It is preferable for teachers to design rubrics collegially as a group rather than as individuals.
Taking advantage of how school teams already work together and ensuring that appropriate content
expertise is represented are useful operating procedures for rubric development (Brookhart 2013).
There is no specified frequency with which teachers should use rubrics. The use of a rubric depends
on its purpose (Brookhart 2013). For example, a rubric may be used at regular intervals during a
writing assignment or once each week to assess oral reading. Given the time and effort required to
develop quality rubrics, it is important to identify learning goals or standards that are best assessed by
performance tasks and rubrics, so that the investment in their development is worthwhile (Arter and
Chappuis 2006).
Rubrics can improve student performance, as well as
monitor it, by making teachers’ expectations clear and by
showing students how to meet these expectations. When
teachers provide an evaluation of student work using a
rubric, it should be clear to students what they need to do
to improve in the future. Rubrics also support student self-
and peer assessment. (See the section in this chapter on
student involvement for more information on self- and peer
assessment).
Rubrics are particularly useful for assessing oral language development, particularly for ELs.
For example, rubrics can focus teachers’ attention on particular discourse practices, grammatical
structures, and vocabulary as they observe and listen to students’ collaborative discussions, oral
presentations, and informal conversations. These observations then guide instructional decision-
making, including ways to structure conversations and productive group work, how to model different
uses of English, and how to provide ample exposure to rich oral language, including from peers. The
CA CCSS for ELA/Literacy and the CA ELD Standards can be used to design rubrics to gauge students’
progress in oral language (including vocabulary and presentations), collaborative discussions, writing,
and other areas of the curriculum. Given the interrelated nature of the two sets of standards, teachers
create integrated rubrics that use both sets of standards, as well as the standards’ companion
appendices and documents, to avoid creating multiple rubrics for the same tasks.
Portfolios
Student portfolios are another useful source of evidence for making judgments about student
learning. A portfolio is a systematic collection of student work and related materials that tells the
story of a student’s activities, progress, and achievement in a given subject area (Arter and Spandel
1992; Venn 2000). Portfolios can provide a progressive record of student growth, or they can be used
to demonstrate mastery of specific learning goals and contain samples only of a student’s highest
achievement (Venn 2000). Portfolios are considered either medium- or long-cycle assessments,
depending on the length of the learning period covered.
Whatever the purpose of the portfolio, sufficient samples related to specific learning goals should
be included to enable an evaluation of either growth or achievement (Chappuis, and others 2012).
The specific learning goals are aligned to standards, and the evidence included in the portfolio reflects
either students’ progress toward meeting standards or achievement of specific standards.
Portfolios can include a range of evidence: student learning goals; samples of written work;
images of work samples (e.g., digital images of models or other representations); audio samples (e.g.,
student narratives, oral presentations, or read alouds), video files (e.g., student performances, ASL-
signed presentations); student reflections; teacher observations; teacher-student conference notes;
and documentation of any other assessment results. Digital portfolios allow students to assemble and
publicly present their work. Assembling a portfolio directly involves students in selecting its contents
Rubrics can improve student
performance, as well as
monitor it, by making
teachers’ expectations clear
and by showing students how
to meet these expectations.844 | Chapter 8 Assessment