AMS 101:
Introduction to American Studies
Dr. Wiedemann's goal in AMS 101
was to help students to think critically and to
understand the context of the messages, meanings,
experiences, and ideas that are woven together
to define American culture. For this project,
Dr. Wiedemannn focused on a short assignment that
was the fourth writing assignment of the semester.
The expected student learning outcomes for this
assigment were:
• To facilitate synthesis of a wide range
of perspectives, texts, and experiences
• To explore and extend critical thinking
about culture and representational practices
• To differentiate between own opinion and
arguments/positions presented in the text
• To recognize and prioritize the most relevant
arguments/positions
• To acknowledge contradictions and ambiguities
in the different positions
Dr. Wiedemann developed a specific rubric for
the short writing assignment as well as a general
grading rubric. She handed out the specific rubric
with the assignment and also posted both rubrics
on blackboard. These rubrics clarified the evaluation
criteria for the students and made it easier for
Dr. Wiedemann to grade the papers.
When she used the rubrics, Dr. Wiedemann realized
the major flaw of the rubric design: the evaluation
criteria ranged from excellent to poor. This resulted
in a considerable amount of evaluations with the
“excellent” or “good”
categories checked, even though “excellent”
did not necessarily reflect the A and B students’
overall critical thinking ability in a 100-level
course. Dr. Wiedemann feels this resulted in a
discrepancy between students’ actual analytical
thinking abilities and their evaluation on this
particular assignment.
Dr. Wiedemann plans to revise the rubric so that
it reflects the scale used in the Washington State
University rubric (ranging from substantially
developed to minimally developed) to avoid this
conflict. Based on her ACT experience, Dr. Wiedemann
feels rubrics are valuable for adding transparency
for the students and “demystifying”
the grading process, but she is not convinced
that critical thinking can be adequately measured
and quantified.
Assignments
Short Writing
Assignment
Rubrics
General Writing
Rubric
Short Writing
Assignment
Rubric
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