All-Star Student Writing Rubric

We all know how important it is to let kids know what is expected of them.  If students are ever going to reach the learning goals we have set for them, we have to let them know how to get there and what it looks like to reach them.  This student rubric was a wonderful support for my young writers this week.  The first thing we did was look at each piece of sample writing and talk about what was good and what could be improved.  It was easy for the kids to decide how many stars each paper should have.   Here they are up close so you can see too:

I got some of the best writing I have ever seen from my class that day.  Even better, we now have a permanent tool for referring to expectations for conventions, ideas, sentence structure, and drawings.  Even though we talk about those all the time, it made a big difference for the kiddos to actually SEE the difference between what is below expectations and what is 4 star writing.  My little students were highly motivated!

The best thing is that now, I have a laminated, permanent tool for my classroom that I can adapt and re-visit throughout the year.  The poster is on a regular size chart paper.  I took my 8.5 x 11 writing paper and shrunk it on the copy machine to 80% to make the little papers for it.  I have extras so that I can make examples for different times of the year, as well as ones that demonstrate specific traits of writing.

I have seen some student rubrics on Pinterest, but never pinned any.  This is just my take on the idea.  I like that I can adapt it to the needs of my students from year to year.  It only took me about an hour to make it and the samples.



Happy Teaching!