My belief in rubric-based grading actually began long before I became a teacher. I was a TA in high school, and had been invited by my mentor teacher to “grade” assignments. The teacher gave me an answer key and a rubric for the assignments. I say “grade” loosely because I was really just identifying key pieces of information against a rubric. The teacher gave the ultimate grade and score, and I never touched the gradebook. One of the memorable moments came from the reading of the short answers in the quiz on “Watership Down”. I had not read the book and could not discern whether the students met the requirements outlined by the rubric. So, I asked the instructor for a copy of the book, read it over the weekend, and then went back to “grading” the quizzes. What I discovered was that the issue was less about my lack of knowledge and more about the rubric itself. Once I had the context I needed, I could see clearly that the rubric did not align with what the quiz question was actually asking. It was a valuable lesson, not just in content knowledge, but in how a poorly constructed rubric can undermine even a well-intentioned assessment. It was actually a very daring experience for me when I went to point out to the instructor the shortcomings of their rubric. Luckily for me, the teacher was encouraging and received my feedback graciously, agreeing that the rubric needed revision.
Since that time, I have been active in my approach to rubric use and invite the students to use a rubric on their own essays as a part of their peer review process. I find that they become more capable of recognizing the requirements of an assignment and can give better feedback to their peers with a clear rubric. So, they first evaluate their own essays with a rubric and then have the opportunity to give feedback to their peers with the same rubric. The students have consistently told me that they appreciate seeing where they might have gone in the wrong direction using the rubric.
When I was a new teacher, I tried to be clear but fair and grade based on the students’ demonstrated skills as required by the university I worked for. I thought I was doing a pretty good job until I had a weekend grading rush. I discovered my own biases when I had a stack of papers to grade and no time to look up which paper was which. I graded fast, using my rubric and making comments on the papers, but so fast that I did not see the names on the papers until I was inputting them into the Blackboard system. That was when I realized that a student I had thought really had an understanding of the coursework was completely misunderstanding the content. The student had been so active in the class and involved in the class discussions, one of my most vocal and engaged students, that I had completely missed the fact that they didn’t really understand the content. Combined, these experiences have influenced my current grading philosophy, to grade blind and to have a clear rubric for the process.
Shortly after my rushed grading weekend, I came across an article that discussed the “halo” effect and the opposite of it, the “horns” effect. Teachers don’t intentionally start out having favorites, but there are always students who participate in class who may not have the strongest skills in their actual work. The halo effect is caused when the grader allows their bias to subconsciously influence their grading based on the student’s perceived effort, participation, or behavioral compliance rather than their actual skills and knowledge. The horns effect is allowing the bias of a student’s perceived lack of effort, lack of participation, or misbehavior to influence grading subconsciously. I recognized my own epiphany reflected in the article.
Looking back on those experiences, the rushed grading night that revealed my own bias and the weekend I spent reading a novel just to be a TA, it is clear they shaped my approach to grading. A good rubric is not just a grading tool, and blind grading is more than just a procedural safeguard. Blind grading with a good rubric is a commitment to fairness, and it protects both the student and the teacher from the very human tendency to let impressions get in the way of honest assessment.
