 Try these steps to write a rubric. First, identify the assignment you will use the rubric for and the course student learning objectives you are focusing on. Second, make a list of the criteria you think are most important for the assignment. In the examples we looked at for an oral presentation, the rubric had eye contact, organization, fluency, etc. If you have a writing assignment, it might be organization, word choice, and accuracy. These criteria will go on the left side of your rubric. In order to be clean and clear, limit yourself to no more than seven total criteria per rubric. And make sure the criteria are measurable. That means it's best to avoid words such as understand or know. Third, once you have your criteria, you can decide on how many performance levels you want to include. I generally like three, but you could go with four. More than that, it's difficult to grade and can be confusing. In our example, we had three. Expert, proficient, and novice. We listed them on the top. Fourth, write descriptors for each performance level. That means you'll write outcomes that students can demonstrate to show which level their work is at. If you have student work to refer to, you can use it to help you write these descriptors. Remember that each level should be similar in wording, but different enough that the instructor and students can see what the difference is between each level. You can also assign points to each level at this stage as well. Fifth, make your rubric. You can use an online free rubric maker such as iRubric or quickRubric or Rubistar, or you can type it up in a word processing program. Six, decide how you want to give the rubric to your students. You can give them paper copies or send it to them through email or through your course management system. Seventh, and finally, try out your rubric. You can try it on assignments that students have turned in in the past, or you can try it with new assignments. If the rubric is difficult to use, revise it so that it is more clear. If the rubric is confusing to you, it will be confusing to your students as well, so be sure to try it out and revise as needed. You can also give it to a colleague to see if they could use it to grade assignments and then revise as needed. We've covered a lot of information about rubrics, but there's one last thing. How to use them after you've made them. If you can, it's best to give students a copy of the rubric when you first give them the assignment. That way, they know how they will be graded when they first start working. When it comes to grading, most instructors like to highlight or circle the descriptor that matches the student's work. So here is our rubric we looked at earlier, but this time with a performance descriptor circled for each criteria. Rubrics are most effective when instructors circle the descriptors, but also write at least some feedback to the student. In this case, the instructor might write, Thank you for your hard work for this presentation, Jose. I can see that you practiced and have studied the topic. Be sure for the next time to speak more slowly and clearly so that we can best understand you. And if the assignment is graded, the instructor can include the grade on here as well. Okay, we've discussed why rubrics are beneficial, how to make them, and how to use them. I hope you'll be able to try making and using rubrics in your own classes.