Visual Rubrics: Do You Use Them?

Fancy that...something I made in college during student teaching actually comes in handy!  ;)  On Thursday and Friday, I started the final project in my Ancient Egypt unit with my 6th graders (see below).  For the final project, we took some notes on Ancient Egyptian artifacts and then I gave students the criteria for their final project for the unit:

     1. Create an Egyptian artifact out of clay using at least one of the three hand-building techniques.

     2. Artifact must include hieroglyphics.

     3. Artifact must somehow reflect yourself in it.

     4. You must turn in a sketch that tells me what your artifact will be, how you will build it, if you plan on glazing or painting it (or both), and you must tell me how you will be reflected in the project.

All of my students have done the three hand-building techniques in class before, either with me or the previous teacher.  We did coil pots last year, pinch pots the year before, and a majority of the students have done slab work with me in the after school program when we have done clay projects then.

However, to remind them what the hand-building techniques are, I brought out some visual rubrics I created when I did my student teaching.  And then I questioned myself as to why I don't make these for more projects!  My craftsmanship rubric does count as a visual rubric (a visual rubric shows students what a project would look like for all grade steps, not just an excellent example), but I feel like I should be using more of these...especially with the Common Core requirements and Marazano way of teaching.

Either way, here are my visual rubrics that I created...one for a coil pot, pinch pot, and slab box.  Unfortunately, my other two slab boxes broke, because ironically, they were put together horribly!  In addition to these ceramic pieces, I had also photographed them and created a poster version, just in case any of them broke in future years (smart thinking on my part! ;) ).

 So my question is, how many of you actually use visual rubrics like these in your class?  Do you find them helpful?  What mediums do you have them for?  Do you make them for specific projects, or do you make general ones that can apply to multiple projects, like a craftsmanship rubric?

 On the opposite side of these rubrics, I have the basic instructions written out as to how to create each one of these projects, just in case students need further reminding.  I did also create separate posters for each hand-building skill as well.

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6th Grade: Ancient Egypt Unit

Two weeks ago I started the Ancient Egypt unit with my 6th graders.  As of right now, we are three days into it.  On the first day, we filled out the first three pages in the note packet, which consisted of notes about hieroglyphics, the Rosetta Stone, and the evolution of the pyramid.

For the first project, students are making paper sculptures of a pyramid.  On the outside they must make it look like a pyramid (we'll even add some real sand texture when finished) and on the inside, they must have the following: (1)a diagram of the rooms inside the pyramid, (2) hieroglyphics and (3) tomb paintings.   When we are finished, I'll give them a little bit of velcro for the flap to close and open the pyramid sculpture easily.

The 6th grade actually just started learning about Ancient Egypt in class too, so this was perfect timing!  I love it when things in art class match what they are doing in social studies...especially when I see the light bulb go off in their heads!

To do these pyramid sculptures, I had them trace a pattern I made, cut it and fold it along the lines.  I made my own pattern out of 18"x12" card stock.  I simply printed off a triangle from Microsoft Office and pieces it together to make my own pattern.  You can find a smaller version for 8 1/2"x11" paper on The SmART Teacher (which is, by the way, my new addiction!).  This pattern differs a little from mine as I don't have a bottom piece for our pyramids.

More pictures to come upon completion!

I showed students the rubric before having them complete these...in my rubric it does say that to receive a 4 in some categories, you should use a ruler...hmmmm...

6th Grade: Mexican Folk Art Mirrors

I just finished up (finally) with the Mexican art unit with my 6th graders.  The last project in the unit, after the Day of the Dead skull masks, was Mexican folk art mirrors.

Metal working was something new for me, so it was kind of exciting for me!  I taught the students how to do repousse and chasing to create radial symmetry on their mirrors.  In order to speed up the process, I have them use mosaic stickers for the mirror frame.  I'm not too happy with the quality of these, but we needed to move on with this project.  My superintended came in yesterday for some supplies and mentioned the same thing (which was a little embarrassing ..but she understood my reason for doing it).  They didn't really do a good job of creating a pattern/picture with the mosaics.  I think this was just pure laziness as I had made an example of a mirror to show them and we extensively looked at various examples of folk art mirrors in a power point...oh well.  Most of them at least understood what radial symmetry was!

Either way, what this has told me about my units that I created over the summer is that I may need to create less complex projects for the first project in each unit so that I can get through them faster.  We'll see how the next one goes...

6th Grade Day of the Dead Masks

Finally!  I can share my 6th grader's Day of the Dead masks!  These turned out pretty great!  Some really wanted to go with a Halloween skull over a Mexican Day of the Dead design...but nevertheless, I had some really great craftsmanship on these!  I had the students fill out the rubric before I graded them, and they were pretty honest and dead on with their grades compared to my grades...which shows they understand what they were learning about and they understand when they aren't working to their potential!  Check back onto this previous post to see the rubric I used to grade these assignments...

