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Home : Assessing & grading | Creating rubrics from tables

Creating rubrics is easy
Turn word processor into rubic maker

Screen shot of Table menu used for creating rubrics

You can easily make your own assessment rubrics for grading writing using the table function in your word processor as a rubric maker. If you plan well, the same rubric can be used for other tasks, such as writer self-assessment.

If you start by making a table in sections, creating rubrics for specific classes or for evaluating specific assignments is a snap.

I use the Table function in Microsoft� Word� to create grading rubrics. You can use a similar table generator in another word-processing program as your own writing rubric generator. The screens may look different, but the general principles apply.

1) Make a file containing all 5 sections

Instead of creating an entire table all at once, first make tables for each of the five sections of the rubric in a single file. By creating rubrics section by section, it is easy to vary the numbers of columns and rows in different sections.

Some recommendations:

  • Start by creating a table with the maximum number of columns you will need anywhere in your writing assessment rubrics.

  • Do not delete columns; that messes up the table width and makes combining the sections a nightmare.

  • Keep the same width for each section you are going to merge into the completed rubric. (If you create each template section in a single file originally this should not be an issue.)

  • Use the merge cells command to give room to write.

  • In your master file, include only labels that will not change with each assignment.

  • Leave space between sections of your matrix as you create your template. (If you accidentally merge the table sections, use the page break function to separate them again.)

When you finish creating all the sections, you should have created space for every writing component you need to include in assessment rubrics for evaluating student writing performance.

2) Save each section in its own file

After you are satisfied with your layout, use the Save As command to save the sections in individual files each with its own distinctive file name.

Saving the originals in separate files makes creating rubrics for new uses far easier than attempting to re-engineer an existing rubric. I've tried that and it never works.

Linda Aragoni of you-can-teach-writing.com

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Linda Aragoni

 

Published 12-Apr-2008; updated: 13-Dec-2011
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Comments by visitors to you-can-teach-writing.com

Good fit for career-minded

Just found your site and was so impressed that I signed up for your ezine and forwarded the link to every writing teacher on campus. Your pragmatic approach is well-suited to our career-minded students, many of whom dread their required composition courses. Thanks for making this available.

~ Cecelia

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