[Rubrics] Adapt Canvas Rubrics to Conventional Rubric Design

[ronmarx]

This idea suggests additional improvements to Canvas rubrics so they conform with conventional rubric design. Although the updated rubric features were improved from the original Canvas release, some fine tuning is still needed, namely, how the grading grid is displayed and adding descriptions in the Rating header. Scroll down to the current/proposed illustrations posted below for a quick view of this idea.

As an Instructional Designer for a large school district in Florida, I create rubrics alongside the assignments we create and curate — much of the time I'm working to convert the pedagogical content given to our team by teachers. Most of the rubrics I receive contain brief descriptions in the header row of the scoring column. Canvas doesn't provide that space in its rubrics.

As a work-around, I attempted to create a rating header containing these brief descriptions. Each had a zero-point score. To my surprise, Canvas then sorted the rating titles alphabetically resulting in misaligned ratings for the remaining body of the rubric. Just couldn't accomplish a full digital interactive copy of the rubrics I'd been provided.

Canvas rubrics would be so much easier to use if they followed a format standard in the teaching profession. The first digital rubrics were created with spreadsheets and then later with HTML tables, which mirrored what teachers had done with paper and ruler for decades. Following this standard format convention would be a fantastic improvement for Canvas over what is now available.

Here's the very best workaround I could produce using the Canvas rubric construction space.

• Notice that the Rating Descriptions are ordered by placing alphabetical sorters in front of the rating labels.
• Also, notice that what should be displayed as a evenly plotted grid has varying widths of columns for each criterion.
• Finally, notice that Canvas requires a Rating Title for each rating of each criterion, resulting an even more text-heavy rubric with redundant text.

Here is the proposed Canvas rubric improvement.

• The improved rubric follows generally accepted format, making it more user friendly and more usable.
• The proposed rubric allows for varying point ratings, but points and rating labels would not be required.
• This rubric improvement idea also doesn't require point values in the Ratings Header, but presented as an option would go a long way to simplifying the look of the rubric by avoiding repetitious and redundant information.

This idea may not cover all aspects of optimal rubric creation and usage, but I strived to included the most used aspects that are currently missing (without awkward workarounds). I also groomed this idea to be easily implemented by Canvas s/w engineers. If this improved rubric would be useful to you as a teacher, and easy to implement as an engineer, please vote it UP.

[cheryl_colan]

This change would mess up a lot of work done using the Outcomes feature at my community college campus unless it is an option as opposed to a design change in the way Rubrics work. We would either need to be able to attach multiple Rubrics to an Assignment, Discussion or Quiz, or we would need to be able to turn the "conventional rubric design" off to maintain the flexibility that exists now. There are a lot of issues with Rubrics in Canvas and I would love for them to be solved, the ability to have Column Headers especially. I always wonder if Canvas Rubrics are actually accessible because non-standard tables generally are not accessible, but I have not had the bandwidth to check. Anyway, please don't break what we have now to implement this suggestion.

[ronmarx]

Yes, good point,  @cheryl_colan ‌. I think your observations are what  @Renee_Carney ‌ anticipated when she responded to my initial posting. This idea is intended as an OPTION, not as a replacement for what currently exists.

This option, however, would give an entire population of Canvas users a rubric model that is universally used in K-12. Teachers use rating descriptors to communicate with parents and students alike through the device of the rubric, just as the criteria descriptions are self-explanatory. That one improvement itself would remove the redundant text from the rubric, making it far more readable. The uniform grid is a no-brainer over what Canvas now provides.

[pelhamr]

I agree this should be fixed.  Below is a rubric I made in Canvas.  It is annoying that all the boxes are not even width in the ratings columns.

[Steven_S]

Yes, uneven columns can look messy, especially in examples where there are the same number of columns in each row.  I have frequently made rubrics with many more columns in some rows than in others, and in that case it saves space.  Tidying the table structure is already automatic in speedgrader, and that solution could be applied to other opportunities to view rubrics without reducing flexibility in setting up rubrics.

In the example above, I would be more than a little hesitant to grade "requirements" with a weight equal to "attractiveness." It should be a common need even in grade school for some aspects of assignments to have a larger impact on the grade than others. In the current rubrics (grading out of 100points to approximate percentages) I could assign 65 points to a perfect score on requirements, 25 points to an oral presentation, and 10 points to attractiveness, and distribute those points into as many categories as needed for that specific category.  If this change were made to rubrics, how many inexplicably blank columns would be in the 10 point attractiveness row, so that 10 points (perfect) lined up with a 10 point (very poor) column from the requirements row?  What would I title such a column? 

