Assessing Student Performance

• Identify the purpose of the evaluation.

Knowing what you want to accomplish with the evaluation is a must-do because it guides your selection of the type of rubric and aids in determining how many levels of performance are needed. If the evaluation is being conducted for instructional purposes to help students develop their skills, create an analytical rubric since it provides more specific information about the performance/product than a holistic rubric. However, when you are working with large-scale evaluation and need to grade performances/products quickly, you will want to use a holistic rubric.

If you want to determine whether a student can perform a skill, a Yes or No checklist with two levels of performance is sufficient. However, if you are concerned about the quality of a student's performance, you'll need to use three or more levels of performance.

• Determine what to evaluate.

Review the listings of performance indicators in the National Curriculum Planning Guide 2000 or in your state's curriculum guide(s). These statements in the National Curriculum Planning Guide 2000 were developed through the cooperation of businesspeople and educators. They define the core concepts and skills that should be taught in business and marketing classes. Select those statements whose performance or final product can be observed by others.

• Decide how much to evaluate.

Examine the performance indicator and its objectives to determine what aspects you want to evaluate with the rubric. For some performance indicators, you will be able to evaluate all of the objectives with the rubric. For others, you will need to evaluate a portion of the objectives. Assess those whose product/performance will be observable and suitable for performance assessment versus paper-and-pencil tests. Make a list of the objectives that you will use.

• Refine factors to evaluate.

This is an excellent time to review student work related to the performance indicator chosen for  evaluation. Review work from the last few years in light of what you want to accomplish. This can give you a new perspective on what students are producing and might reveal instructional gaps that may need to be addressed. It will also help you to see what factors you have previously evaluated.

Make a list of the factors related to the objectives you have targeted that can be evaluated through performance assessment. To assess a student's oral presentation, for example, some of the factors to list might include: relevant information, confidence, grammar and vocabulary, volume and pace, student's appearance, use of visual aids, pronunciation, ability to answer questions, originality, nonverbal communication, length of presentation, structure of presentation, clarity of purpose, etc.

Review the listing of factors that you have generated. Are there additional factors that should be included? Have factors been included that, on second thought, are not significant to the overall performance of the performance indicator or its objectives? Refine your listing.

• Group related factors.

Examine the listing of factors to determine what they have in common. For assessment of an oral presentation, are the factors aspects of the way the presentation is organized? The presentation's content? The speaker's delivery style? The mechanics used?

Group the related factors together, and assign them a descriptive label. These labels are the criteria on which students will be assessed. To use the rubric for more than one task/scenario, write general criteria rather than making them scenario specific.

• Define the criteria.

For the criteria you identify, write a brief definition to communicate their intent/focus in the rubric. Avoid using positive or negative comments in the definitions. Simply define the criteria as they relate to the final performance/product.

• Describe an outstanding performance.

For each of the grouped, related factors that you have identified for each criterion, determine what you would look for in a performance/product that would designate quality work. What would an outstanding performance look like? The Mechanics criterion for oral presentations might include such descriptions as used silent pauses for emphasis, used standard grammar throughout presentation, etc.

As you do this, keep in mind that the final product or performance is what you will be evaluating. You will not be able to assess the steps students take to develop the product or performance. Instead, you must look for evidence that the steps have been taken. For example, if the activity is to conduct an oral presentation, you will not be able to evaluate whether the student researched one source or 20 sources. Rather, you will need to look for evidence during the presentation that the background research has been done. You might, for example, evaluate whether the students are familiar with their topics and whether they are able to answer questions about their topics.

The descriptions of the quality of student work are critical components of the rubric and will be known as the descriptors. They provide the basis for discriminating between the different levels of performance in student work. As you write them, use terminology that can be easily understood by students. Also, write these descriptions in general terms rather than making them specific to one situation. By doing this, the same rating scale, or rubric, can be used to evaluate a variety of scenarios, situations, or problems developed for a performance indicator. For oral presentations, a general factor deals with the quality of the content rather than specifying what content to evaluate.

After the descriptions are written, review them carefully to determine whether some of them

• can be combined to make more substantive descriptors,

• are saying basically the same thing,

• cannot be observed, and/or

• are not significant to the overall final product/performance.

If so, pare down the listing, writing the descriptors so that they are discernibly different from each other, observable, and substantive.

• Obtain feedback.

