Focus / Organization / Elaboration / Fluency
Exceeds
Standard / The writer provides a clear and persuasive position based on understanding of both sides of the issue. The writer is consistently aware of his or her purpose and audience. / The writer uses introductory, body, and concluding paragraphs to skillfully group evidence with corresponding arguments. / The writer supports ideas with specific, accurate, and relevant details and evidence. Ideas are fully explained and consistently tied to the position. / The writer chooses words appropriately, uses transitions consistently, and varies sentence structure to ensure that the writing reads fluently.
Meets
Standard / The writer demonstrates understanding of the topic, takes a clear position, and shows awareness of audience. / The writer uses introductory, body, and concluding paragraphs to group evidence with arguments. / The writer supports ideas with details and evidence, most of which are specific, accurate, and relevant. Ideas are adequately explained but may not be explicitly tied to the position. / The writer may use some awkward wording or minimal transitions, but these problems do not interfere with the writer's ideas.
Approaching
Standard / The writer demonstrates some confusion about the purpose of the writing task, and may show inconsistent awareness of audience. / The writer does not effectively use paragraphs to distinguish between ideas. / The writer attempts to support ideas with details or evidence, but support may be too general, inaccurate, irrelevant, or minimal. Ideas are presented without explanation, and are not explicitly tied to the position. / Awkward working, lack of transitions, or extensive writing errors interfere with the reader's ability to understand the writer's ideas.
Below
Standard / The writer has no position, or changes position. The writer lacks audience awareness, or may be offensive to the reader. / Paragraphs are not used to organize ideas. / The ideas presented in the essay are incoherent, based solely on opinion with no factual evidence, or are copied verbatim from sources. Little effort is made to relate ideas to a position. / The writing contains so many writing errors that the reader cannot understand the writer's ideas.
P:\Defending a Position Rubric.doc