Use Rubrics

Rubrics and Competencies work together in Brightspace and both have to be enabled. For you to use the Rubrics Go to Course Admin and select Tools.

Note: the below steps need only to be followed once for each course

• Scroll down to Competencies and click the slider box to enable the tool. A checkmark instead of a cross (x) should display.
• Scroll down further on the same page and enable Rubrics.

There are two types of rubrics:

1. Holistic. Holistic rubrics consist of single criteria rubrics (one-dimensional) used to assess participants’ overall achievement on an activity or item based on predefined achievement levels. The performance descriptions are usually written in paragraphs and usually in full sentences. Holistic rubrics may use a percentage or text only scoring method. Example of a holistic rubric for a Research Paper:

2. Analytical. Analytical rubrics are two-dimensional rubrics with multiple levels of achievement as columns and assessment criteria as rows. Analytical rubrics allow assessing a participants’ achievements based on multiple criteria using a single rubric. Different weights (value) can be assigned to different criteria and include an overall achievement by totalling the criteria. Using points and custom points for analytic rubrics may use both text and points to assess performance. With custom points, each criterion may be worth a different number of points. For both points and custom points, an Overall Score is provided based on the total number of points achieved. The Overall Score determines if learners meet the criteria determined by instructors. The Total and the Overall Score of the rubric can manually be overridden. Analytical rubrics are usually written in a table form.Example of an analytical rubric for a Research Paper:

There are two ways to create a rubric:

1. From the Rubrics tool in the Course Admin page
2. From the Assignments tool, while setting up an assignment

We will discuss both options below.

From the Rubrics tool:

1. Open Course Admin in a course and select Rubrics.
2. The “Rubrics” page will open. Click on New Rubric.

From an existing Assignment folder:

1. In the Assignment folder, select Edit Assignment
2. In the Evaluation & Feedback tab, select Add Rubric and click on Create Rubric.

– For both workflows, the steps below are identical –

1. Setting up a Rubric
   • Choose a Name for the rubric and add a description
   • Set the “Rubric Status” to “Published“ if students are allowed to view the rubric. (Rubrics set to “Draft” or “Archived”, will not be able to be linked to an assignment).
   • Select Type  (see ‘Types of Rubrics’)
   • Select Scoring (if needed)
   • Set the number of Levels and assign a score (if used) to each level
   • Select the number of Criteria. Additional criteria can be added by selecting the ‘+ Add Criterion’ text
   • Add additional Critera Groups by clicking on Add Criteria Group below the table or click on the three dots in the top left corner of the rubric table to Copy- or Delete Criteria Groups

2. Under Options the Rubric Visibility for learners can be controlled, as well as Hide Scores from student’s view: (see How students see Rubric for more information)

3. Add a description for the Rubric if required. These notes will not be visible to students.
4. Choose whether the Rubric should be associated with a Competency in Brightspace to aid in assessing competencies.

   Once associated, the Rubric cannot be edited or deleted unless the association has been removed.

5. You can now start adding content to the rubric in the single page workflow document. You can also delete criteria and levels, and reorder them. See Levels and Criteria for more information.

6. All changes made to the rubrics are saved automatically. Click Close when the rubric is finalized.

To preview the created rubric, you can go to Preview in the drop-down menu next to the rubric you would like to preview. Here, you will be able to see the rubric, but also to download or print it. This can be done by clicking on the Print Rubric button.

What criteria and levels should I use?

Criteria:  Which deliverables, behaviours or applications of knowledge or skill will be looked for when assessing the activity? What needs to included and what should be said? What are the outcomes of the assessment? What should the student know or be able to do at this stage? Use the answers to the questions below to define the criteria for the rubric.

Levels: The levels of a rubric can be compared with a Likert scale. Use levels to determine to which extent the student has met the criteria. Many levels can be added to a rubric but the simpler the rubric, the easier it will be to use it. The student may earn marks for their level of achievement.

Below, a generic example of a rubric for a practical assignment:

As you can see, Rubrics state clearly what you want your students to achieve. It also helps clarify if you are assessing the right outcomes. It is recommended that you make the rubric available to students so that they know exactly what is expected of them. If not the entire rubric, then at least the criteria according to which they will be assessed. Instructors can now enter a score for a criterion on a points-based rubric before clicking on a level within the rubric. Previously, an instructor could only manually enter a score after selecting a level.