Tuesday, November 10, 2009
Rethinking Writing Rubrics
This video is an interview with Maja Wilson, a public school teacher and author of Rethinking Rubrics in Writing Assessment. She talks about how rubrics do not allow for teachers to properly assess interesting pieces of writing. Teachers use rubrics in order to follow a common guideline as to what good writing is. Wilson finds a problem with this notion. She talks about the history of rubrics and how they were used to filter through the number of university applicants—to separate the good writers from the bad. She believes that this is not the job of public school teachers. She says that public school teachers are there to help every student. She also talks about how rubrics produce uniformity in writing and also in the teachers’ reading. When this uniformity is utilized writers begin to lose the individualization and texture of writing. Wilson also states that “an interesting piece of writing throws a rubric into chaos.” She believes that rubrics do not work well with interesting pieces of writing. The video states that test scorers have said that interesting pieces of writing take longer to assess. This contradicts what was mentioned by Spandel. Spandel says that rubrics save assessment time. By utilizing a rubric, teachers will have more time for comments and suggestions because everything else is already written down for the student in the rubric. She also discusses how the rubric allows for the empowerment of the student and also for the voice of that student to be heard, which contradicts with the idea of uniformity, as mentioned by Wilson. How do you feel about rubrics? Do you believe they create uniformity among student writing? Is this a positive or negative effect? Do rubrics allow for individuality among writers? Are there any ways to improve rubrics?
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I that Maja Wilson makes many great points in her interview. Rubrics provide a sense of uniformity. For some, make the writing process clear, but at the same time, the sense of uniformity within a rubric can harm the writing process because the boundaries are already set, with no room for "thinking outside the box." Maja Wilson describes how a uniform rubric shuts down the teacher's responses. All the teachers are responding to is what is presented in the rubric and nothing else.
ReplyDeleteI really liked how Maja Wilson describes how when teachers use a rubric, the texture and insight of reading and responding to a writing assignment is lost. The feel for the writing, the creativity and voice from the author of the writing is gone. Each piece of writing is unpredictable and should not have to fit a certain mold. Writing is a creative process in which students are able to voice their opinions through their own words, not having to fit a template.
I really like this video and almost used it in my post. I think that the she makes a good point when she says that using rubrics was used primarily to weed out the good writers from the bad. I agree with Maja Wilson when she says that it our job as educators to help all students. Our job is not to separate one group of students from the rest, but rather notice these differences and praise the work that children do do. I think that as long as assessments and rubrics are allowing all children to succeed within the context of certain restrictions, rubrics can be a helpful tool in guiding children along in the writing process. If there is freedom within the boundaries of rubrics, than children can still become independent thinkers and writers if not chained down by the restrictions of rubrics. I think that the best part of student writing is developing writing skills as individuals, not as a whole class. As as future teacher, I would hope that all my students' writing is not the same, but fosters individual knowledge in each child. Part of what makes us unique are the different opinions that we develop and the different perceptions we have about different ideas and I think this is especially true pertaining to writing.
ReplyDeletewhere to start! Rubrics are always an interesting topic to discuss as educators. I think that they are good only in certain situations and that in general slow down the grading of papers and assignments. I feel that when students are writing to a rubric they are losing who they are as a writer because they are only concentrating on what is required and they do not think outside the "box" or "rubric". I do agree with the fact that they start to create uniformity among students and their writing. I feel like you would basically get 30 papers with all the same points but in the end yes they did what the rubric said but did they work on their overall writing skills and knowledge of language, most likely not. I would say that rubrics so not allow for individuality among writers because like i stated before when you write to a rubric it limits your thoughts and constricts you to one way of writing which is sad because writing should be expressive. Your voice needs to be heard. I believe that there should be just a simple vision among educators when it comes to writing and that is to work on the basics such as organization, tone/voice and the other six traits that were listed in the recent reading.
ReplyDeleteI think that rubrics need to be used to an extent. They can be good in some cases but bad in others. They are good to allow students to know exactly what they will be graded on as long as the teacher follows the rubric when grading. However, there is no space for students to be creative in their writing with rubrics because students who are given a rubric write for it. They write in order to hit everything the rubric mentions so they will receive a good grade. As Wilson mentioned, rubrics are used at universities to separate good and bad writers, it is not fair. What if that person if not accepted because they do not match up with the rubric? Who knows how many other abilities that student could have brought to the table? Rubrics become repetitive and boring. I think that rubrics need to be kept to a minimum in order for students to be able to be individualistic with their writing and make it interesting.
