self grading assignments

Easy Grading Ideas for the Modern K-12 Classroom

As teachers, we are constantly trying to find ways to make our lives just a little easier. A great option for this is to look into easy grading assignments, like those that utilize student self-grading. Now, this is much more than just having students trade papers with one another as you read an answer key out loud. Student self-grading is an entire system that allows students to critically review their own work, grade it, and then hold themselves accountable in front of their peers.

Here is a  brief explanation of specifically what digital self-grading is  if you are unfamiliar.

Finding Options for Easy Grading in the Classroom

Self-grading assignments can be a fantastic option for educators looking for an easy grading solution in their classroom. With a self-grading system, teachers can quickly assess student work without spending too much time on grading. This system also allows students to take more ownership of their learning by allowing them to assess their own progress . By providing students with an assignment checklist and grading scale, they can easily identify wrong answers and correct them before submitting their work.

Another benefit of self-grading assignments is the ability to easily adjust the number of questions and answer choices to fit the needs of individual students or class levels. Teachers can create assignments with varying degrees of difficulty and adjust the grading system accordingly . This flexibility can help ensure that students are challenged appropriately while also giving them the opportunity to succeed.

Self-grading assignments also offer students a unique opportunity to develop their critical thinking skills. By analyzing their own work and identifying correct and incorrect answers, students are forced to think critically about the material they have learned. This process can help students better understand the material and retain it for future use.

THE LONG-TERM BENEFITS OF STUDENT SELF GRADING

It is important to understand the long-term benefits of student self-grading. When students are given the opportunity to assess their own work, they take ownership of their education, which can increase motivation and foster a sense of responsibility. This, in turn, helps them develop critical thinking skills that are essential for success in all aspects of life, including collaboration, communication, and leadership.

Student self-grading also helps reduce grading time while fostering an ownership mentality in students. This independence and accountability for their own work will serve them well in college and beyond. Implementing student self-grading can also provide extensive long-term benefits.

Overall, as an education major, you should consider implementing student self-grading in your classroom as it teaches valuable life skills that will benefit your students in the long run, while also reducing your grading time and benefiting your mental well-being.

Implementing SELF-GRADING programs

Student self-grading is an excellent way for students to become more independent and accountable for their own work. It also helps them develop their critical thinking skills. Implementing student self-grading can also help reduce your grading time.

We know it sounds like something that would never work. But let’s look at the facts:

Imagine reading your paper out loud to yourself for 3 minutes. It is probably cringe-worthy (you can do better than that!). Now imagine someone grading you on that same paper. That score better be 100%!

When students grade their own papers, they are much more likely, to be honest with themselves. They know that if they do not get a good score, they will have to explain themselves to their classmates.

Student self-grading creates a sense of ownership for the work. Students are much more likely to take care of something that they feel is their own.

These programs use algorithms to assess assignments, provide instant feedback, and generate scores without the need for manual grading. This technology frees up valuable time for educators to focus on individualized instruction and provide targeted support to struggling students.

Self-grading programs are particularly effective for multiple-choice and short-answer questions, which can be evaluated accurately and quickly using automated methods. With the rise of online learning and remote instruction, self-grading programs have become increasingly popular in modern classrooms.

Self-Grading Programs

Having opportunities for self-grading moves forward tenfold when you use programs that grade for you (yes, you read that correctly!).

One example of a self-grading program is Kahoot!, an online learning platform that enables teachers to create and share quizzes with their students. Kahoot! uses gamification to make learning more engaging and interactive , with points, badges, and leaderboards that motivate students to participate. The program provides instant feedback to students, allowing them to track their progress and identify areas where they need to improve.

Kahoot! also allows teachers to monitor student performance and adjust their teaching strategies accordingly, making it a powerful tool for formative assessment.

Another example of a self-grading program is Google Forms, which enables teachers to create quizzes, surveys, and assessments that can be automatically graded. Google Forms supports a wide range of question types, including multiple-choice, short-answer, and essay questions. The program also allows teachers to customize feedback and scoring, making it a flexible tool for classroom assessment.

A while back, I created an explanation of seven different programs that are very user-friendly that are self-grading. These brief tutorials are very helpful for all teachers, new or old. If you are interested in seeing them, please fill in the form below and you will be taken right to the breakdown of information.

In short, using self-grading assignments can help reduce teacher stress, increase student engagement, and help students learn how to better check their own work. If you are not currently using them in your classroom, I highly suggest that you start today!

Why it Matters

When students are given the opportunity to grade their own work, they are taking ownership of their education. This can lead to increased motivation and a desire to learn more. It also helps foster a sense of responsibility. Students are much more likely to take care of something that they feel is their own.

In addition, student self-grading helps students develop their critical thinking skills. This is a skill that will serve them well in all aspects of their life. While they will still be vying for that ultimate letter grade, this will help guide them in the process and help them invest in actually understanding correct answers.

To boot, imagine being able to fill in your grade book without piles of papers to grade …and it’s a lot easy for students to not misplace physical papers this way, too!

As you can see, student self-grading is an excellent way for students to become more independent and accountable for their own work. It also helps them develop their critical thinking skills.

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This article was originally published on January 4, 2022

About the Author: Jenn Breisacher

After moving from a teacher-dominated classroom to a truly student-centered one, Jenn found herself helping colleagues who wanted to follow her lead.  In 2018 she decided to expand outside of her school walls and help those out there who were also trying to figure out this fantastic method of instruction to ignite intrinsic motivation in their students.  Read more about her journey with Student-Centered World at studentcenteredworld.com/about

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Self-Grading Quizzes & Assignments

Are you ready to check grading off your to-do list? I won’t lie, my first few months back in the classroom post-maternity leave were rough . The exhaustion, frustration over lack of time, not being the mom or teacher I wanted to be, all left me feeling crushed under a weight that I just couldn’t escape. Can you relate? Check out this amazing #teacherhack, a self-grading quiz, that changed everything…

Are you ready to check grading off your to-do list? As a new mom, I needed a way to gather valuable data for my students, and still, have the energy to be “ mama ” when I picked my baby up from daycare. Self-grading quizzes made all that possible, and I can’t wait to share what I’ve learned with you.

Self-Grading Resources Save Time

Grading took a significant amount of time, and giving less work to my students wasn’t an option as our district has strict requirements for assessing. Unless I took action, it was clear that nothing was going to change. Tired and defeated, I poured over teaching strategies and productivity hacks to find ways to be even more efficient.

The exhaustion, frustration over lack of time, not being the mom or teacher I wanted to be, left me feeling crushed under a weight I couldn’t escape. Can you relate?

Teaching is tough, grading doesn’t have to be.

This led me to the biggest game-changing #teacherhack of all time. It felt too good to be true, but time and time again, I was able to use this new strategy to access immediate student data without lifting my favorite purple flair pen.

Does any of this resonate with you? If so, I’ve got your simple solution: Self-Grading Assignments and Quizzes .

Self-Grading Quizzes Provide Immediate and Organized Data

D igital activities (or quizzes) that grade themselves the instant a student hits the “submit” button are called self-grading assignments . All scores will appear in an organized spreadsheet ready for you to use. You can even see a breakdown of which questions were correct/incorrect. This breakdown is incredibly helpful when forming strategy small groups and pulling students for review.

