Do Student-Designed Rubrics Increase Overall Engagement and Performance?
Lena Cosentino, Kingsborough Community College
Bio
Lena Cosentino is a UFT Teacher Center Instructional Coach and science teacher at New Dorp High School in Staten Island. This is her 20th year teaching science and her fourth year as an instructional coach. She is a four-time recipient of the Math for America Master Teacher Fellowship and a mother to a wonderful daughter.
Course Setting
I teach College Now BIO 37 – Human Genetics at New Dorp High School. This is a semester-long class. During this spring semester, I have 29 students who are a mixture of 10th-, 11th-, and 12th-grade students.
Problem of Practice
How can the co-creation of a perseverance rubric, integrated into a Building Thinking Classrooms environment, increase student agency and the frequency of meaningful contributions during whole-class and small-group discussions?I wanted my students to value the learning process over the final product when it came to participation in class. I also hoped to move students away from the idea of compliance and toward more meaningful participation in classroom activities.Strategy
In previous years of teaching this class, I relied on a number of rubrics that were either constructed by the school, such as the NDHS Classwork Rubric, or adapted for use in my own classroom.
During this inquiry cycle, I worked with my class to co-create a rubric centered around perseverance. Unlike traditional rubrics that use numerical scales at the top, this rubric functions more as a continuum, allowing students to self-identify which actions they should be taking in the classroom. Building Thinking Classrooms (BTC) rubrics are designed to provide students with clearer expectations regarding the criteria needed for success, largely because students are actively involved in the rubric-creation process.
This inquiry stemmed for me from the problem of how do I get students to care more about how they learn versus what grade they get. That assessment isn’t something done to them, it’s something done for them, to help them learn.
Documentation
Perseverance Rubric
This is the perseverance rubric we created together in class. Students developed the indicators describing what it means to persevere through a group-work task.
Perseverance Rubric Exit Pass
Toward the end of the semester, I asked students whether they believed using this rubric improved their performance. All responses were positive, and students also stated that they found it easier to use than the NDHS classwork rubric.
Measuring Impact
Student Self-Reflection
Students were asked the following question: “Do you think using this rubric improved your performance?” The results were entirely positive. Students appeared to believe that using this rubric to measure their progress was overall helpful.
Comparing Perseverance Rubric to NDHS Classwork Rubric
Students were asked to compare the ease of using the school-wide classwork rubric with their co-created perseverance rubric. Students reported that their co-created rubric was easier to use.
Analysis
I think the strategy was successful because most students participated in small-group discussions more frequently compared with previous years. Asking students which rubric they found easier to use was also helpful in guiding my instructional practice for next year. I value the idea of students earning credit for both the learning process and the final product. I believe this helps students who are concerned primarily with grades recognize that learning involves more than just performance outcomes.
When examining student data on the surface level, it was difficult to identify a major difference in overall class performance. The assignment averages were very similar. For both assignments, the class average was 97%, demonstrating a high level of collaboration and success on the tasks. However, the more difficult aspect to measure was overall participation in discussions. In more formalized class discussions, such as Socratic seminars, it is easier to track individual participation.
In the future, I would ask students which specific characteristics they believe should be measured to evaluate their learning. I selected perseverance because I personally believe it is important for success, but there is definitely room for greater student ownership. Now that I have sample work to use, I would also like students to spend time examining high-scoring versus low-scoring work so they can assess assignments using their own criteria.
Recommendation
Including students in the development of assessment criteria in any capacity helps increase engagement and student buy-in. Having clear, co-constructed expectations increases participation and provides students with concrete examples of actions they can take to improve their performance. Involving students in the assessment process also creates a classroom environment in which assessments feel less stressful and less punitive.
In terms of recommendations, I believe it is important for teachers to determine which skills they value and want to cultivate in their classrooms. Engaging students in rubric creation helps increase both buy-in and engagement.
Resources
- Liliedahl, P. (2021). Building thinking classrooms in mathematics: 14 teaching practices for enhancing learning. Corwin.