High School Observational Drawing Rubric

Taking a break from my curriculum planning, I've been working on my pre- and post-assessment plans for my high school SLOs for this year.  I've decided it's going to be a two-part assessment.  Although I was lucky enough last year on the elementary end to not have to incorporate any writing pieces, I'm being asked to incorporate a writing component on the high school end, so here is my plan.

The first part will be an observational drawing of some sort.  I plan to use the same observational drawing rubric for both 7th grade and Studio Art.  At this point, I'm not sure if I'll have them do the same subject, but I do know that I want the Studio Art students to draw their hand.  (The teacher I graded post-assessments last year did this and I liked it!).  The first drawing will be a one-day drawing and the post-assessment will probably be a 2-3 day drawing, where hopefully the students will incorporate more creativity in the pose and background of their hand.  I'm debating about having 7th graders do their hands as well, or a still life, or quite possibly their shoe (or maybe even a self-portrait!).

Here is my preliminary observational drawing rubric that I've been working on today.  It is a combination of ideas taken from the regional art assessment rubric that we created last year at Boces, and some of my own ideas.

	4	3	2	1	0
Technical Accuracy _____	“Draw what you see, not what you know.”  Accurately drew shapes, proportions, contours and details. Drawing is expressive and detailed.	Attempted to draw what was seen.  Attempted to draw proportions correctly and points of overlap.  Drawing is expressive and somewhat detailed.	Somewhat drew what was seen however proportions are not exact; student did not observe and draw points of overlap.  Drawing is somewhat detailed.	You can tell what the student was observing in the drawing, but proportions are not correct.  Did not observe and draw any points of overlap. Drawing lacks almost all details.	Student did not do an observational drawing.  Drawing has no details.
Shading/Value _____	Student successfully incorporated all 8 ranges from the gradient scale with smooth transitions. Student used at least 3 shading techniques to create value. Student accurately observed and shaded highlights and shadows, and the direction of the light source is apparent.	Student incorporated 6-7 ranges from the value scale with smooth transitions.  Student used 2 shading techniques to create value.  Student observed and shaded highlights and shadows.  Viewer can see where the light source comes from.	Student incorporated 4-5 ranges from the value scale with rough transitions.  Student used 1 shading technique. Some highlights and shadows are observed, but not very accurately and they do not match the light source.	Student incorporated 2-3 ranges from the value scale with very rough transitions.  Only used 1 shading technique.  Very vague representations of highlights, shadows and light source.	Did not create value in drawing.  No transitions.  Only black and white.  No shading techniques used.  No highlights, shadows are light source are drawn.
Elements of Art _____	Student understands and uses the elements (line, shape, form, space, texture, value, & color) to create a successful and interesting artwork. Student has a strong sense of line, both real and implied.	Student uses the elements to create a successful artwork. Student understands the basics but has not experimented.  Student uses real and implied line.	Student attempts to use the elements.  Student shows a minimal understanding of the basics of the elements.  Student uses real line.	Student unsuccessfully uses the elements; shows a very minimal understanding of the basics. Student uses real line.	It is clear that the student does not understand how to use the elements. No attempt at organizing the elements.
Composition _____	Student understands and uses principles of art (rhythm, movement, balance, proportion, variety, emphasis, harmony and unity) to create a strong and interesting composition.  Utilized the positive and negative space extremely well on the paper.	Student used the principles of art to create an interesting composition.  Utilized the positive and negative space well on paper.	Student attempted to use principles to create a composition.  Attempted to use the positive and negative space well on paper; drawing takes up ½-3/4 of the paper space.	Student did not use the principles well to create an interesting composition.  Did not use space well; drawing only takes up ½ of the paper space.	Student did not use the principles of art to create an interesting composition.  Did not use space well; drawing is very small and/or takes up less than ¼ of the paper.
Creativity _____	Student has taken the technique being studied and applied it in a way that is totally his/her own.  The student's personality/voice comes through. Everything is original.	Student has taken the technique being studied and has used source material as a starting place. The student's personality comes through in parts of the painting. Everything is original.	Student has copied from another source. There is little evidence of creativity, but the student has done the assignment.	Student has not made much attempt to meet the requirements of the assignment. A majority of the assignment has been copied from another source.	No creativity attempted.  Artwork is a direct copy from another source.
Craftsmanship / Presentation _____	Utilized time appropriately.  Artwork is created and maintained in a professional manner.  No tears, smudges, or stray marks.  Artwork is neatly signed in the appropriate spot.	Utilized time appropriately.  Artwork is created and maintained fairly neatly.  No tears, minimal smudges or stray marks.  Artwork is neatly signed in the appropriate spot.	Could have utilized time better.  Artwork is created and maintained with an attempt at neatness.  Artwork may be torn, smudged or have stray marks. Artwork is signed.	Did not utilize time well.  Artwork is poorly created and maintained.  Artwork is torn, smudged, or has stray marks that distract from the image.  Artwork is sloppily signed.	Artwork is not finished, was folded, crumpled up, ripped, etc.  No signature on artwork.

I'm not sure if I'm going to keep the elements and composition descriptor...I might combine them into one?

I think I was having a brain fart during this rubric creation because I was really struggling on how to word some of these descriptors, so I headed over to RubiStar for help.  Have you used this site before?  It's really great for making rubrics for any subject area.  You don't have to create a log-in to use it, but if you do, you can save your individually created rubrics to your account.  There are seven rubric types to choose from for art.  You can choose and edit the descriptors, edit the grade numbers and descriptor titles.  You can even add your own.  

The second part of my pre- and post-assessment will be an art quiz.  At the end of the year, I am expected to give a final exam like all other subject areas, so instead of bombarding the students with a second post-assessment type exam, I'll just make the final exam the post-assessment.  Hopefully using eDoctrina will make this exam generation painless and easy, as I plan to enter in all of my unit quiz questions into a test bank.  I'll give the students a brief quiz at the beginning of the year and couple that score with the observational drawing for my pre-assessment score for each student.

The quiz portion will also include the written portion.  Again, RubiStar already has a rubric for artwork analysis so I pulled that rubric directly from the website to use.  The only thing I will be adding is a descriptor for grammar and sentence structure.

CATEGORY	4	3	2	1
Description	Makes a complete and detailed description of the subject matter and/or elements seen in a work.	Makes a detailed description of most of the subject matter and/or elements seen in a work.	Makes a detailed description of some of the subject matter and/or elements seen in a work.	Descriptions are not detailed or complete.
Analysis	Accurately describes several dominant elements or principles used by the artist and accurately relates how they are used by the artist to reinforce the theme, meaning, mood, or feeling of the artwork.	Accurately describes a couple of dominant elements and principles used by the artist and accurately relates how these are used by the artist to reinforce the theme, meaning, mood, or feeling of the artwork.	Describes some dominant elements and principles used by the artist, but has difficulty describing how these relate to the meaning or feeling of the artwork.	Has trouble picking out the dominant elements.
Interpretation	Forms a somewhat reasonable hypothesis about the symbolic or metaphorical meaning and is able to support this with evidence from the work.	Student identifies the literal meaning of the work.	Student can relate how the work makes him/her feel personally.	Student finds it difficult to interpret the meaning of the work.
Judgement	Uses multiple criteria to judge the artwork, such as composition, expression, creativity, design, communication of ideas.	Uses 1-2 criteria to judge the artwork.	Tries to use aesthetic criteria to judge artwork, but does not apply the criteria accurately.	Evaluates work as good or bad based on personal taste.