[wendi.wolfram]

Thank you, everyone, and great questions, let me see if I can help clarify. While I always strive to be open to new changes that benefit students, I have been teaching for over 25 years in F2F, Hybrid, and Online venues, my inquiry is to really help me make sure that I am not just stuck in my own ideals regading the standardization of a rubric across so many different courses, disciplines, and grade levels.

So, here is where I stand, I am a total advocate for rubrics, as a biologist, I find them to be great tools for clarifying assignment expectations and providing specific point values for missing requirements. They are invaluable in preventing varying degrees of point interpretation by other faculty and reduce the risk of grade inflation.

Content within the rubrics should be clearly defined and should be at the level of the Discussion Board. For example, a rubric for a freshman might include a higher point value for writing mechanics and ensuring that all prompts have been addressed but may not be focused as much on the depth of the response, where as a senior level rubric would put less emphasis on writing mechanics and more emphasis on researching the topic and providing a more in depth response that demonstrates a higher level of critical thinking regarding the topic.

When I develop a rubric, I ensure that there is a set number of points for each requirement within a set criteria, for example, if I have 4 bullet points for each of my criteria, then my rubric has 5 levels (if counting Level 0 for not meeting criteria) providing an opportunity for students to earn credit for each requirement.

The idea that was pitched is to use a rubric built for a freshman level course which divided the assessment value over 3 Levels (Level III = 100%; Level II = 85%; and Level 1 = 70%).

The criteria were then broken into 3 sections to be scored at the 3 levels:

1) Content Quality of the Main Post – that scored 4 criteria from response accuracy, addressing all assignment criteria, demonstrating connections with unit material, and providing accuracte sources.

2) Participation in DIscussion – that scored 4 criteria from student engagement with 2 people, professional/respectful response; factually based perspecitve, and asks a question.

3) Writing Style and Mechanics – that scored 3 criteria from displays college-level writing, to organized response, to finally in-text citations and references.

I should also add, that each Grading Level (III, II, I) have static criteria from those being assessed and that if any of those single required criteria are missing in Levels II or Level I, the student gets zero credit for that criteria section even if they got 3 of 4 parts being evaluated correct.

I hope this makes sense as I am not trying to disparage my colleagues in any form or fashion, I am simply curious about what others think of this approach to rubrics for Discussion Boards in Online courses. While I may personally be opposed, it doesn’t mean that there isn’t merit to this approach.

Thanks everyone for your wisdom and insight!! 🙂

[Shalini Saini]

I see your point and agree to your approach. However, some consistency over the level of the course or course content types can help students to attempt better and instructors can evaluate better with a familiar and defined grading structure. I need to think more on implementing it correctly and how to develop that considering what factors to keep common and what can be more course type/level. Thanks for brining it up for the discussion.

[jmonserrmdc-edu Jorge Monserrate]

Hello to all. I also teach a science course (Human Nutrition) online, synchronous, Wendy. In my experience, providing a well designed rubric for all graded assignments/work greatly facilitates a learner’s knowing what your expectations are. The criteria you select to grade, for example. I use them frequently, including for my weekly or bi-weekly discussions using the Canvas LMS platform. I have a template for discussions. Simple. I determined 3 criteria to grade. #1 is participation 5/10 points, for example. There needs to be an explanation of your expectation for participation and any other criteria you consider of importance in a discussion. If I have more than 30 students, I separate them into groups of five.

Even though I have this template, I let students know that they are subject to change (ex. if the discussion will be based on a watching a video).

Believe me, rubrics are great tools for transparency in grading. I’ll be glad to assist you, just let me know.

Jorge