Benefits of Immediate Feedback

Student scores began increasing because I was able to meet with kids the same day they took they took their self-grading assessment. This allowed me to give meaningful and timely feedback to each student. Somedays we even met 1-1. ( My class size was 29. I can’t tell you the last time I actually had the time to meet 1-1 with every student in a day). Relationships with my students were better than ever because I could actually invest the time I wanted to help them flourish.

Bonus: with grading off my plate I had extra time to invest in my family too. (… and I sure as heck wasn’t dragging a stack of papers back and forth anymore .)

So, forget the piles of paper. Forget tossing a stack of ungraded assignments in your teacher bestie’s recycling the day before report cards are due. Forget the long hours of grading. Last but not least, definitely forget taking your students’ work on a joy ride to and from school multiple times before getting it all graded.

Self-grading assignments can eliminate all of that for you with just the click of a button.

Assignments and quizzes that actually grade themselves are REAL and they will change your year.

Interested in learning more? I’ve put together a FREE guide just for you to get started with self-grading quizzes. Click the button below to grab your FREE copy of “A Teacher’s Guide to Self-Grading Assignments.” Start saving time today by saying goodbye to grading!

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Self-Assessment

Self-assessment activities help students to be a realistic judge of their own performance and to improve their work. 

Why Use Self-Assessment? 

• Promotes the skills of reflective practice and self-monitoring. 
• Promotes academic integrity through student self-reporting of learning progress. 
• Develops self-directed learning. 
• Increases student motivation. 
• Helps students develop a range of personal, transferrable skills. 

Considerations for Using Self-Assessment 

• The difference between self-assessment and self-grading will need clarification. 
• The process of effective self-assessment will require instruction and sufficient time for students to learn. 
• Students are used to a system where they have little or no input in how they are assessed and are often unaware of assessment criteria. 
• Students will want to know how much self-assessed assignments will count toward their final grade in the course. 
• Incorporating self-assessment can motivate students to engage with the material more deeply. 
• Self-assessment assignments can take more time. 
• Research shows that students can be more stringent in their self-assessment than the instructor. 

Getting Started with Self-Assessment 

• Identify which assignments and criteria are to be assessed. 
• Articulate expectations and clear criteria for the task. This can be accomplished with a  rubric . You may also ask students to complete a checklist before turning in an assignment. 
• Motivate students by framing the assignment as an opportunity to reflect objectively on their work, determine how this work aligns with the assignment criteria, and determine ways for improvement. 
• Provide an opportunity for students to agree upon and take ownership of the assessment criteria. 
• Draw attention to the inner dialogue that people engage in as they produce a piece of work. You can model this by talking out loud as you solve a problem, or by explaining the types of decisions you had to think about and make as you moved along through a project. 
• Consider using an “exam wrapper” or “assignment wrapper.” These short worksheets ask students to reflect on their performance on the exam or assignment, how they studied or prepared, and what they might do differently in the future. Examples of exam and homework wrappers can be found through Carnegie Mellon University’s Eberly Center. 

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How to Shift to Self-Grading in English Classes

By articulating clearer expectations about what’s being evaluated, teachers can help students become more fluent in improving and assessing their own work.

Grading English papers isn’t a straightforward task—and neither is writing them. Students are often asked to showcase too many skills within an assignment—or not given specific, actionable guidance and feedback—which can make the entire process bewildering. “I thought I’d clarified that grades on papers came from students demonstrating their skills in a number of areas,” says middle school teacher Stephanie Farley in a piece for MiddleWeb . “As it turned out, the students couldn’t figure out how facility in those areas translated into points or a letter grade.”

Having concluded that she was assessing too many skills at one time, and hadn’t clearly articulated the skills she wanted students to learn, Farley invested a lot of time in refining a grading strategy that would change the way her students are graded: they would grade themselves.

“ Student-centered assessment is the most transformative change I’ve made in my English teaching practice within the past five years,” Farley says. It began with her asking students to try grading just one paper themselves, and soon enough “there was no stopping the kids [and] I had successfully transitioned my class to student-centered assessment.”

Here are three steps Farley used to help kids evaluate their own work, with consistent oversight from herself:

Create Kid-Friendly Standards

Good writing encompasses mastering many skills all at once, and for kids who are starting out, breaking it down into smaller, concrete goals as they work towards fluency can make progress seem more feasible.

Farley concluded that rewriting all of her learning targets in “kid language” and only focusing on one skill at a time helps her students better understand what they’re aiming for. Teaching what a “big idea” or a “supporting detail” looks like in a written piece of work, for example, helps students get familiar with the language used for assessments.

She also recommends replacing more formally worded statements like “Develops a big idea that is well supported by details within the story” with simpler sentences such as “I can write a story or essay with a purpose – or big idea – in mind,” and “I can use details in my story that support – or give examples of – the big idea.”

Beside providing a rubric for all written assignments, Farley encourages students to evaluate each other’s work based on learning targets. “It’s hard to be objective about your own work, but practicing on others’ work trains your brain to take a step back and look for the learning targets ,” she adds.

Teach the Basics of Self-Evaluation

Assessing one’s own learning requires a solid grasp on what skills are being evaluated, and Farley gives her students plenty of written feedback—using language clearly tied to the learning objectives—and time to make revisions before asking students to evaluate their own writing. “In this way, they already knew which areas of the work needed improvement and what was strong, so if they edited successfully, they’d have a fair understanding of where the work stood in terms of the rubric,” she writes.

To make the evaluation more specific, Farley asks her students to pinpoint an example of how they fulfill a learning target, like highlighting where a “big idea” is in their story—which corresponds to the goal of “writing a story with a big idea in mind.” This visual connection not only helps students see how well big ideas are expressed in their writing, but also means that the teacher doesn’t need to do as much work to explain problems in the future.

Hold Individual Conferences

Once students have completed a self-evaluation and it’s time for grading, Farley sits down and talks through what they’ve come up with to help fill in any gaps in their own assessment. “I was quick to point out when students didn’t give themselves enough credit or underrated their achievement,” Farley writes. “If needed, I’d also mention where their work didn’t quite align with their evaluation of it.”

During these one-on-ones, Farley’s students would explain their revisions using examples that correspond to the different criteria in the rubric, and eventually arrive at a conclusion of what grade they merit. She adds that it’s rare for her to disagree with her students’ evaluations, but when it does happen, she “explained how the work could improve and invited the student to revise again.” Finally, the agreed-upon grade is recorded in the gradebook.

Farley notices that self-grading has led students to internalize some of the language of good writing; they now know how to articulate in very specific terms where they’re succeeding and where they have room to grow. “In this class, I learned how to write using descriptive language like metaphors and sense imagery. But most of all, I felt like I got better at and more confident about writing,” according to one of Farley’s students. Witnessing her students feel “safe and confident in the classroom” is one of the greatest rewards to Farley as an educator, she writes.

