takes this principle of evaluating real work into all areas of the curriculum.

Rubrics are said to be an authentic assessment tool. They are most helpful when used to evaluate real-life tasks where students are engaged in solving real-life problems. They are a formative type of assessment because they are used before. during, and after the learning process.

Rubrics: Make expectations clear Help students judge own work Reduce time spent evaluating Easy to use and explain Make scoring fair and consistent

“Rubrics can improve student performance, as well as monitor it, by making teachers' expectations clear and by showing students how to meet these expectations. The result is often marked improvements in the quality of student work and in learning. Thus, the most common argument for using rubrics is they help define "quality."

One student actually didn't like rubrics for this very reason: "If you get something wrong," she said, "your teacher can prove you knew what you were supposed to do!” (Marcus 1995).

“[Rubrics] provide teachers with an effective, objective method for evaluating skills that do not generally lend themselves to objective assessment methods”.

“[Rubrics] help students become more thoughtful judges of the quality of their own and others' work. When rubrics are used to guide self- and peer-assessment, students become increasingly able to spot and solve problems in their own and one another's work…..

“Repeated practice with peer- assessment, and especially self- assessment, increases students' sense of responsibility for their own work and cuts down on the number of "Am I done yet?" questions.”

“Rubrics reduce the amount of time teachers spend evaluating student work. Teachers tend to find that by the time a piece has been self- and peer-assessed according to a rubric, they have little left to say about it. When they do have something to say, they can often simply circle an item in the rubric, rather than struggle to explain the flaw or strength they have noticed.”

Performance Criteria/Dimensions - come from standards -usually 5-7 Rating Scale -representing most to least proficient -usually an even number of points Descriptors -Statements describing each level of performance

Examine existing rubrics Look at standards Decide evidence needed Create performance task Use rubric to evaluate performance Use handout “Writing a Rubric” in packet

TEKS National Standards Your own desired outcomes/goals What should students know and be able to do?

How will you know if they know it / can do it? What kind of evidence will you need? What does success look like, sound like? List essential attributes

A performance task provides a student the opportunity to demonstrate his or her abilities and to apply knowledge and skills. -Your driver's road test was a performance task -An audition for the school's choir is a performance task

Plan and conduct an experiment. Write a story, composition, or poem. Give an oral report. Design and make a videotape. Construct a scientific model. Program a computer. Tutor a classmate. Complete an art project………..

Keep a science journal. Interview a scientist. Guide classmates on a trip. Correspond with a scientific author. Graph data. Construct a concept map. Research information in the library……

Draw a chart or diagram. Give photo or slide presentations. Compose a song. Write science questions. Record long-term plant growth. Care for/keep record of animals. Organize a healthy luncheon.

The best performance assessment tasks are interesting, worthwhile activities that relate to your instructional outcomes and allow your students to demonstrate what they know and can do.

Does the task truly match the outcome(s) you're trying to measure? The task shouldn't require knowledge and skills that are irrelevant to the outcome. Example: If you are trying to measure speaking skills, asking the students to orally summarize a difficult science article penalizes those students who are poor readers or who lack the science background to understand the article. In that case, you would not know whether you were measuring speaking or (in this case) extraneous reading and science skills.

Is the task a worthwhile use of instructional time? Performance assessments may be time- consuming so that time should be well- spent. Instead of being an "add-on" to regular instruction, the assessment should be part of it. See Handout, “Effective Performance Tasks”

Can the task be used to measure several outcomes at once? If so, the assessment process can be more efficient, by requiring fewer assessments overall.

With your colleagues, make a preliminary decision about: the standards your assessment will address the criteria of the performance or product to be assessed. For example, Illinois students' writing assessments are scored for focus, support, organization and conventions. A musical performance might be rated for intonation, rhythmic accuracy, tone quality, etc. An oral presentation might be rated for content, organization, delivery and language.

Art Formal elements - structure - composition Technical - techniques - materials Sensory elements -expression - mood - emotion - energy

One technique that may be helpful is to sort examples of actual student work into three piles, the very best, the poorest and those in between. With your colleagues, try to articulate what makes the good assignments good. Your list will probably contain many more dimensions than you will actually be able to evaluate for each of your students. Try to cluster your tentative list of dimensions into just a few categories or scales.

Write a definition of each of the dimensions. Develop a continuum (scale) for describing the range of products/performances on each of the dimensions.  For each of your dimensions, what characterizes the best possible performance of the task? This description will serve as the anchor for each of the dimensions by defining the highest score point on your rating scale.

 Describe in words the worst possible product/performance. This will serve as a description of the lowest point on your rating scale.

 Describe characteristics of products/performances that fall at the intermediate points of the rating scale for each dimension. Often these points will include some major or minor flaws that prevent the product/performance from receiving a higher rating.

Evaluating your rubric Does the rubric relate to the outcome(s) being measured? Does it address anything extraneous? Does the rubric cover important dimensions of student performance? Do the criteria reflect current conceptions of "excellence" in the field? Are the categories or scales well-defined?

Is there a clear basis for assigning scores at each scale point? Can the rubric be applied consistently by different scorers? Can the rubric be understood by students and parents?

Is the rubric developmentally appropriate? Can the rubric be applied to a variety of tasks? Is the rubric fair and free from bias? Is the rubric useful, feasible, manageable and practical?

Let’s look at See handout…

“A rubric can be a powerful communications tool. When it is shared among teachers, students and parents, the rubric communicates in concrete and observable terms what the school values most. It provides a means for you and your colleagues to clarify your vision of excellence and convey that vision to your students…..

It can also provide a rationale for assigning grades to subjectively scored assessments. Sharing the rubric with students is vital—and only fair—if we expect them to do their best possible work. An additional benefit of sharing the rubric is that it empowers students to critically evaluate their own work.” Heidi Andrade, 1995

Web Page -Sample Rubrics -Online Rubric Creators -Software to download -Articles for further information