Home

Overview Lessons & Materials Pre Mission Prep. Mission Day Assessment Student Pages


Assessment

Overview


Earth System Science Comparison


Grading Rubrics


ERT Member's Log


Team Evaluations


Program Evaluation


EARTH SYSTEM SCIENCE ANALYSIS: Grading Rubric

 

How to Score Student Responses

For each of four "events" (Yellowstone fire, Mt. Pinatubo eruption, Hurricane Georges, and Montserrat eruption), each student is asked to describe the short-term and medium-term effects by each event on the sphere he or she has chosen to investigate.

The Effects Chart given here lists the main effects by event upon each sphere as stated in the readings. Each cell in the chart lists the major hazardous effects, short term and medium term, by event and by sphere.

    Please note: There are also positive effects that result from events, but most students will focus on the hazardous effects. Positive effects are frequently long-term issues. The final analysis concerning Montserrat focuses on hazardous events in relationship to the island in the short and medium terms.

The following rubric uses the chart as a guide. Teachers might wish to follow this format to assess their students' responses. An accumulation of assessments over the course of the e-Mission project might show trends in individual and class progress.

ESS Analysis Rubric

    Score

    # of Items

    Description

    3

    All Main Effects + Additional Effects

    Student accurately describes the same number of major effects of an event on their sphere as listed plus one or more effects.

    2

    All Main Effects

    or

    Some Main Effects + Additional Effects

    Student accurately describes the same number of effects of an event on their sphere as listed.

    or

    Student accurately describes some of the main effects listed plus one or more effects.

    1

    Some Main Effects

    or

    Additional Effects

    Student accurately describes some of the main effects.

    or

    Student accurately describes effects not listed in the chart.

    0

    No effects or

    Incorrect focus

    Student lists no effects or lists effects upon a sphere that is not theirs.

Sample response and scoring:

The following is a response from a sixth grade student regarding the effects of the Yellowstone fire on the hydrosphere.

"More sediment into the water from all of the ashes the fires were creating. The heat might have evaporated the water, raising the humidity. The snow happened because the smoke carried the water vapor up into the area where water freezes when condensing, thus creating snow. "

Applying the rubric to this sample response:

  1. "More sediment into the water from all of the ashes the fires were creating."
  2. The student mentioned one of the two main effects of the Yellowstone fire on the hydrosphere as listed in the chart.

  3. "The heat might have evaporated the water, raising the humidity."
  4. This part of the response reflects an effect not listed on the chart AND reflects extended thinking regarding the interrelationship between two spheres, hydrosphere and atmosphere. The first part of the sentence is accurate. The heat from the fire would cause more water to evaporate. The second part of the sentence is both inaccurate and addresses an interaction with a different sphere, the atmosphere. This student did not take into account that humidity is composed of two factors–amount of water vapor in the air and the air temperature. Even though there is more water vapor, the temperature would also rise due to the fire. It is probable that the humidity actually dropped as a result of the fire, since the rise in temperature was probably greater than the increase in water vapor. He would receive credit for the first part of the statement.

  5. "The snow happened because the smoke carried the water vapor up into the area where water freezes when condensing, thus creating snow. "

This part of the response represents a solid attempt at causal reasoning, but is both inaccurate and addresses a different sphere. As with the case of the humidity response, this student overestimates the impact of additional water vapor produced by the fire. The snow mentioned in the Yellowstone fire description that fell in late September was formed in the atmosphere independently of the fire.

Score: 2. The student accurately mentioned one of the two main effects (more sediment in the water) and one additional accurate effect (more evaporation).

Teacher's Note: Students at the middle school level are at the beginning stages of abstract reasoning. This makes it difficult for students at this age to take into account more than one factor in a causal argument. This student could reason about increases in water vapor but did not include factors such air temperature or general weather patterns. Keep an eye out for other examples. As students gain experience in causal reasoning, they will become more comfortable with including multiple factors in their arguments.