Conceptual Unit Rubric

Conceptual units will be evaluated according to the following criteria. Please note that it is perfectly fine for you to borrow ideas directly from sources (e.g., instructional websites, books you have read) as long as you credit them with references.

A grade of F will be awarded to units that

• are turned in after the specified due date
• are turned in on time yet which do not include the minimum components (rationale, objectives, materials, lessons and activities, assessments).
• are so terrible that even you would agree that you deserve an F.

A grade of D will be awarded to units that are turned in on time and include the minimum components, and in which

• the minimum components do not meet minimum expectations (e.g., the rationale does not argue persuasively that the unit is worthy of study or appropriate for the students; the list of materials is not justified, is inappropriate for the target students, or is incomplete; the objectives describe the teacher’s behavior or broad philosophical goals instead of describing what students do for assessment; the lessons and activities are not described in any detail; the assessments do not follow from the lessons and activities; the assessments do not involve students in constructive activity and instead test the recall of arbitrary knowledge; the assessments and activities do not account for multiple intelligences/alternative ways of knowing). Furthermore, the author of the unit gives little evidence of having read the course texts carefully.

A grade of C will be awarded to units that are turned in on time, include the minimum components, meet minimum expectations for each component, reveal evidence of the author’s having read the course texts carefully, and in which

• the unit theme (e.g., The American Dream, The Heroic Journey, Loss of Innocence, etc.) or target strategy (e.g., learning strategies for understanding narrators’ subjectivities) is not aligned across the major sections of the unit as a whole (e.g., the unit might include a rationale, activities/lessons, assessments, etc., but the activities and lessons do not teach the students the skills they will need in order to do well on the assessments; or the rationale focuses on one topic but the lessons focus on another; etc.). Furthermore, while the author reveal skillfulness at appropriating lessons from the course textbooks, he or she does not include original lessons that build on the concepts outlined in the course texts.

A grade of B will be awarded to units that are turned in on time, include the minimum components, meet minimum expectations for each component, are aligned across the major sections of the unit, reveal evidence of the author’s having read the course texts carefully, build on concepts outlined in the course texts, and in which

• the lessons and activities are not fleshed out in sufficient detail (e.g., you might provide a writing assignment but not include a clearly described sequence of activities that students will be engaged in prior to turning it in, as described in activities in The dynamics of writing instruction: A structured process approach for the composition teacher in the middle and high school or in the NCTE TRIP books that are available at the Free Downloadable Books! page).

A grade of A will be awarded to units that are turned in on time, include the minimum components, meet minimum expectations for each component, reveal an overall theme regarding your understanding of teaching, reveal evidence of the author’s having read the course texts carefully, build on concepts outlined in the course texts, and include lessons and activities that are fleshed out in detail. These units clearly organize literature around some specific theme or principle and are firmly grounded in theories of learning and teaching, thus revealing thorough reading and in-depth understanding of the course texts. Rather than focusing on the teaching of skills in isolation, the aims of this unit are visibly connected to the construction of personal meaning through reading and writing for real purposes. These connections are thoroughly justified in the unit rationale and objectives (unit and lesson) and are apparent in the accompanying activities and assessment criteria. Lesson plans are theoretically grounded, sensibly sequenced, and well-organized, and are designed to enable students to learn to construct meaning in subsequent independent undertakings. Materials and procedures are clearly and specifically stated and referenced to published scholarship (e.g., course texts, theory from texts you’ve read in other college courses, credible internet sources, etc.) The author may borrow specific instructional ideas from course texts but also should build on those concepts for more original design of lessons and assessments.