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Creating self-grading student assignments

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Creating assignments that are both engaging and informative is an essential part of your job as a teacher. However, grading can be a time-consuming and tedious process, taking away from the time you could be spending on other important tasks. Luckily, with advancements in technology, it is now possible to create assignments that are self-grading. In this blog, we will explore the steps teachers can take to create student assignments that are self-grading, helping to save time while still providing students with meaningful feedback.

Step 1: Choose the right platform

The first step in creating self-grading assignments is to choose the right platform. There are many tools available online that allow teachers to create and share self-grading assignments with students. Some popular platforms include Google Forms , Kahoot , and ClassFlow . When choosing a platform, it’s essential to consider the specific needs of your students and the subject matter you are teaching.

For example, if you are teaching a language class, you may want to use a platform that allows for audio and video recordings, such as Flipgrid . If you are teaching a math class, you may want to use a platform that allows for the creation of graphs and equations, such as Desmos . Additionally, it’s essential to choose a platform that is user-friendly and easy to navigate for both you and your students.

Step 2: Create the assignment

Once you have selected the appropriate platform, it’s time to create the assignment. When creating self-grading assignments, it’s important to consider the following:

• Choose the appropriate question type: Most self-grading platforms offer a variety of question types, including multiple choice, true/false, short answer, and essay. Choose the appropriate question type based on the subject matter and the learning objective.
• Add detailed instructions: Be sure to provide clear and concise instructions for each question. Students should know exactly what is expected of them and how to respond.
• Include feedback: Providing feedback is an essential part of the learning process. Consider adding feedback to each question, so students know where they stand and how they can improve.
• Use multimedia: To create engaging assignments, consider using multimedia such as images, videos, and audio recordings. This will help to keep students interested and motivated.

Step 3: Set up the grading system

Once the assignment is created, it’s time to set up the grading system. Most self-grading platforms offer a variety of grading options, including point-based and percentage-based grading. When setting up the grading system, consider the following:

• Determine the weight of each question: Assign a weight to each question based on its importance and relevance to the learning objective.
• Set the passing grade: Determine the passing grade for the assignment. This will vary depending on the subject matter and the level of difficulty of the assignment.
• Consider partial credit: Some platforms allow for partial credit to be awarded for certain types of questions. Consider whether this is appropriate for the assignment.
• Test the assignment: Before sharing the assignment with students, be sure to test it thoroughly to ensure that the grading system is working correctly.

Step 4: Share the assignment with students

Once the assignment is created and graded, it’s time to share it with students. When sharing self-grading assignments with students, consider the following:

• Provide clear instructions: Be sure to provide students with clear instructions on how to access the assignment and how to submit their responses.
• Set a deadline: Set a deadline for the assignment and communicate this clearly to students.
• Provide feedback: Once the assignment is submitted, provide feedback to students as soon as possible. This will help them to understand their strengths and weaknesses and identify areas for improvement.

Step 5: Analyze the results and provide feedback

The final step in creating self-grading assignments is to provide feedback to your students. This is an essential part of the learning process, as it helps students understand where they went wrong and how they can improve.

If you’re using Google Forms or Microsoft Forms, you can provide feedback by adding feedback for correct and incorrect answers.

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How to convert student hand-outs into digital self-grading worksheets

Technology comes with many advantages. So why not assign digital assignments instead of paper ones? It’s actually pretty easy to convert those documents into engaging interactive activities if you’re using the right tools.

Picture this: with digital assignments, teachers can add:

• More interactivity for students
• Multimedia elements like audio, video, zoomable images
• My favorite: automatic grading
• A comprehensive and efficient feedback system

So, what are you waiting for? In this blog post, you will learn how to transform your paper worksheets (PDF or DOCX documents) into digital worksheets with BookWidgets . It’s the perfect tool to digitize your worksheets.

Before we move on… If you’re new to BookWidgets you need to see the bigger picture. If you already know BookWidgets, skip this part and discover the new docx/pdf import feature.

What is BookWidgets?

Teachers can easily integrate BookWidgets inside other learning management systems (LMS) such as Google Classroom, Microsoft Teams, Schoology and more. The integration enables teachers to follow student progress in real time when they are working on a BookWidgets assignment. This way, teachers can quickly guide their students in the right direction when they need help.

BookWidgets is being used by teachers all over the world for both summative and formative evaluation. The grading dashboard allows teachers to review student work efficiently and easily give comprehensive feedback.

Convert your Microsoft Word documents or PDF files into digital worksheets

When you’re using a new EdTech tool like BookWidgets, you always have to spend so much time transforming your assignments and putting them into the tool. Only after that, you can enjoy all the advantages this tool has to offer, like auto-grading, feedback options, possibilities, live monitoring and so on.

That’s why BookWidgets introduces the Microsoft Word and PDF document import. You can now import questions from your existing DOCX and PDF documents into quizzes and (split) worksheets.

Let me show you how you can import questions from docx and pdf documents into your BookWidgets quizzes and worksheets, step-by-step. If you rather want to see for yourself, check out our handy BookWidgets video tutorial about the document import feature .

Step 1: Prepare your documents

When you’re importing from a PDF, it must be a text-based file (not image-based) Here’s how you can find out: open the PDF and try to highlight text with your mouse. If that works, your PDF is text-based. Note that PDFs may be image-based intentionally precisely to prevent copiablity.

Step 2: Prepare your widget

Click on “Create new widget” > choose your widget type. You can already give it a title and change some settings if needed. Of course, you can do this later on as well.

Step 3: Start the docx/pdf document import

A few important guidelines when you’re importing docx or pdf questions to your worksheet:

You always have to highlight the piece of text you would like to use for instructions/directions . This text will always show in the “question” section in a question type.

Then, indicate the question type in BookWidgets . Click on “*New question*” and make the right choice. If you are completely new to BookWidgets, it might be a good idea to check out this widget so you get an understanding of the possible question types and formatting in your digital worksheet.

Depending on the question type you have chosen, highlight new pieces of text and define them as configuration fields . Only configured/indicated fields will be imported.

You have now imported your first question. Keep on going ! To create and import a new question, highlight the new piece of text and select “New question” again. Repeat this process until all your questions are transformed to digital interactive questions.

Step 4: Check your imported questions

Indicate the right answers

In BookWidgets, teachers also have to indicate the correct answers so the questions can be auto-graded. In your .docx or .pdf, questions don’t always have the right answers filled out. Most of the time, they are left open so students can fill them out.

This means that you have to go over your imported questions in the BookWidgets worksheet again and indicate the correct answers as mentioned below the questions (= teacher instructions). Once you indicate the correct answers, your worksheet will be auto graded and you will save a lot of time (again!).

Delete unnecessary layout

When marking your questions or your text inside your document, you’ll notice that BookWidgets will import some other layout you don’t want. Make sure to always check the questions you’ve imported and delete unnecessary formatting like bullet lists and symbols.

Indicate your scoring options

Something we can’t bring over is the score on a question. This means that you have to go over your imported questions and scroll down to the scoring options. Now indicate the scoring weight and how you would want the score to be calculated.

