Fourth Grade Writing Rubric

[logophile]

Hello all!

I have a daughter who is in fourth grade this year and her class is spending a lot of time working on writing. During conferences, her teacher said she knew I was a writer and asked if I would take a look at their writing rubric, just to see what I think. It's quite good and I thought I would post it here for fun. (I also took a copy of it to the magazine a I write for and gave it to my boss... she's sending it out by email today to all the writers...)

To receive an A grade in fourth grade, your story must...

*Have a main idea that is obvious to the reader
*Have thoughtfully selected details that enhance the main idea and enlighten the reader. Details match the main idea.
*Have a lead that grabs your attention and makes you want to read!
*Be tightly structured.
*Have an effective ending that really wraps things up.
*Use deliberate word choices to match the writer's interent and paint a clear picture in your mind.
*Have a voice that makes the writing come to life - you can hear the writer's personality.
*Use a varied flow of sentences of different lengths that sets a good rhythm when read aloud.
*Have almost no errors in the entire piece.

I think it's great that the school is being this specific in their teaching. I think if people start off with this as the known expectation, we will raise more fluent writers.

 

[TheEarl]

What age is 4th grade? I like the rubric a lot - wish this kind of thing had been taught at my schools. I learned most things from reading and teaching myself - all of my refinement comes from Lit.

The Earl

 

[Guest]

What age is 4th grade?

Ten years old.

 

[gauchecritic]

If I knew what a rubric was I would be applauding loudly. Except the part about wrapping everything up at the end. I hate when that happens. I much prefer to leave questions unanswered.

 

[logophile]

Glad you guys like it. It's interesting... I mostly taught myself too. It was all guess and check. I did take a couple of writing classes in high school, but I don't think anyone ever broke the whole thing down as succinctly as that for me.

Also, I'm glad to know that I'm not the only person who doesn't know what a rubric is. I guess I'm off to dictionary.com to find out...

 

[Guest]

I was taught all that in primary school. Isn't it still? We were also told that when we became exceptionally good we'd be allowed not to wrap things up at the end. It was a great goal to have.

Perdita

 

[logophile]

I was taught all that in primary school. Isn't it still? We were also told that when we became exceptionally good we'd be allowed not to wrap things up at the end. It was a great goal to have.

Perdita

That's awesome. I'm so glad to know that proper writing was being taught somewhere! I've wondered occassionally if some of the short comings in my education were the result of growing up in a farming community. Perhaps writing wasn't considered important? I'm not sure but there were lots of holes. And not the good kind, either!

 

[carsonshepherd]

Everything I need to know about writing, I learned from your daughter's fourth grade class.

 

[logophile]

She'll be so proud!

 

[Bridget69]

I really like this structure. I don't remember writing qualifications being that elaborate when I was in the fourth grade.

 

[yui]

If I knew what a rubric was I would be applauding loudly.

Rubric...isn't that one of those colored cube thingys from the 80's?

 

[logophile]

rubric: A set of authoritative rules to give direction to the scoring of assessment tasks or activities. To be useful, a scoring rubric must be derived from careful analysis of existing performances of varying quality. A task-specific rubric describes levels of performance for a particular complex performance task and guides the scoring of that task consistent with relevant performance standards. (A task-specific rubric is more specific than a performance standard and can apply a performance standard to a particular context found in a performance task.) A general rubric is an outline for creating task-specific rubrics, or for guiding expert judgment, where task-specific scoring rules are internal to the scorer.

 

[R. Richard]

Logophile and Perdita:

From my experience what Logophile describes is not taught in most UNIVERSITY courses. I grew up (or whatever I did) in ghettos and the simple ability read and write was the mark of superior intelligence. I did go to college (several of them). I was never once taught anything even remotely resembling what Logophile describes. We spent all our time reading 'purple passages.' I am not sure, but I think those were items written on restroom walls in purple crayon.

JMHO.

 

[U4ea]

Having taught 4th grade, I can tell you that rubrics make life SOOO much easier. Especially when the kids were given the rubric up front instead of later. I've taught 5th grade and 2nd, too, and I can tell you that they are all able to handle rubrics and what they do as long as they are tailored to fit their maturity level.

That rubric looks pretty good, btw. A few things look a little hazy, like the "almost no errors" thing. The teacher will get called on that one if she's not careful. I always put a specific number of errors to really give them a guideline. You can start getting more subjective the older the kids get, and perhaps, 2nd semester 4th grade isn't too young for that. I'm sure they can handle it better than others.

*smiles* I think it's really cool that the teacher felt comfortable enough to hand it over and ask your opinion! Few teachers have that kind of comfort with the parents of the kids in their classes these days. *applauds the teacher, too*

 

[Guest]

To clarify: I wasn't taught to write in the 4th grade, but beginning in the 6th and through h.s. by Catholic nuns. Best education in my time (mid to late 60s).

Perdita

 

[R. Richard]

To clarify: I wasn't taught to write in the 4th grade, but beginning in the 6th and through h.s. by Catholic nuns. Best education in my time (mid to late 60s).

Perdita

Perdita:
I don't know how it worked where you were. I attended quite a few high schools and got through mainly because of my athletic ability. Thus, I attended a few Catholic High Schools. The penguins knew their subject matter, knew how to teach and also knew how to use the ruler they carried (and I don't mean for measuring!) Discipline was a key!

 

[oggbashan]

In my equivalent of 4th grade we were all cramming like mad for the 11+ examination which decided whether we went to Grammar School or a Secondary Modern.

Comprehension of a passage of English was tested, and we had to do a 100 word precis. The rubric quoted would have been useful if we had had such things. We were writing essays instead of fiction. We were told we had to have a beginning, the pros and cons, and a conclusion.

I still have two pieces written about then: A tourist description of Gibraltar, and a fantasy piece about an awakening Kraken. They are in my school's magazine archives, now available on the Web, and I prefer not to draw attention to them. I was better at essays.

Og

 

[Guest]

RR: in grade school the nuns did use the ruler but only on boys , and for acting up, not bad grammar. In h.s. (all girls) there was no physical punishment but at times real fear instilled. Our principal used to call surprize gatherings in the auditorium, choose girls at random and ask questions about grammar, in English and Latin. But mostly we learned cos they were very good teachers.

Perdita

 

[logophile]

*smiles* I think it's really cool that the teacher felt comfortable enough to hand it over and ask your opinion! Few teachers have that kind of comfort with the parents of the kids in their classes these days. *applauds the teacher, too*

She's great. In exchange for this, I've offered to bring in article I'm editing and show the class the before and after product so they can compare it to the rubric for themselves. It should be interesting. I've had some real doozies this year. A couple of them were so bad that any 4th grader will easily be able to see the mistakes and figure out how to correct them!