ReplyDeleteTo be completely honest, I am not a fan of rubrics. I feel that they stifle creativity and place many restrictions on writing. Because of what is emphasized in our society, students of any age are always under pressure to perform well on standardized testing and get good grades. When you hand a child a rubric, the first thing they are going to do is think about how to meet all the criteria so that they can get a good grade. They focus on making sure they include everything that is needed in their writing that they often forget about the writing itself! This is turned writing into a mechanical process. If the kids complete the formula, then they get an A. What ever happened to writing for the sake of writing? When I am given a rubric, I always get writer’s block because I am making sure that I am including everything that is on the rubric. However, if I am given a free-write or am just writing in a journal, or even a blog, then I can just keep writing despite the topic. Rubrics do create uniformity among the students because they are all being taught to write to the same formula. Of course you will get those one or two students who stand out and choose to go above and beyond expectations, but that is rare especially when they are younger. That is why I believe that rubrics in general are a bad idea, but most especially rubrics for younger students.
ReplyDeleteHowever I do believe that rubrics may be used as guides, but most instructors do not use them in that way. Some students need a rubric, but I believe that if you offer the rubric as a guide rather than the criteria you set to grade, then that would be more effective. Once you tell students that they have to follow these guidelines, and include all of these concepts, and that their grade will be based on how well they do that, then once again it becomes mechanical, and writing is no longer fun.
What a great video! I have to say I agree with Maja Wilson. At first I kind of thought, oh Spandel makes some good points about rubrics; they can be useful and make assessment easier. I think rubrics might be more necessary for people who have to grade writing; such as, SAT prompt writing, college essays, or any type of writing where a lot of papers are being looked at and compared. In the classroom; however, Maja is right teachers need to not be limited on how they view a paper. Students should also not be limited on what they write and many times rubrics can cause students to write a certain way that is not their own. A teacher in a classroom needs to be there to assist the students in becoming better writers, not “filtering” them out like those who grade papers for large assessment testing or colleges.
ReplyDeleteRubrics in my opinion do cause uniformity among student writing. This can be positive when a student is able to write to the rubric in a way that gets them an A on their papers, but is this really useful in creating the best writers? No! I believe in order for students to enjoy writing and create their own voice they need to not be in contact with rubrics. Any good student would try their best to meet every requirement to fulfill the needs of rubric and teacher. Why should we punish any student for going above and beyond or for thinking outside of the box? I also think there can never be one set rubric for every piece of writing. There is a wide range of writing styles and genres. Rubrics need to be adjusted to fit the differences accordingly. Now how can we improve rubrics? Not use them would be best, but a teacher could create a separate rubric with your students, for every writing assignment. Even better idea would to individualize a rubric for every student according to what they may be good or even not so good at?
I like this video you found because it contrasts our book which really believes in rubrics. As I was watching this I kept thinking, well what do you suggest teachers do instead, finally at the end she suggested just giving comments. But as we know students don't really take their time reading comments unless they get a negative grade and want to know why they did poorly, or what they missed. And if you take away rubrics they how do you know how to grade, and how do students know how you are going to grade them. I think that rubrics are okay for bigger assignments, but they really shouldn't be used all the time like our books suggests.