Step 5: Add more questions if needed

• Text question (just for giving instructions/ extra explanation or theory/ describe your goals/ …)
• Multiple choice question & multiple choice with multiple possible answers question
• Single line text question (Short answer - open or closed)
• Multi line text question (long answer - open)
• Rich text question
• Fill-in-the blanks question
• Mark sentence question
• Drag words in sentence question
• Correct words in sentence question
• Fill-in-table question
• Question table & question table with multiple possible answers
• Annotate picture question
• Whiteboard question
• Word ordering question & picture ordering question
• Picture multiple choice question & picture multiple choice with multiple possible answers
• Rated multiple choice question
• Numeric question
• Equations question

This basically means that if you want to add more questions, you can still do this. Just click on “Add question”. And choose some questions you couldn’t import using the import from document feature.

Step 6: Choose your settings

• Title & reporting tab : enable or disable students to submit their answers
• General tab : Go over the worksheet/ quiz options that are important to you. Can students see the correction immediately after submitting, or do you want to return feedback on your own terms?

BookWidgets document import - What you can and can’t do

There are some extra details that you may want to know when importing documents into BookWidgets.

Besides the fact that this document import option enables you to save time when converting your documents to digital worksheets, it has some more tricks up its sleeve :

Import images

Import math or chemistry formulae

However, there are also some restrictions to the new document import in BookWidgets.

Layout change

PDF import limitations

In some cases, it might be a good thing to try and convert your PDF file into a .docx file. You can use the pdf to docx website for that.

Video tutorial: Import questions from existing MS Word and PDF documents into BookWidgets

Before you go, make sure to watch this handy video tutorial on the BookWidgets DOCX and PDF import feature. Frederic will explain everything to you step-by-step.

I hope you like BookWidgets’ newest addition! Make sure to share this with your fellow teachers who are just getting started converting their existing documents to digital worksheets with BookWidgets.

If you’re new to everything you just read, make sure to start at the beginning and create your first BookWidgets worksheet or quiz:

Create my first digital assignment with BookWidgets

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Digital Grading Assignments Made Easy

Digital grading 101: how to use a digital worksheet maker to create easy-to-use auto-graded assignments and assessments.

Are you feeling weighed down by the stack of grading you have? Free up nights and weekends by automating your grading in your classroom. We’ve come up with a guide to jumpstart your digital grading journey. 

What is Digital Grading?

A digital-graded, or auto-graded assignment, is an assignment that is instantaneously graded. Often teachers use tools that automate the grading process. They create an assignment and then put in a key that the app uses to grade submissions. Self-graded assessments and worksheets can be partially or fully graded by auto-grading software. TeacherMade converts all of your assignments to digital worksheets and gives you the option to auto-grade interactive digital activities. 

What types of assignments and assessments can be Digital graded?

Most assignments can be auto-graded using TeacherMade . Here are a few ideas: 

• Homework : Teachers use homework for practice. So why not automate it? You can even set up your assignment options so that students can get instant feedback, so they know how they are doing at the moment.
• Worksheets : Are worksheets dominating your grading time? Much like homework, teachers spend a lot of time grading worksheets. Free up your time grading and focus on things that matter more: instruction, meaningful feedback , and relationships. 
• Formative Assessment : Do a quick check with your students and get instant feedback on their learning journey.
• Quizzes : Most quizzes can be automated. Just put in your key with TeacherMade . 
• Tests and Assessment : Multiple-choice tests are perfect for self-grading. But you can also grade portions of tests and use self-grade for the rest.
• Bellringers : Start your day off in the right way with auto-graded bell work. It’s easy to have students log in to their digital bell work, and then you can quickly receive the feedback.

Benefits of Digital graded Assignments

Once you implement auto-scoring in your classroom, you will be amazed at all of the benefits you will experience. 

Save time with self-graded assignments and assessments

Many teachers are reluctant to start using digital assignments that self-grade because of the learning curve. It can be frustrating to learn a new app or software only to realize it’s not the right fit in your classroom. And each time you use it, there is time spent getting it set up just right. But here’s the thing, you’re already spending time typing and editing assignments that you use all the time. You’re also spending time copying the assignment, handing it out, and grading it. Why not cut this time out with some setup time?

With TeacherMade , our app makes it easy to set up auto-grading on all of your assignments. If you can set up a PowerPoint, you can set up a self-graded assignment. Try TeacherMade today . 

Digital worksheets are the key to implementing auto-graded Assignments in your classroom today

If you want to simplify grading with auto-grading, the best way to do this is to regularly use digital worksheets in your classroom. It’s easy to create a TeacherMade assignment. 

• Step 1: Upload your worksheet or assessment file. ( We accept these file types. )
• Step 2: Add fields for student responses.
• Step 3: Include answers to questions that work for self-scoring.
• Step 4: Send links to assignments to complete.
• Step 5: Allow our auto-grade feature to do all of the work from there!

Get immediate data that informs instruction

Your results show up instantly on TeacherMade. Take these results and immediately modify your lesson for an impact that will reach your students. With traditional grading, you may have to wait over a week before getting a clear picture of your students’ knowledge. It can feel too late to correct your course of action by then. 

Intervene faster with faster results

Connect with students that need intervention faster with TeacherMade . You will instantly know which concepts students struggle with while using our self-grading feature. Stop wasting time grading, and connect with students when the material is still fresh on their minds. 

Why use TeacherMade as a digital worksheet maker over Google Forms or Slides?

You may want to use Google Forms or Google Google Slides because it is already connected to Google Classroom. But TeacherMade syncs up with Google Classroom and provides an intuitive and feature-rich app for creating digital worksheets. 

• Stop limiting students with basic online worksheets from Google Forms. With TeacherMade, your online activities will look and feel like traditional paper assignments and tests. 
• Add multimedia like your voice or a video clip to your traditional PDF assignments.
• Grade assignments instantly. TeacherMade allows you the flexibility to edit your answer key as you grade– just like when you grade paper assignments and tests. 
• Our app connects to all of the major LMS platforms: Google Classroom, Canvas, and Schoology.

Use TeacherMade as a Digital grading worksheet and assignment resource

Regain your nights and weekends with TeacherMade. When you digitize your assignments, you gain the advantages of self-grading. This leads to seeing results faster and adjusting your instruction in the moment. Become a more organized and informed teacher with our auto-grading features today. 

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Self-Grading and Peer-Grading

Rubrics-based grading to create academic reflection and dialogue

When engaged in writing tasks, students must grade their own work and have a partner grade their work before submitting it to the teacher for final review. This enables students to reflect upon their work and revise as needed. In addition to improving student output and metacognitive knowledge, this practice can also lead to student dialogue around why a different score was given between the creator and team member.

Peer Grading: Discussing Rubric and Assignment

Student Does

• Grades their own written work, such as a writing task.
• Has a teammate grade their work after they have.
• Discusses any discrepancies between the two grades with the teammate.
• Submits student-graded work to the teacher.

Teacher Does

• Checks to make sure both the student and a teammate have reviewed and graded the work.
• Reviews and provides the final grade for the student’s work.

Technology Does

• Gives students access to shared documents and resources

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Peer grading at lps richmond.

Sophia Thomas, teacher, explains how peer grading is used as a strategy to deepen learning... Learn More

Strategy Resources

Student perspective on peer grading at lps richmond.

