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Blackboard

Learning Management System

Rubrics

• What are Rubrics?
• What are the advantages of using rubrics?
• What rubric tools are available at UMKC?
• What Resources are Available?
• What is the Blackboard Rubric Tool?
• Requirements
• Overview of How it Works
• Benefits & Drawbacks
• FAQs

What are Rubrics?

Rubrics are an assessment tool that lists the criteria (the parts of a paper or a project that have points associated with them) and articulated gradations of quality for each of those criteria. The gradations of quality described in the rubric are what distinguish rubrics from checklists.

Rubrics describe both desirable qualities as well as common pitfalls in student work. These descriptions are helpful to students because they help them think about their work and which elements of it will contribute to a high quality end-product.

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What are the advantages of using rubrics?

Rubrics can be used to clarify learning goals, design instruction that addresses those goals, communicate the goals to the students, guide our feedback on students' progress towards the goals and judge final products in terms of the degree to which the goals were met.

Use rubrics before, during and after you deliver instruction. Instructional rubrics help students understand the goal of an assignment and focus their efforts. Instructional rubrics help the faculty to give meaningful feedback to students without spending an inordinate amount of time doing so. Feedback is an essential element in the learning process, particularly when it gives students specific information about the strengths and weaknesses of their work.

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What rubric tools are available at UMKC?

There are 2 rubric tools available through Blackboard at UMKC:

• Blackboard Rubrics: The new rubric tool in Blackboard allows instructors to build rubrics and attach them to discussion board forums, Blackboard assignments or grade center columns. Per the instructor's settings, students can view the rubrics ahead of time. When assessing student work with the rubrics, instructors select the appropriate level of accomplishment for each criteria and can even add comments. Students can then view the marks and comments for their work.
• Turnitin Rubrics through GradeMark: The Turnitin Rubric tool through Grademark is directly tied to Turnitin Assignments. Turnitin, GradeMark and PeerMark peer evaluation tools are all integrated into one page for easy evaluation of student work. One downfall of the Turnitin Rubric Tool is that it does not allow students to see the rubrics prior to submitting the assignment.

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What Resources are Available?

1. Rubistar Rubistar is a rubric builder which allows you to begin with a project-specific template and use it as is or modify it to meet your needs. Rubrics are downloadable.
2. Discovery Education: Kathy Schrock's Assessment & Rubric Information Page
   This page contains links to rubrics collections, subject specific rubrics, rubric builders and articles about using and creating rubrics.
3. AACU VALUE Rubrics
   This page contains AACU's (American Association of Colleges and Universities) VALUE rubrics which contain the most common and broadly shared criteria or core characteristics considered critical for judging the quality of student work in fifteen outcome areas.

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What is the Blackboard Rubric Tool?

The new rubric tool in Blackboard allows instructors to build rubrics and attach them to discussion board forums, Blackboard assignments, test questions or grade center columns. Per the instructor's settings, students can view the rubrics ahead of time. When assessing student work with the rubrics, instructors select the appropriate level of accomplishment for each criteria and can even add comments. Students can then view the marks and comments for their work.

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Requirements

The Blackboard Rubric Tool is a product of Blackboard and therefore has the same requirements as are necessary to use Blackboard. As with Blackboard, it is important to have pop-up blockers turned off for the Blackboard Rubric Tool to work properly.

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Overview of How it Works

The rubrics can be created at the before, after or at the same time as its corresponding assignment, discussion board forum, column, etc.. Once the rubric is associated with an assignment, etc., it can be made available to the students per the instructor's settings. The instructor can then provide feedback on student work by selecting the score for each criteria listed in the rubric and even provide comments right in that cell. There is a text box for general comments at the end of the rubric. All of this is done directly in Blackboard and can be made available to students.

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Benefits & Drawbacks

Benefits

• Versatile - Can be associated with Blackboard assignments, discussion board forums, essay test questions, and grade center grade columns.
• Improves Communication of Expectations - Per the instructor's settings, the students can view the rubric prior to turning in an assignment or project to evaluate their progress.
• Paperless Grading - The instructor can view the students' work and provide feedback right in the rubric form while in Blackboard. The students can then view the rubric scoring and instructor feedback right in Blackboard.
• Can Be Shared with Colleagues - Rubrics created in Blackboard can be exported and shared with colleagues. The colleagues can then import the rubrics into their own course sites.

Drawbacks

• Not Easily Printable - The rubrics are not easily printable.
• Must Be Created in Blackboard - Rubrics cannot be imported from a document. They must be completed in Blackboard. However, once a rubric has been created, it can be copied, and exported and imported into a different course site.

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FAQs

Can I import my rubrics?
Rubric cannot be imported from a document. They must be created in Blackboard. However, rubrics can be exported from one course site and imported into another.

Can students see the rubrics before the due date?
By default, the rubrics are set to be unavailable to students. The instructor can change that setting to allow students to see the rubrics before the due date.

Can I use my rubrics in more than one course or in more than one assignment?
Yes. Rubrics can be exported from one course site and imported to another course site. Also, within a course, a rubric can be associated with multiple gradable items.

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