ReplyDeleteIt is interesting to hear different viewpoints on rubrics, especially from those who specialize in writing. There are three points that Wilson mentioned in the video clip that I thought were interesting. First, she stated that rubrics were set in place originally for “all teachers to agree on how it [writing] should be scored” (Wilson). I do not think this is a beneficial, productive, or possible idea. Teachers are not all going to agree on how each individual piece of writing should be scored. Each piece of writing is unique and draws attention to different aspects of writing. In addition, some teacher’s as Weaver discussed in her text, consider some errors to be more distracting or crucial to writing than others. Secondly, Wilson mentions that instead of using rubrics to assess writing, the teacher’s “job is to help everyone” (Wilson). I agree with this completely. Each student within the class will write differently and struggle with different concepts within writing. A rubric should not confine the teacher or student to look at certain aspects to develop as a writer. Instead, the teacher should develop a more personal rubric or focus for each student and their writing. I thought it would be helpful, if when a teacher holds writing conferences during one-on-one time he or she develops a personal and unique writing rubric for the student to focus on what is pertinent to their writing and development. Lastly, Wilson agrees that rubrics “produce uniformity,” which I also agree with to a certain extent (Wilson). I agree with this, because teachers will grade each paper looking at the same things and students will pay attention to the things mentioned in the rubric. I disagree with this, because despite having a rubric that calls for the same guidelines, students are unique in their writing and unless they plagiarize, each writing style and level will be different from the next. I do not think that rubrics are needed. As a teacher of writing you should work with each student personally to help students grow as writers. I do not think rubrics allow for genuine individuality, because writing to fulfill a rubric limits creativity and expression just as focusing on all the grammar rules while learning to write leads to chaotic and less creative or free writing. I think rubrics should reflect each individual separately and should be more of a chart with reminders or goals to keep in mind to help that student succeed.
ReplyDeleteI thought the discussion between Maja Wilson and the interviewer on grading interesting writing was very.. interesting. Maja Wilson commented that with the rubrics, when you come across an interesting piece of writing, the amount of time spent on grading the paper increases tremendously. Who knew that interesting papers would contribute to grading fatigue! In Spandel’s book Creating Writer’s through Six Trait Writing, the author says that scores are assigned to papers are merely suggestions to a writer to show their level o writing ability. I like Wilson’s reasoning on this topic better when she said that these scores assigned by rubrics are predictions of a student’s writing ability, but the scores are invalid because writing is something that is unpredictable and always changing.
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed watching this Video and getting Maja Wilson opinion. I think that rubrics can be a very tricky thing. I think that they can be helpful when setting up a basic model to follow during writing but I dont think the the rubric should tell all that should be in the paper or homework. Like Spandel says, writing should be graded on the writing itself. There is no right answer and their work should have a voice. Scores should be on individual work and not off a rubric. I do feel that rubrics creat uniformity and don't allow students to be individuals and have their own voice in writing. Its for sure a negative effct on writing and rubrics should be taken lightly. Rubrics should really just be a starting off point and a way to get thoughts and ideas flowing.
ReplyDeleteRubrics is a tricky matter to decide on for me. I feel that rubrics give students a heads up on what the teacher is looking for, but at the same time might constrict them. Throughout all my education, rubrics have always been given for graded assignments. I liked it since I was able to see what certain aspects I needed to include in my paper to receive a high grade. On the other hand, having my whole paper already mapped out for me did not allow me to create my own style of writing. The rubrics gave me a play by play of how my paper was to be formed and I had no say in the manner if I wanted a high mark on my paper. A rubric that gives the students a clear understanding of hat the teacher wants is useful, but at the same time I think there needs to be room for creativity. Students should have the choice in how they want to approach their writing.
ReplyDeleteWow! Rubrics are such a controversial topic. I like this interview and almost used it as well. Maja brings up some interesting facts that I did not know about. I like how she took the time to research why rubrics were not working for her at first. It is true that rubrics do provide structure. On the other hand it is also true that rubrics can cause students to lose a voice in their writing. I cannot get over the fact that rubrics were first used to help teachers agree on the writing process. Today that s not true. Different teachers carry different criteria in their rubrics. This is bad for students because they then struggle with writing with every teacher they come in contact with. There are teachers that focus on certain things that other teachers might not really emphasize in their classroom. Weaver explains this very well in her chapter on rubrics. I know that as teachers we want our students to become successful writers, but on the other hand we have to come together and set criteria for all of our students and make it consistent!
ReplyDeleteI feel that rubrics are great when you are trying to get students to see where their work stands as far as a great paper, a good paper, and okay paper, a mediocre paper, etc. I don't think that teachers should grade exactly on rubrics though, because sometimes a students work can fall in between, such that it meets half of the qualifications of one part of the rubric, but not part of the other, and vice versa.
ReplyDeleteI, like Stephenette, can't get over the fact that rubrics were used for teachers to agree on grading. Teachers simply do not have the same standards today and will grade according to their interpretation of good work. I think that students have so much adapting to do with each teacher they have. They all have different styles and expectations for their students and they in turn, have to adapt to that. And some students lose their voice in the process.