A student shares how peer grading through "team checks" works to help her get better... Learn More

LPS Writing Assessment

This is a sample writing assessment for Navigator Math. Learn More

LPS Scoring Rubric

This is a sample rubric used to score assessments and student work. Learn More

LPS Class Example: Exam Reflection Template

LPS uses a template to help students reflect after taking an assessment. Learn More

LPS Richmond California is part of the Leadership Public Schools (LPS) network of public charter high schools. It has developed a personalized academic numeracy program called Navigate Math.

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Foster more independence in your students by allowing them to grade their own lessons and tests without handing them the answer key! Save yourself from the mountain of papers to grade and allow your students to get immediate feedback and correct their work themselves. Learn more...

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Assessment Rubrics

A rubric is commonly defined as a tool that articulates the expectations for an assignment by listing criteria, and for each criteria, describing levels of quality (Andrade, 2000; Arter & Chappuis, 2007; Stiggins, 2001). Criteria are used in determining the level at which student work meets expectations. Markers of quality give students a clear idea about what must be done to demonstrate a certain level of mastery, understanding, or proficiency (i.e., "Exceeds Expectations" does xyz, "Meets Expectations" does only xy or yz, "Developing" does only x or y or z). Rubrics can be used for any assignment in a course, or for any way in which students are asked to demonstrate what they've learned. They can also be used to facilitate self and peer-reviews of student work.

Rubrics aren't just for summative evaluation. They can be used as a teaching tool as well. When used as part of a formative assessment, they can help students understand both the holistic nature and/or specific analytics of learning expected, the level of learning expected, and then make decisions about their current level of learning to inform revision and improvement (Reddy & Andrade, 2010). 

Why use rubrics?

Rubrics help instructors:

Provide students with feedback that is clear, directed and focused on ways to improve learning.

Demystify assignment expectations so students can focus on the work instead of guessing "what the instructor wants."

Reduce time spent on grading and develop consistency in how you evaluate student learning across students and throughout a class.

Rubrics help students:

Focus their efforts on completing assignments in line with clearly set expectations.

Self and Peer-reflect on their learning, making informed changes to achieve the desired learning level.

Developing a Rubric

During the process of developing a rubric, instructors might:

Select an assignment for your course - ideally one you identify as time intensive to grade, or students report as having unclear expectations.

Decide what you want students to demonstrate about their learning through that assignment. These are your criteria.

Identify the markers of quality on which you feel comfortable evaluating students’ level of learning - often along with a numerical scale (i.e., "Accomplished," "Emerging," "Beginning" for a developmental approach).

Give students the rubric ahead of time. Advise them to use it in guiding their completion of the assignment.

It can be overwhelming to create a rubric for every assignment in a class at once, so start by creating one rubric for one assignment. See how it goes and develop more from there! Also, do not reinvent the wheel. Rubric templates and examples exist all over the Internet, or consider asking colleagues if they have developed rubrics for similar assignments. 

Sample Rubrics

Examples of holistic and analytic rubrics : see Tables 2 & 3 in “Rubrics: Tools for Making Learning Goals and Evaluation Criteria Explicit for Both Teachers and Learners” (Allen & Tanner, 2006)

Examples across assessment types : see “Creating and Using Rubrics,” Carnegie Mellon Eberly Center for Teaching Excellence and & Educational Innovation

“VALUE Rubrics” : see the Association of American Colleges and Universities set of free, downloadable rubrics, with foci including creative thinking, problem solving, and information literacy. 

Andrade, H. 2000. Using rubrics to promote thinking and learning. Educational Leadership 57, no. 5: 13–18. Arter, J., and J. Chappuis. 2007. Creating and recognizing quality rubrics. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson/Merrill Prentice Hall. Stiggins, R.J. 2001. Student-involved classroom assessment. 3rd ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice-Hall. Reddy, Y., & Andrade, H. (2010). A review of rubric use in higher education. Assessment & Evaluation In Higher Education, 35(4), 435-448.

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Grading using checklists, rubrics, and self-assessments

In 10 years of teaching, I’ve found that my grading philosophy sometimes defers from what’s expected from administrators and parents. We give students tests ten times more than we did when I started teaching. Of those tests, many of them are tests with over 40 questions. I’ve seen my students experience serious anxiety over these tests and I’ve seen the parents angry and confused when their student that’s been getting As on all the assignments pulls in a C as their final grade because they weren’t feeling well the day of the test.

I believe in one thing specifically: Grading based purely off of assessments is setting kids up for major anxiety and feelings of failure. 

I’ve seen students that have amazing scientific minds fail tests. Students that conduct their own science experiments at home based off of inquiries they have about their world.

I’ve seen business-minded students that make and sell items at home fail tests. These students understand profit and loss, reinvesting in their business, and marketing. These skills weren’t on the test.

I’ve also seen students that had no motivation to do anything in class ace every test and get a higher overall grade than the student that worked hard at school and at home.

So what can we do in class? How do we move the focus away from assessments, especially if they’re mandated?

We reimagine our grading and teaching process. We provide activities that allow for student choice (like project-based learning), and we grade them in a way that assesses the whole student and their abilities. We grade using checklists, rubrics, and self-assessments .

Grading using checklists

There are many different ways that you can grade students using checklists. You can keep track of their reading progress for a grade (see Sara’s “Status of the Class” below). You can create a standard checklist to check off when they show you they understand skills. You can even break it down into smaller skill-based items that you want students to master within a standard.

If you have 9 small skills on your math checklist this week, you can enter a grade based off of mastery of those skills. For example, a student with mastery of 9 skills will get a 9/9, or 100%. Mastery can be shown individually in small group, or in a quick formative assessment.

Remember that formative assessments typically involve qualitative feedback that focuses on the details of content and performance. This is also a great time to give students individual feedback! My formative assessments are always task-based.

From the guest post “ 3 Ways to Build a Community of Readers “

Grading using rubrics

Rubrics are a great way to grade students on larger tasks, such as project-based learning . An added bonus to using rubrics is that your students know what to expect. You can even make a hybrid checklist-rubric that has boxes for students to check as they’ve completed them.

Get this free project-based learning rubric here .

Grading using self-assessment

One of the problems I often see with some students is that they don’t care about grades. Many students don’t even understand why they got a certain grade, and most won’t take the time to ask. Self-assessment is a really powerful thing because it allows students to get a grade that they understand. Most students are open and honest when they reflect on their work. You will likely even find out why they didn’t do well on the assignment because they will tell you when they were confused or what was hard for them. This is information that you can’t get when you’re sitting down by yourself grading.

Self-assessments and reflections go great with rubrics. If they know what is expected of them, they can easily give themselves a grade and justify that grade with the different parts of the rubric. My students got really good at circling a rating on each row of the rubric and then referring back to that on their self-assessment.

You can download the reflection and grading guide for free here .

However you choose to grade, remember that the grade should mean something to the student. It’s their future that’s being shaped and the best thing we can do for them is to give them some responsibility in the manner. You’d be surprised at how students react when given more power in their grades!

Featured Resources in this Article

Project Based Learning Rubric

You may also enjoy this article.

About the Author

April smith.