A potential compromise to help both styles of teaching is to allow column headers to specify the percent earned at each achievement level out of the point value specified in each row.  Grade schools could set every row at the same point value if that suited them, while others could distribute points appropriately for their content. 

Even so, it would be a reduction in flexibility to force the same percentage at the same achievement level of every row, and imitating the current flexibility would require blank columns when some rows need more categories than others.  There is already very little room to fit in a detailed description, and blank columns are a waste of valuable space. 

[pelhamr]

The above rubric is for a college course assignment, not grade school. As far as if rubrics should or should not have different point values for each item being assesses, that is based on instructor preference. I believe instructors should have the option to do it either way. Note: the original poster also used common point values for each item. As for your suggestions stated in your third paragraph, I agree. 

[Steven_S]

I didn't mean to suggest that your rubric was necessarily for grade school - only that the emphasis in this conversation seems to be accommodating what the original poster identifies as a grade school standard design which moves all point values to a header bar.  I was trying to shortcut an example of why points in the header bar will not work for everyone by using one of the existing rubrics already displayed. Yours was just handy ... sorry.

Your rubric is also a perfect example of a case where all that is really needed is to tidy the table structure.

[pelhamr]

Thank you  

[ronmarx]

Rokaisha and steven‌, Having used the http://rubistar.4teachers.org rubric maker since around 2005 for my history students in grades 9-12, I was surprised (and a bit dismayed) that the default rubric table in Canvas was something else. It's common on Canvas Community to see a lot of over-intellectualization of ideas resulting in little or no change in the Canvas LMS product because, I surmise, there appears to be a lack of consensus. Implementing basic, teacher-based experiential features and functions is risky if there's no consensus.

Steve Jobs said, “It's really hard to design products by focus groups. A lot of times, people don't know what they want until you show it to them.” The Canvas product development teams have shown us their version of many basic features of an LMS. Unlike users of the viable Apple products released since 1984, many of us—educational professionals—know what we want and need for efficient administration of our learning environments of which Canvas is a part. I still have hope that the Canvas development leads and their teams will rethink various Canvas features and make the changes their users have clamored for years to implement.

[Steven_S]

Hi Ron,

You are correct that as educational professionals we all know what is required by the learning environments we use.  However, since we are now all using the same environment instead of designing individual classroom experiences, details that some need are different than what others need.  For example, the case I offered was constructed off Rokaisha's rubric only as a convenient comparison, not an intellectual exercise.  It is the reality of how I, as a professor, grade my students on every assignment.  Moving the points into the header will actually remove a function that I use regularly, and so I appreciate the canvas team's approach to hearing all of our input before making changes. 

I have seen some changes since we've started using canvas, and so I know that they read these ideas and address the most pressing and practical, although not always in the exact way that we have requested.  For example, I have noticed that in the new-gradebook speed grader view of the rubric the column widths seem to be more organized.  Also the headers for each item accept rather long character limits, and so it is an option to skip the "learner" and "scholar" headings and simply describe the criteria in that space without any long description.  That would seem to go most of the way to what you need without removing the functions I (and others I'm sure) use. 

Steven

[ronmarx]

Hi Steven,

I'm not sure I understand how placing RATING headers, as shown in my example, removes the function of grading your students for every assignment. Assuming that your assignments having multiple criteria, and that each criterion has several levels of demonstrated proficiency, you can still override the rubric value for a given matrix cell.

My original example shows a brief description under each Rating label, but that is optional. If a student (or parent) wants to drill down into a particular criterion, then a 'cursor hover' could produce a pop-up. Again, optional but not necessary. (In the K-12 world, as I'm sure in the 13-20 world, it depends on how much work the teacher/instructor wishes to create for him/herself!)

Maybe I misunderstood your reply comments to  @pelhamr ‌, but how she constructed her rubric, (i.e., "I would be more than a little hesitant to grade "requirements" with a weight equal to "attractiveness."") is not the point she raised about uneven columns and duplicated ratings information strewn throughout the rubric matrix. Again, maybe I misunderstood, but specifying "...the percent earned at each achievement level out of the point value specified in each row..." is how Canvas rubrics work now, isn't it? Don't we work backwards from percentage proficiency scores to calculate what point totals are assigned to each level for each criterion?

Again, since it's possible to override any score for any criterion, no functionality is removed for any teacher by removing the duplicated scoring information of the current Canvas rubric design. Making the rubric grid nice and even is just a no-brainer.