About the Big 6^® Rubric

To Teachers:

I have very strong ideas about rubrics. One of my complaints about most rubrics is that they offer students failure as an option. After many years at an alternative school, where students kept working on a lesson until they passed it, I believe we must expect students to achieve mastery of a unit of study so they will be able to apply the concepts to the next learning unit. In short, we cannot afford to let any student move unprepared into their next level of education.

Students must receive progressive feedback on a project from the teacher in order to rework weak areas and accomplish what is expected. A rubric is the perfect tool for monitoring both the student and the teacher. Thus, a failing grade for a project is unacceptable (unless a student refused to even work on it or submit the assignment) and so I offer only three options on a rubric: Acceptable, Proficient, and Exemplary (roughly the equivalent of a C, a B, and an A).

I also believe that "proficiency" is what we want for student achievement, that is, a student has mastered the content and processes of a unit of study and is fully competent at that level of learning. Therefore, the benchmark description is set at the middle level of the rubric as the finest performance I expect from a student. This does three things: 1) it sets a higher standard of performance that all students, regardless of ability, are expected to reach; 2) it gives clearly exceptional students who strive to excel an opportunity to exceed my expectations (which they often do); and 3) it provides a cushion for students who struggle, by offering a level of achievement that is a little less than hoped for, but still within acceptable parameters of what a student needs in order to be fully prepared for the next level of learning.

With this in mind, I present my rubric to accompany the Big 6 Research Guide.

Back to Top of Page