April began her career as a 5th grade teacher in 2008 and quickly developed a passion for creating engaging educational materials to share with fellow teachers. She now works with districts around the country, training their teachers and leaders on how to implement research-based strategies and differentiation techniques that meet the needs of diverse learners.

• Online Assessment, Grading, and Feedback

Empowering Learners through Online Discussion Self-Grading

• September 9, 2022
• Laura M. Schwarz and Nancyruth Leibold

This article first appeared in the  Teaching Professor   on October 26, 2017. © Magna Publications. All rights reserved. 

Have you ever thought, “There has to be a better way!” while grading your online learners’ discussions? It is no secret that grading student discussions is time consuming, laborious, and tedious, considering the disproportionate amount of time required to give solid, quality feedback on a large volume of discussion. On the learner side, students often do not use the rubric to craft their discussions or read and use feedback to improve. This adds to the frustration and can make grading learners’ discussions feel like a waste of time. Fortunately, a better way exists: engage and empower your students by having them grade their own discussions!

Discussion self-grading is an innovative, unconventional, and creative learning method. It empowers learners to improve by employing adult learning principles outlined in the theory of andragogy and reflective learning. These principles encourage learners to be self-directed and responsible for their own learning (Knowles, Holston, & Swanson, 2015), and that serves to motivate the learner. Learners engage in their own learning process with internal motivation and are allowed to maintain control.

Discussion self-grading also requires reflection on experiences, beliefs, knowledge, one’s self, and practices with the goal of improving (Kember, McKay, Sinclair, & Wong, 2008). Reflection is an important lifelong skill for life, career, learning, and problem solving. It helps people improve both performance and practice in all facets of life. In the case of discussion self-grading, as learners engage in grading their own discussions, they reflect upon their discussion performance. Learners discover their mistakes and accomplishments, learn what they can improve and how, and are motivated to do better in the future.

Learners may also reflect on the posting’s topic and content and here, too, engage in reflective learning as they revisit their writings. As for the traditional problem of learners not using the rubric, learners must employ the rubric to grade their discussions and thus become both more familiar with the rubric and the importance of following the rubric’s criteria. With this comes improved discussion performance.

Implementing discussion self-grading is fairly straightforward and consists of three basic steps:  

Step 1: Create a discussion self-grading rubric

The first step in implementing discussion self-grading is to create a rubric. A discussion self-grading rubric serves as a measuring tool by which learners evaluate their performance. Evaluation criteria should reflect the performance areas that the instructor deems important and necessary, as well as a breakdown for quality with a score for each level of performance. For example, the rubric could contain items for content of initial posting; content of responses to others’ postings; discussion timeliness and interaction such as number of responses to others; spelling, grammar, sentence format; and correct APA format. The rubric can then break down each criterion into definitions for each performance level with accompanying points for each as a scoring strategy. For instance, the criterion for timeliness and interaction could break down into one point for making posts on two different days, with the initial response and responses to others’ postings completed by the due date: .75 point for a late first post and/or for posting everything on one day only with responses to at least two peers’ postings, .5 points for responding to only one peer’s posting, and zero points for not replying to or providing minimal comments or information to other participants.  

Step 2: Create a discussion self-grading quiz

After creating a rubric, you must provide a means for learners to score themselves on each of the rubric criteria. A self-grading quiz works well for this purpose. Start by creating one question for each criterion. If for example there are five criteria, there should be five questions. The criterion forms the stem of the question, and each of criteria can be used for each of the performance levels (see example below).

Which of the following best reflects your participation, timeliness and interaction in discussion according to the discussion Rubric?

• Makes postings on at least two different days (Wed initial post due by 11:59PM). Responds to at least 2 peers’ postings and reads all posts in assigned group (1 point)
• Late first post and/or posts everything 1 day only. Responds to at least 2 peers’ posting and reads all posts in assigned group (.75 point)
• Responds to only 1 peer posting (.5 point)
• Does not reply to or provides minimal comments and information to other participants (0 points)

You should create one quiz for each discussion: for instance, you would create one quiz for each unit or week. Setting the quiz to automatically export to grades is helpful in automatically populating the grade area with scores. Providing several days for learners to complete the discussion helps provide adult learners with flexibility. For example, you can set up the discussion self-grading quizzes to start after the discussion begins and end a few days after the last discussion responses are due with the due date shown in the calendar as a reminder. Not setting a time limit and allowing multiple attempts in case of “mistakes” is also an adult-learner-friendly practice.

Step 3: Create instructions for learners

Last, creating and communicating a set of clear instructions for learners is paramount to understanding and success. Instructions can be both written and explained in a live or recorded video. Adult learners need to know the why, what, and how (Knowles, Holston, & Swanson, 2015). An explanation of adult learning (andragogy) and the importance of developing skills of reflection for reflective learning and self-growth can serve as the “why.” Explaining the rubric and its importance serves as the “what,” and explaining the quiz serves as the “how.” Providing a practice discussion self-grading quiz and demonstration are likewise helpful. Furthermore, informing learners regarding the expectation of honesty—including instructor audits and consequences for dishonesty—is also important.

Faculty and student feedback on discussion self-grading have been extremely positive. This article’s authors have used discussion self-grading with hundreds of students to date and have found that learners were largely honest and accurate. Moreover, they found that discussion quality improved significantly over instructor grading, particularly after the first week. Faculty also found that discussion self-grading encourages reflective learning skills and empowers students. Learner frustration decreased, and satisfaction increased. Learners paid increased attention to detail in both discussions and assignments—in other words, the attention paid to the rubric through discussion self-grading appeared to have carried through to other assignments. Most learners completed the self-grading quiz on time, and the need to reopen the quiz for students who forgot to complete it was infrequent. Another positive was that discussion self-grading allowed faculty to have more time for other course needs such as grading major assignments and developing and refining course materials and structure. Unsolicited learner feedback was likewise positive; students said that it was a great way to learn.

For more articles like this, check out a  Teaching Professor  yearly membership for $159 or a monthly membership for $19.

Laura M. Schwarz is an associate professor of nursing at Minnesota State University, Mankato, and Nancyruth Leibold is an assistant professor of nursing at Southwest Minnesota State University.

References:

Kember, D., McKay, J., Sinclair, K., & Wong, F. K. Y. (2008). A four-category scheme for coding and assessing the level of reflection in written work.  Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education, 33 (4), 363–379. doi: 10.1080/02602930701293355

Knowles, M. S., Holton, E. F., & Swanson, R. A. (2015).  The adult learner: The definitive class in adult education and human resource development.  (8th ed.). New York, NY: Routledge.  

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Rubric Best Practices, Examples, and Templates

A rubric is a scoring tool that identifies the different criteria relevant to an assignment, assessment, or learning outcome and states the possible levels of achievement in a specific, clear, and objective way. Use rubrics to assess project-based student work including essays, group projects, creative endeavors, and oral presentations.

Rubrics can help instructors communicate expectations to students and assess student work fairly, consistently and efficiently. Rubrics can provide students with informative feedback on their strengths and weaknesses so that they can reflect on their performance and work on areas that need improvement.

How to Get Started

Best practices, moodle how-to guides.