Show the listing of criteria and their descriptors to a variety of audiences. Start with your colleagues. Ask them to review the information to make sure that your groupings of factors are logical and that you have comprehensively addressed the criteria and descriptors. Ask that they check the listing of descriptors to be certain that an evaluator could observe the descriptors. If not, you will need to modify or delete descriptors.

Ask your advisory committee for their input. Do they agree with the criteria? Can they identify additional descriptors to include in the listing? Would they recommend deleting or combining any descriptors? On the basis of 100 points, how important do they consider each criterion to the overall performance?

Now, ask students to read the criteria and descriptors to check their clarity. If students identify confusing or unclear statements, discuss them with students, asking for their input to improve the statements.

• Develop a continuum of performance levels.

Student performance can be rated on a continuum from outstanding to inadequate. Your job is to decide how many levels of performance you will use and what labels you will assign them. Fewer levels make for easier scoring, while more levels provide more complete feedback for the student. However, use of too many levels loses the rubric in detail. Use of an even number of performance levels forces the evaluator to decide whether a performance falls on the negative or positive side of the rating scale.

Examples of performance levels are:

Exemplary     →   Accomplished  →   Developing  →   Beginning

Professional  →    Experienced    →  Developing  →     Novice

Frequently      →    Sometimes      →       Rarely      →     Never

When developing the continuum of performance levels, be consistent in naming the different levels. If you are evaluating frequency, for example, all levels should focus on frequency: often, occasionally, rarely, never. On the other hand, if you are evaluating a student's expertise, you should develop levels that deal with expertise: professional, experienced, developing, novice.

• Define poor performance.

For each descriptor identified for the outstanding performance, describe its poor performance. In oral presentations, an exemplary performance under Mechanics is: Speaker pronounced words correctly and clearly, making it easy for the audience to understand what was being said. The opposite of that performance might include: Speaker mumbled and mispronounced words throughout the presentation, making it almost impossible for the audience to understand what was being said.

• Complete the continuum.

For each pair of exemplary and poor performances, fill in the intervening levels of performance. Levels of performance are used to designate the quality, how well the student performed each of the descriptors. A student's performance can vary across all levels of the continuum, e.g., some aspects of the performance may be at the top level while others are at the poorest. Still other aspects may fall somewhere in between.

• Create task/scenario.

Now is the time to design the activity through which students will demonstrate their mastery of the performance indicator. This is a fun step because it allows you to use your creativity, developing tasks/scenarios that are challenging and realistic. As you construct the scenario, be sure that it requires students to use the skills you want them to master that are identified in the descriptors.

When writing tasks/scenarios, you will need to develop directions, a situation/problem, and a listing of equipment/supplies/materials needed to perform the tasks. Directions should be clearly and succinctly stated so that students understand specifically what they are to do.

For the situation/problem, create a realistic project that students are likely to encounter in the work world. Creating situations/problems from the real world gives students a view of what will be expected of them beyond school. Many students find school more relevant in this context.

The situation/problem should be new, not one that has been covered in class or in homework assignments. In this way, students are applying what they have learned as a result of classroom instruction. Ideas for situations/problems can be found in any number of places. Think about how students will be required to use the skill on the job or in their careers. Many activities you already use in your classroom can be modified and turned into performance assessment activities with a little thought. Professional publications, other teachers, and members of your advisory committee are also good sources of ideas for situations/problems.

The situation/problem should identify the setting in which and the audience for which the problem/situation is to be solved or performed. Is the student to perform the activity at work? In class? As a competitive event for a student organization? Many teachers use audiences from the world of work—employers, coworkers, and community agencies.

As you identify the resources that students will need, think about what materials, equipment, and supplies students would have access to if they were assigned the problem/situation at work. Develop a complete listing of all the resources students should obtain before beginning the project.

The tasks/scenarios should be fair and free of bias. In other words, all students must have an equal opportunity to perform the projects successfully. They should not be hindered in their performance due to gender, culture, socio-economic status, or access to resources. All students must have access to the required tools.

Compare your completed tasks with the objectives with which you began.
Does the task you've designed require students to use the skills you want them
to learn?

• Revise, revise, and revise.

Before implementing the tasks, ask several teachers and students to read the activities for clarity. When you write something, you know what you want to say, so it's easy to think you've conveyed your thoughts clearly. However, someone who is unfamiliar with the topic may not understand what you mean. Students must know exactly what is expected of them.

Periodically, analyze the various elements of your rubric. You'll find that improvements can always be made.