Churches' 4D Rubric Development Model

The 4D Churches’s model of rubric development involves four distinct phases. The
famous approach in project management is the Define, Design, Do, and Debrief. It is
advocated that the creation of the rubrics be stepwise, so as to progressively develop the
rubrics that are effective and useful in learning evaluation contexts that correspond with the
learning outcomes and assessment objectives.

The suggested model of the 4D Churches gives rubric development a clear structure
and direction, rot includes reflection, design, development and assessment. They considered
the use of Context, Process, Product and Person chronological process to align rubrics with
learning outcomes as well as maximize on the features like specificity and action ability that
made rubrics appropriate formative and summative assessments. Also, the development
models such as the Presentation, Feedback, and Post-It, as well as the Pass-The-Hat models
makes involvement of both the instructors as well as students, this leads to more appropriate
and effective tools for achieving student performance evaluation. By ensuring that when
developing the rubrics the language used is clear and consistent assessments that are most
appropriate to the work produced by the students can be established.

Development of Rubrics: Process and Explanation

Defining rubrics is a well-planned process to ensure that any assessments made

regarding learners’ performance are accurate and most importantly fair and uniform. A
rubric, as an assessment tool, describes concrete and specific standards as to what constitutes
acceptable student performance in a given skill or task and specifies the performance levels
needed to achieve various grades. The implementation of rubrics has been presented as a
series of several important steps beginning with reflection of the intended learning and the
subsequent steps of grouping and labelling of the learning outcomes as well as the processes
involved with application of rubrics in the form of a grid. Teachers’ as well as students’
engagement leads to identification of significant features of a tool and make the tool relevant
to the learning activities. A number of developmental models are available which provide
frameworks to guide the development of a suitable rubric.
Step 1: Reflection (Review Learning Objectives)

The first component of rubric development considered in the present work is

reflection. This stage relies on a broader perspective of goals of the course or a given
assignment not only the task in question. Reflection requires posing some key questions
(Stevens & Levi, 2013) such as:

Objective: Evaluating students’ capability in speaking and writing all the speaking and
writing skills needed including grammar, usage of structures and vocabulary patterns, and the
manner of expressing writing.

Skills to be assessed: Speaking and Writing.

Questions to Consider:

What skills are necessary to complete the assignment successfully?

What evidence should students provide to demonstrate mastery of the task?

What would the highest possible performance look like?

What are the elements of the task that students are likely to fail at?

This phase checks that the rubric is developmentally appropriate for the course and
that the defined performance standards match the course intended learning outcomes.
Reflection aids one to be very clear on exactly what is considered worthy, hence all features
relevant to the overall quality of work get h hitters on specifically aimed at through the rubric
(Moskal, 2003). This kind of reflective approach is very important to avoid emergence of a
situation wherein the rubric only analyses the tasks to be accomplished without close
inspection of the general objective of the assignment. It is intended to design an assessment
instrument that will help explain not only how students would be able to show what they have
learned but how teachers can reliably assess such learning (Andrade, 1997).

Step 2: Listing (List Performance Criteria)

The second process that counts towards the creation of the rubric is identification of
details. In this stage, developers divide the assignment or task into smaller sub-tasks within
which they are likely to find some measure of control. These components might include
learning outcomes, task formats and particular skills that the students are required to exhibit.
According to Stevens and Levi (2013), listing out the elements ensures that the rubrics link
closely with the learning objectives and guarantees that all aspects critical to learning are
evaluated. More importantly, the language used when making these decisions should be
specific. Montgomery’s (2000) work explains that when the descriptors of a rubric involve
wordiness, the usage of the rubric becomes inconsistent due to the differences in meaning
among users such as raters and students. The use of clear and specific language is useful in
decreasing equivocality so that everyone involved has the same picture in regard to what
everything that is being assessed entails. The criteria outlined ensures that the subsequent
rubric development process is aligned to measurable and observable student performance.

Learning Outcomes

1. Coherent and structured oral and written communication activities.

2. Choose words and grammatical structures relevant in the given activity.

3. They require the present ideas to be presented well organized and in a persuasive manner.

4. Choose right intonation, conversational flow and pronunciation during speaking.

Task Format:

Speaking: A 5-minute oral presentation on a given topic.

Writing: A 500-word essay analyzing a contemporary issue.

Step 3: Grouping and Labeling

After the details have been described on list, the process is followed by the steps
where similar expectations of performance can be grouped and identified with the correct
terms. This is where the dimensions of the rubric are recognized. In the scheme of the rubric,
a “dimension” will denote an aspect of performance that would be graded, for example, flow
in spoken language or organization in the writing produced. At this stage, developers sort the
skills or tasks that are related in some way into one category. For instance, some of the
common criteria are ‘accuracy’ ‘complexity.’ And ‘range’ ’in language use, might belong to
dimension ‘grammar and syntax’ (Stevens & Levi, 2013). In this way, the rubric is grouped
and labeled so that the rater and learner associate the message with the particular rubric
adequately. It assists in preventing the formation of repetitive kind of categories and enables
reestablishing of the individual dimensions of the performance. As important as it is to make
the rubrics completely clear during this step, it is important to pay much attention so as not to
leave out some critical parts.

