How do I use rubrics?

Overview

Rubrics are helpful tools used in Review-Based Assignments. They allow reviewers to evaluate student submissions and give feedback on the documents students upload. You can create rubrics by outlining a set of criteria along with possible ratings for each criterion. This helps to:

• Ensure a fair and consistent assessment by reviewers
• Provide clear guidelines for the reviewer
• Offer clear instructions for the student being reviewed, who can view the rubric before submitting their work

Creating new rubrics

When you create a Review-Based Assignment, under Rubric, use the Rubric for evaluation of submissions dropdown to select an available template, or select Create new rubric, and insert the Evaluation criteria. 

You can also create new rubrics under Settings > Scoring > Rubrics.

If you would like to omit the rubric portion and/or overall feedback from your assignment, you can enable the following features under Basics when creating your Review-Based assignment.

Evaluation criteria

1. For each criterion, enter a brief Description of this criterion. (We suggest using a general description here, i.e. Grammar & Spelling).
2. Under Scoring, enter a Description and number of Points for each rating.
   • To add a new rating, click + Add rating, and use the trash can icon to remove a rating.

• To add new criteria, click either + Add under Evaluation criteria.
• To remove a criterion, click on it, and then click - Remove under Evaluation criteria.
• To reorder your criteria, click & drag the 3 horizontal lines, left of the Criterion and its description.

Click Next step, and finish creating your assignment.  Once complete, your new rubric will be available under Settings > Scoring > Rubrics, listed as “Rubric for [assignment name].”

Managing rubrics

To manage all your rubrics in one place, navigate to Settings > Scoring > Rubrics.  Like scoring templates, you will see all of your available rubrics, listed by Rubric name, Total points (summative based on your highest point ratings), and Used by assignments. 

You can add new rubrics by clicking + Create new rubric to manually create a new rubric, or click Import from LMS.  Each rubric will be available when creating a review assignment under the Rubric for evaluation of submissions dropdown.

Click on a rubric's Actions button to Edit, Duplicate, or Delete it.

• To edit a rubric, navigate to Actions > Edit.  Adjust the details, and click OK to save changes. 

  To protect scoring integrity, rubrics cannot be edited once they've received at least one submission.  If you'd like to reuse this rubric with changes, we suggest you duplicate it so that you may edit the copy.

• If you'd like to copy an existing rubric, click Actions > Duplicate.  A new version of the rubric will populate in the list under the title, "Copy of [original rubric title]," and you may edit it as desired. 

• Rubrics actively in use by assignments cannot be deleted.  In order to delete a rubric that is in use, click on the hyperlinked assignment title, and edit the assignment(s), and change the Rubric for evaluation of submissions.

  An assignment's rubric cannot be changed once the assignment reaches the review phase. 
  
  If your assignment has already reached this phase, and you edit the deadlines to extend the submission phase, then you will be able to change rubric. However, if any students previously submitted to the rubric, they will need to resubmit to the new rubric once the assign returns to the review phase.

Importing rubrics from your LMS

To import rubrics from your Canvas course, please build the rubric in Canvas first, and then follow these steps in Perusall, under Settings > Scoring > Rubrics:

1. Click Import from LMS.
2. In the pop-up window, Authorize the Perusall API access.
3. Select a rubric from your LMS to import it into this course.

The new import will appear in your list of available rubrics, and you can choose it when creating a review assignment type.

Import from LMS currently only supports our Canvas LTI 1.3 integration.  If you are using this integration and your admin has enforced scopes for the Perusall API, they will need to include the ones needed for Rubrics.