I think next year, if I do this exact project again, I will try out using tin foil that was suggested to make the mask forms more of a skull shape...I think that's the only thing that could have made these better!

 
 
 

A.P.P.R.: Pre and Post Assessments

I've had a few people commenting on these assessments so I decided I would share what I've come up with so far.  I've already shared my rubrics for the self-portraits but here I will share what I've decided to do for my pre and post assessments at every grade level.

In St. Lawrence county, we had one staff development day in March that we all got together at and tried to come up with regional assessments.  We had a really difficult time and never really finished, nor got back together to finish.  I wasn't really happy with what we came up with either as it was way to specific and for most of the grade levels, didn't match what I taught.  I really don't like the idea of repeating an exact project at the beginning and end of the year, and that's what they wanted to do.  I feel like the following assessments I made allow for students to create something different as their end product so they won't be taking home two identical projects (aside from the test assessments!).


Before I share these though, please understand the following:

         1.  I won't have to use all of these each year...this year I have figured that I will need to do assessments for 5th, 6th, Kindergarten and 1st grade as these are my largest grade levels that will give me my 51% student population.

         2.  I may have to change my assessments at the beginning of the year a bit, depending on whether or not my superintendent approves of them as rigorous assessments.  (I'm guessing that I will have to take the time management aspect out of my rubrics as it will be difficult for the other teacher to assess this since she won't be in my room...unless of course I would be allowed to assess that part of the rubric.)

Kindergarten

I've shared the worksheet that goes with this assessment here.  For this assessment, students will be asked to cut out various shapes (simple to advanced) and to glue them onto construction paper.  I plan to assess their scissor skills and their gluing skills.  I am a little unsure as to if this particular assessment can be done by the other teacher as I am assessing their scissor and gluing skills here and most of the cutting rubric in particular will need to be filled out from observations...

1st Grade

For my 1st grade assessment, I will have student split their paper into 6 sections.  They will receive 6 minutes to draw each item as I call it out to the best of their ability.  Those include a fuzzy dog, a rainbow, a flower, a tree, their family, and anything they want.  The following rubric is what I created for that assessment:

2nd Grade

My 2nd grade assessment will be treated partly as a type of test and partly as a drawing.  (To deal with students with IEPs, I will probably read the scavenger hunt part out loud.)  We start to get into critiques and talking about art in 2nd grade, so their assessment will reflect that.  They will receive three paintings (Picasso's Crying Woman, American Gothic, and the Arnolfini Wedding Portrait).  For the last part of the assessment, they will receive the remainder of the first period to start and one other complete class to finish half of Vittore Carpaccio's painting called Two Venetian Ladies on a Balcony.  Here is the grading rubric for this assessment:

3rd Grade

In 3rd grade, we will focus on depth and landscapes, so their assessment will be for landscapes.  For the pre-assessment, I will read them the story of Little Red Riding Hood without showing them any of the pictures.  They will then have two class periods to draw what they think the path looked like to grandmothers house from the story.  At the end  of the year, they will do the same thing, but I will read them the story of Hanzel and Gretel.  I will look for details in their drawing that they remembered from the story, as well as the characteristics of a good landscape.  Here is that rubric:

4th Grade

In 4th grade, they will start to do more drawings from real life and learn some basic shading techniques so their assessment will be to draw a still life and shade it in black and white.  Here is that rubric:

5th Grade

In 5th grade we will focus on color theory so they will receive a color theory test in worksheet form where they have to color in the color wheel using colored pencil and answer a series of questions by coloring.  I haven't decided if I will give them one or two days for this...I'm leaning towards one day unless they have an IEP for longer.  Here is that worksheet (I plan to score it out of 100):

6th Grade

Sixth graders will also receive a test.  The first part of the test will consist of the students seeing seven different slides.  The second part will consist of 11 vocabulary words that they must define and tell me which culture they come from (Porcelain, capital, altar, cartouche, pictograph, Dreamtime, hieroglyphics, candy skull, animal spirit, Ionic order, nomad).  I am thinking that I will split this test into two days, part 1 and part 2.  Below is what the 1st page of that test looks like:

Name:  _____________________________    Date:  _______________

Class:  ______________________________

Be sure to read ALL the directions carefully in each section carefully.  Answer each question to the best of your ability.  You may not ask another student for help.

     A.   

Prehistoric                Egyptian                    Greek             Asian Aboriginal                 Mexican                    Native American

 For the first section, you will see seven slides.  Each slide will remain on the board for three minutes.  For each slide, you must tell me what culture it comes from and 1-2 sentences explaining why that artwork represents that culture (5 pts. each)

1.    Culture:  _________________________________

Facts:  ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________