Performance Dimensions (Describe Levels of Quality for Each Criterion)

1. Clarity: The level at which the student develops their concepts is also very clear.

2. Coherence: The content coherence or the order in which the presentation or essay has been
arranged.

3. Grammar: The accuracy and the differentiation of syntactic constructions.

4. Vocabulary: Vocabulary level and whether it is convenient or not.

5. Fluency: (speaking only): Tempo of speech with minimal amounts of pauses, hesitations
included.

6. Pronunciation (speaking only): Degree of accuracy and clarity of speech.

Step 4: Applying the Rubric Grid

The last process in rubric development is where the developed grouped dimensions integrated
into a rubric grid. In this stage, the dimensions discussed in step 3 are written in the left
column of a chart, while the ‘performance levels’ (newcomer, moderate, expert) fill in the
top. The crossing of each dimension and the performance level creates a cell of the grid and it
expresses also the descriptors for each type of performance (Stevens & Levi, 2013). After
rubric has been aligned in grid form, it can easily be used to assess the performance of
students in systematic manner. For instance, the writing rubric might have strands that
include “Organization,” “Grammar, “and “Coherence” Each of these strands publishes a table
showing how performance from excellent, satisfactory and poor looks like. The process
makes it easier for the raters to apply the rubric and hence eliminating most of the overtones
of subjectivity in the evaluation process.
Grid Structure: The performance indicators give the rating as Excellent, Good,
Satisfactory, and Needs Improvement.

Speaking and Writing Assessment Rubric

Criteria Excellent (4) Good (3) Satisfactory Needs

(2) Improvement
(1)
Clarity Ideas are Ideas are generally Ideas are Ideas are
expressed clear, but may lack unclear in poorly
clearly, with some organization places, and expressed, and
well-organized or clarity. some sections much of the
and are hard to content is
understandable follow. unclear or
arguments. disorganized.
Coherence Well- Mostly organized Some Lacks clear
organized with with some minor organizational organization;
clear lapses in issues; ideas ideas jump
transitions; coherence. are partially from one to
follows a disconnected. another
logical without logical
structure. flow.
Grammar Almost no Few errors, mostly Some errors in Frequent
errors; in complex sentence grammar
complex and structures, but structure that mistakes;
varied does not impede affect clarity. major errors
sentence understanding. affect clarity
structures used and
correctly. understanding.
Vocabulary Uses a broad Adequate Limited Limited
range of vocabulary usage; vocabulary, vocabulary;
vocabulary few errors or with some frequent
appropriately awkward word inappropriate inappropriate
and accurately. choices. or repetitive word choices.
 word choices.
Fluency Speaks Some pauses and Frequent Speech is
(Speaking) smoothly with hesitations, but pauses or halting and
minimal speech is generally hesitations that difficult to
pauses or fluid. affect the flow follow due to
hesitation; of speech. constant
clear and pauses.
steady pace.
Pronunciatio Clear, accurate Pronunciation is Pronunciation Pronunciation
n (Speaking) pronunciation generally clear issues are is unclear or
with very few with some minor frequent but difficult to
errors. mispronunciations. still understand,
understandable. making
communication
hard.

Step 5: Add a Descriptor or Numerical Score to Each Performance Level

The numerical score for each level corresponds to the following:

• Excellent (4): 90-100% (A)

• Good (3): 70-89% (B)

• Satisfactory (2): 50-69% (C)

•Needs Improvement (1): Below 50% (D)

Step 6: Practice Using the Rubric

Action: Use the developed rubric to assess a student's sample essay.

Example: Read two different essays and apply the developed rubric, so that the criteria
can be used in a standard manner and possible inconsistencies or missing components
can be corrected.
Step 7: Share the Rubric with Students

Action: Make sure to hand out the rubric before the students begin writing their essays.

Example: Place the rubric on the course website and state the ways in which the assignments
will be assessed.

Step 8: Assess Students’ Work

Action: To assess the students’ work after they have submitted the essays, use the given
rubric to give each criterion a value out of 4.

Example: Following the grading, the students should be given feedback on each of the
criterion with explanations as to how the essay got the given score.

Step 9: Evaluation of Rubric Effectiveness (Debrief)

The performance of the rubric will be assessed based on the response from students and
instructors once the rubric has been deployed in assessments.

• Is the rubric credible in terms of its interaction with the different levels of the presented
performance?

• Informs whether the specific tips for the student are provided in the rubric which will help
them to develop in their skills.

• Does the rubric being used make easy sociological sense to both the raters and the students?

• Is it relevant to learning objectives of the course?

Through these evaluative criteria, the rubric will have further enhancements hence increasing
its reliability and clarity. Creation of this rubric is in accord with the process described in
Churches’s model, to match the goals of the assessment and to give students valuable
feedback necessary for improvement of their language competencies.

Step 10: Revise the Rubric

Action: Recommendations returned to students: Modify the rubric if there are problems with
clarity, difficulty or issues that appeared during grading and students indicated this.

Example: If students consulted the work confused by the “Evidence and Support” criterion,
then it is better to refine the descriptor stating the kinds of evidence needed.