Advice on setting up a Rubric for a Pass/Fail scale

Advice on setting up a Rubric for a Pass/Fail scale

by Eric vanBok -
Number of replies: 11

I would like to set up a Rubric for grading an assignment that results in a Pass/Fail grade.

The Rubric is pretty specific.  It is a series of 8 criteria that the assignment is rated on, with 5 levels each.  Then there are two criteria that are Yes/No. How I would like this to work is if either of the Yes/No criteria is No, the student gets a Fail grade.  Both of the Yes/No criteria need to be Yes for them to get a Pass grade.

Then with the other 8 criteria, they need to score at least a 71 out of the 100 points for those to pass.

I have experimented with different points for the Yes/No criteria and different passing scores for the assignment.  But I haven't gotten the combination of values to get this to work correctly yet.

Can anyone give me guidance on how best to approach this?  Areas that I can look at, or settings I can try to make this work?

I will appreciate any help at all.  Thank you.

I am using Moodle 3.6.2. 

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In reply to Eric vanBok

Re: Advice on setting up a Rubric for a Pass/Fail scale

by David Morrow -

ERic,


How about this:

Rubric with 10 criteria

Criteria 1 - 8 are worth 1.25 points each (with levels of 0.25, 0.5, 0.75, 1.00, and 1.25). That would be 10 points total so the target for this portion would be 7.1

Criteria 9 and 10 are worth 45 points each (each with two levels, with no = 0 and yes = 45)

Set the passing grade to be 97.1

A “No” on 9 or 10 would ensure a failing grade. Scoring less than 7.1 (71%) on 1-8 would also result in a failure, even if 9 and 10 were both marked Yes.

There are other configurations - I think it is easier if the total for 1-8 is very small relative to the yes/no criteria.

Thanks,

David

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In reply to David Morrow

Re: Advice on setting up a Rubric for a Pass/Fail scale

by Eric vanBok -

Thank you for your ideas on this.

That is along the path I was thinking too.  However, my grading for this assignment is on a scale that is Pass/Fail.  So there is a maximum grade of 2 for it.

If I follow the logic that we are looking for 97.1% of a grade of 2, that would be a grade of 1.942 for passing, which would round to 1.94.

The thing is that doesn't work.  The issue is that as long as someone gets a yes on both criteria 9 and 10, they pass.  Even if I set the passing grade to 2.0, which is a perfect score.  It doesn't matter what they score on criteria 1 through 8.  If criteria 9 and 10 are both yes, they pass.

Maybe I have something else set wrong, but the numbers are just not adding up how I think it should work.

Is there some setting somewhere that changes how the rubric is calculated and translated into the grade for the Pass/Fail scale?

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In reply to Eric vanBok

Re: Advice on setting up a Rubric for a Pass/Fail scale

by David Morrow -

Eric,

Sorry - I was thinking in terms of points, not scales. You make a 97.1 or higher and you pass. Below that you fail.

But I see your predicament, I think.

I don't know what sort of reporting you have to do. Would the activity completion report help? You could do as I describe, with the assignment being a 100 point grade and passing set to 97.1. Then, add a completion condition that a passing grade must be earned. The activity completion report would give you an at-a-glance report of who has passed/failed (as long as everyone has been graded.

Best of luck!

David

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In reply to Eric vanBok

Re: Advice on setting up a Rubric for a Pass/Fail scale

by Dan McGuire -

If 2 is the maximum score possible, then make items 9 and 10 worth .8 each and the first 8 items worth .0625 each. Then you can set the passing score to be 1.85, which would mean that students would need to get 70% of the first 8 items at a pass in order to get a total passing grade. It would seem to me that creating gradations for the first 8 items is not useful or very meaningful.

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In reply to Dan McGuire

Re: Advice on setting up a Rubric for a Pass/Fail scale

by Eric vanBok -

I want to thank you both for your advice.

I have tried quite a few different setups, and unfortunately, they are all failing.  It seems like it is impossible for me to use a rubric as I want for generating a grade on a simple pass/fail scale.  No matter what I do, it just will not behave as I need it to.  It always gives a passing score if both of the yes/no questions are yes, regardless what the other 8 items are scored.

I can't figure out why.

That is leaving me to explore switching from a simple pass/fail scale to scoring it out of 100 and setting a very high passing score.  I need to see if the higher-ups will be happy with that though.  If not, I will be returning to this to see if I can suss out a solution.

In the meantime, if you happen to have other ideas, please let me know.

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In reply to Eric vanBok

Re: Advice on setting up a Rubric for a Pass/Fail scale

by Richard van Iwaarden -
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Hi Eric,
You are right about this... it doesn't work.

The thing is: the rubric always calculates for itself and does not respect the 'grade to pass' setting.

A simple way to set this up:

  1. Create a rubric with 4 criteria, simple score 0 and 1
  2. Create a scale that says 'fail/pass'
  3. Set grade to pass to 2.0

What happens is the following: even if you score 75% in the rubric, you will always pass. The 'grade to pass' does not effect the rubric. The rubric always figures out that 75% of the score will be considered as passed.

I have tried some things, but I could not figure this out either. The advice that you have been given above is incorrect as far as I can see.

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In reply to Richard van Iwaarden

Re: Advice on setting up a Rubric for a Pass/Fail scale

by Ryan Hazen -

I can't replicate this in the rubric with the proper max grade set in the assignment:





If the grade to pass was set at 2 this student would not have passed.

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In reply to Ryan Hazen

Re: Advice on setting up a Rubric for a Pass/Fail scale

by Richard van Iwaarden -
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If the grade to pass was set at 2 this student would not have passed.

The rubric does not respect the 'grade to pass' setting - that's the problem.

Please try to make your rubric so that you only PASS if you pass all the 4 criteria (C1 to C4). Check for the same score (3 out of 4) and you will see that you will always pass the rubric.



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In reply to Eric vanBok

Re: Advice on setting up a Rubric for a Pass/Fail scale

by Richard van Iwaarden -
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Please vote for my tracker here: MDL-66105
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In reply to Richard van Iwaarden

Re: Advice on setting up a Rubric for a Pass/Fail scale

by Eric vanBok -
Thank you for confirming what I found and creating the tracker entry.

In the end, I gave up and we switched from a pass/fail grade to a grade out of 100 with a very high passing score. Not ideal but at least it works.
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In reply to Eric vanBok

Re: Advice on setting up a Rubric for a Pass/Fail scale

by Ryan Hazen -

Have you tried using negative grades in the rubric? The would work in theory, where the "no" value is a negative of the total grade of the assignment:

Rubric with negative values

In the case above, the student scores 2 points on the first two criteria, and then a -10 on the last, resulting in a 0% in the gradebook.

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