Success criteria for assessment

Part of visible learning is making sure that students are aware of what they need to be able to do in order to demonstrate the learning that was intended. This helps to make the learning process more transparent, and gives students more ability to set learning goals and monitor their own progress. 

Success criteria are basically the judging standards used to determine if a learning intention has been achieved. When conducting assessments (be they formal or informal), it is useful to provide students with a success criteria rubric in advance of the assessment so that they know what will be expected and have a better idea of how to prepare. 

By putting success criteria in a rubric, it shows students what they need to be able to do or know in order to achieve a certain grade. This is helpful for students when they are goal setting, as it makes it clear to them what they need to do in order to meet their goal (such as move from a C to a B grade for example). It is also helpful for the teacher when they are marking assessments, as they can simply mark or highlight on the rubric what the student has achieved, which helps to reduce the amount of written feedback that they need to include. 

You can download a free template to use when creating your own success criteria in the Freebies Vault (if you are not yet a member you will need to sign up first).  Here you will also find a video that talk you through how to complete it, as well as a completed rubric for additional guidance. 

I hope you find it useful, and please forward this link to any other colleagues that you think would benefit. 

Kelly :) 

 PS. You may also be interested in reading this article: The importance of clear learning intentions and success criteria.