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Step 1: Analyze the assignment

The first step in the rubric creation process is to analyze the assignment or assessment for which you are creating a rubric. To do this, consider the following questions:

• What is the purpose of the assignment and your feedback? What do you want students to demonstrate through the completion of this assignment (i.e. what are the learning objectives measured by it)? Is it a summative assessment, or will students use the feedback to create an improved product?
• Does the assignment break down into different or smaller tasks? Are these tasks equally important as the main assignment?
• What would an “excellent” assignment look like? An “acceptable” assignment? One that still needs major work?
• How detailed do you want the feedback you give students to be? Do you want/need to give them a grade?

Step 2: Decide what kind of rubric you will use

Types of rubrics: holistic, analytic/descriptive, single-point

Holistic Rubric. A holistic rubric includes all the criteria (such as clarity, organization, mechanics, etc.) to be considered together and included in a single evaluation. With a holistic rubric, the rater or grader assigns a single score based on an overall judgment of the student’s work, using descriptions of each performance level to assign the score.

Advantages of holistic rubrics:

• Can p lace an emphasis on what learners can demonstrate rather than what they cannot
• Save grader time by minimizing the number of evaluations to be made for each student
• Can be used consistently across raters, provided they have all been trained

Disadvantages of holistic rubrics:

• Provide less specific feedback than analytic/descriptive rubrics
• Can be difficult to choose a score when a student’s work is at varying levels across the criteria
• Any weighting of c riteria cannot be indicated in the rubric

Analytic/Descriptive Rubric . An analytic or descriptive rubric often takes the form of a table with the criteria listed in the left column and with levels of performance listed across the top row. Each cell contains a description of what the specified criterion looks like at a given level of performance. Each of the criteria is scored individually.

Advantages of analytic rubrics:

• Provide detailed feedback on areas of strength or weakness
• Each criterion can be weighted to reflect its relative importance

Disadvantages of analytic rubrics:

• More time-consuming to create and use than a holistic rubric
• May not be used consistently across raters unless the cells are well defined
• May result in giving less personalized feedback

Single-Point Rubric . A single-point rubric is breaks down the components of an assignment into different criteria, but instead of describing different levels of performance, only the “proficient” level is described. Feedback space is provided for instructors to give individualized comments to help students improve and/or show where they excelled beyond the proficiency descriptors.

Advantages of single-point rubrics:

• Easier to create than an analytic/descriptive rubric
• Perhaps more likely that students will read the descriptors
• Areas of concern and excellence are open-ended
• May removes a focus on the grade/points
• May increase student creativity in project-based assignments

Disadvantage of analytic rubrics: Requires more work for instructors writing feedback

Step 3 (Optional): Look for templates and examples.

You might Google, “Rubric for persuasive essay at the college level” and see if there are any publicly available examples to start from. Ask your colleagues if they have used a rubric for a similar assignment. Some examples are also available at the end of this article. These rubrics can be a great starting point for you, but consider steps 3, 4, and 5 below to ensure that the rubric matches your assignment description, learning objectives and expectations.

Step 4: Define the assignment criteria

Make a list of the knowledge and skills are you measuring with the assignment/assessment Refer to your stated learning objectives, the assignment instructions, past examples of student work, etc. for help.

  Helpful strategies for defining grading criteria:

• Collaborate with co-instructors, teaching assistants, and other colleagues
• Brainstorm and discuss with students
• Can they be observed and measured?
• Are they important and essential?
• Are they distinct from other criteria?
• Are they phrased in precise, unambiguous language?
• Revise the criteria as needed
• Consider whether some are more important than others, and how you will weight them.

Step 5: Design the rating scale

Most ratings scales include between 3 and 5 levels. Consider the following questions when designing your rating scale:

• Given what students are able to demonstrate in this assignment/assessment, what are the possible levels of achievement?
• How many levels would you like to include (more levels means more detailed descriptions)
• Will you use numbers and/or descriptive labels for each level of performance? (for example 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 and/or Exceeds expectations, Accomplished, Proficient, Developing, Beginning, etc.)
• Don’t use too many columns, and recognize that some criteria can have more columns that others . The rubric needs to be comprehensible and organized. Pick the right amount of columns so that the criteria flow logically and naturally across levels.

Step 6: Write descriptions for each level of the rating scale

Artificial Intelligence tools like Chat GPT have proven to be useful tools for creating a rubric. You will want to engineer your prompt that you provide the AI assistant to ensure you get what you want. For example, you might provide the assignment description, the criteria you feel are important, and the number of levels of performance you want in your prompt. Use the results as a starting point, and adjust the descriptions as needed.

Building a rubric from scratch

For a single-point rubric , describe what would be considered “proficient,” i.e. B-level work, and provide that description. You might also include suggestions for students outside of the actual rubric about how they might surpass proficient-level work.

For analytic and holistic rubrics , c reate statements of expected performance at each level of the rubric.

• Consider what descriptor is appropriate for each criteria, e.g., presence vs absence, complete vs incomplete, many vs none, major vs minor, consistent vs inconsistent, always vs never. If you have an indicator described in one level, it will need to be described in each level.
• You might start with the top/exemplary level. What does it look like when a student has achieved excellence for each/every criterion? Then, look at the “bottom” level. What does it look like when a student has not achieved the learning goals in any way? Then, complete the in-between levels.
• For an analytic rubric , do this for each particular criterion of the rubric so that every cell in the table is filled. These descriptions help students understand your expectations and their performance in regard to those expectations.

Well-written descriptions:

• Describe observable and measurable behavior
• Use parallel language across the scale
• Indicate the degree to which the standards are met

Step 7: Create your rubric

Create your rubric in a table or spreadsheet in Word, Google Docs, Sheets, etc., and then transfer it by typing it into Moodle. You can also use online tools to create the rubric, but you will still have to type the criteria, indicators, levels, etc., into Moodle. Rubric creators: Rubistar , iRubric

Step 8: Pilot-test your rubric

Prior to implementing your rubric on a live course, obtain feedback from:

• Teacher assistants

Try out your new rubric on a sample of student work. After you pilot-test your rubric, analyze the results to consider its effectiveness and revise accordingly.

• Limit the rubric to a single page for reading and grading ease
• Use parallel language . Use similar language and syntax/wording from column to column. Make sure that the rubric can be easily read from left to right or vice versa.
• Use student-friendly language . Make sure the language is learning-level appropriate. If you use academic language or concepts, you will need to teach those concepts.
• Share and discuss the rubric with your students . Students should understand that the rubric is there to help them learn, reflect, and self-assess. If students use a rubric, they will understand the expectations and their relevance to learning.
• Consider scalability and reusability of rubrics. Create rubric templates that you can alter as needed for multiple assignments.
• Maximize the descriptiveness of your language. Avoid words like “good” and “excellent.” For example, instead of saying, “uses excellent sources,” you might describe what makes a resource excellent so that students will know. You might also consider reducing the reliance on quantity, such as a number of allowable misspelled words. Focus instead, for example, on how distracting any spelling errors are.

Example of an analytic rubric for a final paper

Example of a holistic rubric for a final paper, single-point rubric, more examples:.

• Single Point Rubric Template ( variation )
• Analytic Rubric Template make a copy to edit
• A Rubric for Rubrics
• Bank of Online Discussion Rubrics in different formats
• Mathematical Presentations Descriptive Rubric
• Math Proof Assessment Rubric
• Kansas State Sample Rubrics
• Design Single Point Rubric

Technology Tools: Rubrics in Moodle

• Moodle Docs: Rubrics
• Moodle Docs: Grading Guide (use for single-point rubrics)

Tools with rubrics (other than Moodle)

• Google Assignments
• Turnitin Assignments: Rubric or Grading Form

Other resources

• DePaul University (n.d.). Rubrics .
• Gonzalez, J. (2014). Know your terms: Holistic, Analytic, and Single-Point Rubrics . Cult of Pedagogy.
• Goodrich, H. (1996). Understanding rubrics . Teaching for Authentic Student Performance, 54 (4), 14-17. Retrieved from   
• Miller, A. (2012). Tame the beast: tips for designing and using rubrics.
• Ragupathi, K., Lee, A. (2020). Beyond Fairness and Consistency in Grading: The Role of Rubrics in Higher Education. In: Sanger, C., Gleason, N. (eds) Diversity and Inclusion in Global Higher Education. Palgrave Macmillan, Singapore.

• Articles / Self Regulation

Helping Middle Grades Students Self-Regulate

by MiddleWeb · Published 03/22/2022 · Updated 11/01/2023

By Dr. Amy Gaumer Erickson and Dr. Pattie Noonan

Self-regulation is a proactive, self-directed process for attaining goals, learning skills, managing emotional reactions, and accomplishing tasks (Gaumer Erickson & Noonan, 2021, p. 1).

Students can learn specific skills to support their ability to self-regulate. The 6-minute video below introduces the concept of self-regulation, clarifies the definition, and provides examples of self-regulation at home and at school.

Students who learn self-regulation skills experience benefits such as completing more of their homework on time, doing better in their classes, feeling more in control of their learning and their upcoming tasks, getting better at organization and time management, and learning more in their classes.

They are also better at figuring out specific reasons that they are struggling with something and directly addressing those complications, as well as gaining a better understanding of how specific actions they take (or don’t take) have an impact on their progress and overall success.

In addition to academics, self-regulation can be applied to improving musical, artistic, or athletic ability; maintaining control over your emotional reactions; and reaching a variety of goals.

Looking into self-regulation components

Let’s explore the self-regulation process. It contains four essential components and works with students across grades 6-12 with appropriate adjustments.

► First, students must plan how to progress toward meeting goals . This includes creating detailed plans, monitoring, adjusting, and reflecting. It is imperative that students direct their own success.

In this video, you will hear from Izzy, a high school senior. She talks about how she created a plan to complete her online Physics homework.

► The second component is monitoring your plan . When students begin monitoring, it is crucial that they learn how to monitor actions instead of just outcomes. One way a student could monitor improving their grade would be to write down the questions they missed on each assignment and find the correct answers. The student would be monitoring the action of finding the correct answers to see if it is improving their science grade instead of simply monitoring the grade itself (the outcome ) after turning in each assignment.

Izzy’s plan included time management, organization of her assignments, and consideration of distractions that might derail her plan. Let’s take another look as Izzy explains the difference between monitoring progress and monitoring actions.

Izzy used a checklist to monitor her assignment completion. She also reflected on her choices for breaks and adjusted her plan to include exercise as a break instead of snacking as she noticed physical activity helped her be more productive.

► The third component is ‘adjusting as needed’ . This means that students are able to determine if their plan is working or not and make adjustments to their actions to increase their likelihood of meeting the goal or accomplishing the task.

Students can learn how to predict obstacles that could derail their plan and actions they could take to prevent those obstacles from getting them off-track by using If–Then statements (If I encounter this obstacle, then I will do this) and learning how to manage distractions.

► The fourth component is reflecting . It is important for students to take time to think about what is working and what is not going well. When they are able to reflect and identify strategies that are helping them self-regulate, they can use those the next time they need to accomplish a task. Even though it is the last component listed, students should be actively reflecting on how things are going throughout the process.

How we can help students persist

When students encounter setbacks to their plan, they may find it difficult to persist. Here, Amy describes three strategies to help students overcome obstacles: mental contrasting, analyzing options, and stating implementation intentions.

We want to support our students by coaching them rather than directing them. Self-regulation fuels students to become socially and emotionally engaged, lifelong learners.

Also see the article by these authors: Add Assertiveness to Tweens’ Communication

Celestine, N. (2021). What is mental contrasting and how to benefit from it? Positive Psychology. Available from https://positivepsychology.com/mental-contrasting/

Duckworth, A. L., Grant, H., Loew, B., Oettingen, G., & Gollwitzer, P. M. (2011). Self‐regulation strategies improve self‐discipline in adolescents: Benefits of mental contrasting and implementation intentions. Educational Psychology, 31(1), 17-26. https://doi.org/10.1080/01443410.2010.506003   

Duckworth, A. L., White, R. E., Matteucci, A. J., Shearer, A., & Gross, J. J. (2016). A stitch in time: Strategic self-control in high school and college students. Journal of Educational Psychology, 108(3), 329-341. https://doi.org/10.1037/edu0000062

Gaumer Erickson, A.S., & Noonan, P.M. (2021). Teaching Self-Regulation: Seventy-Five Instructional Activities to Foster Independent, Proactive Students, Grades 6-12. Solution Tree.

Gollwitzer, P. M., & Sheeran, P. (2006).  Implementation intentions and goal achievement: A meta-analysis of effects and processes.  In M. P. Zanna (Ed.),  Advances in experimental social psychology (38, 69-119). Elsevier Academic Press. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0065-2601(06)38002-1

Amy’s practice-based research focuses on the implementation of intra- and interpersonal competencies instruction within a Multi-Tier System of Supports (MTSS), guiding educators to embed competency instruction within content-area coursework and evaluate students’ social-emotional growth. She has taught at the middle and high school levels in urban, suburban, charter and alternative schools.

Dr. Pattie Noonan is an associate research professor at the University of Kansas where she centers her work on providing and evaluating professional development related to social emotional learning. She holds a firm belief in the capacity of all students to become socially and emotionally engaged, career equipped, lifelong learners. Much of her work entails providing schoolwide professional development and coaching to educators, counselors, trainers, and instructional coaches, while working in close collaboration with leadership. Pattie is the co-author, with Amy, of The Skills That Matter and Teaching Self-Regulation .

Share this:

Tags: Amy Gaumer Erickson goals middle grades middle school organizing owning learning Pattie Noonan planning reflection self regulation

MiddleWeb is all about the middle grades, with great 4-8 resources, book reviews, and guest posts by educators who support the success of young adolescents. And be sure to subscribe to MiddleWeb SmartBrief for the latest middle grades news & commentary from around the USA.

3 Responses

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for now on i will make a planner for homework

Self regulation is something we must focus on while on school or anywhere else. We need to manage some of our times like our screen/phone/TV time as well as our studying time.if you are in school you should focus more on your studying time and less on your screen time. if you do decide to do this it could make a big change in your school grades and will help you a lot.

self regulation is something you should focus on and if you focus on that and then you focus on stuff like your grades you can get the best grades ever.

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