Objective assessment, whether it’s for students, employees, or projects, is impossible without at least some standardization. But it’s difficult to know where to start, which is where the right rubric template comes in.
A rubric template lets you assess a student’s work using a rating scale that’s appropriate for a specific student assignment or test question. With the right template, you could even expand your performance criteria to include more descriptive language and specific feedback.
The best free rubric template for you depends, of course, on your exact needs. For example, grading rubric templates will have different criteria from a project rubric designed for performance evaluations.
No single rubric can include all the necessary criteria to cover all of these nuances. But the best blank rubric template offers the flexibility and customization to account for them.
- What is a Rubric Template?
- 10 Free Rubric Templates
- 1. ClickUp Gradebook Template
- 2. ClickUp Project Assessment Template
- 3. ClickUp Project Assessment Report Template
- 4. ClickUp Performance Review Template
- 5. ClickUp Performance Report Template
- 6. ClickUp Evaluation Form
- 7. ClickUp Evaluation Report Template
- 8. PDF Oral Presentation Rubric by BrightHubEducation
- 9. Word Analytic Rubric by the University of Nebraska
- 10. Word Debate Rubric by EducationWorld
What is a Rubric Template?
A rubric template is a standardized form that helps you evaluate and grade a worker, project, or student. It puts standard criteria in place to create a score that applies to everyone you grade while still being flexible enough to account for more qualitative evaluation.
Most rubric templates include a few core components:
- An overview section that outlines project or assignment details, learning goals, and overall performance expectations
- Line items for each criterion on which the teacher will grade the student, with specific scores for each part of the performance
- Additional rows that allow for more general comments on each line item
- A summary of overall student performance based on all relevant information in the grading rubric
- A section for teachers or evaluators to provide feedback and outline the next steps for performance improvement
The result of these individual aspects is a holistic rubric template that the evaluator can fill in each time a student completes the assignment, saving them time.
What makes a good rubric template?
Because they must be flexible, editable rubric templates tend to differ significantly in both format and setup. Naturally, a template for evaluating employee performance levels looks different from one that focuses on grading criteria for individual students or group projects.
With that said, the best rubric templates do share a few important characteristics:
- User-friendliness: The most helpful templates make creating rubrics easier each time you do it
- Easy export options: For example, it should be easy to export your grading rubric into Google Docs or your LMS
- Customization: The more easily you can customize your blank rubric template to match your rating scale and other criteria, the better
- Simplicity: Your goal is to minimize the time-consuming processes of your grading rubrics, so a simple template (maybe even condensed to a single page) is best
- Integration into a larger system: Chances are your blank rubric template is just one of many online tools you use to evaluate students. The more it can integrate with those other tools, such as your performance review software, the better
10 Free Rubric Templates
If you want to build a truly holistic rubric for your students and performance evaluations, these blank rubric templates can help.
1. Rubric Template
The ClickUp Gradebook Template is a straightforward way to keep track of all student activity in your classroom over a semester. It consists of four main views:
- Start Here: An introduction to the rubric template that outlines exactly how you can score your students
- Rubric Table: Sections organized by month and columns including the student’s name, quiz average, homework average, long test average, participation grade, and a comment section to write descriptions of their work
- Grading List: To enter individual student grades for individual assignments
- Participation Level: To rank students according to how well they’ve participated in your classes and teaching efforts
The best part about this rubric template is its balance between complexity and efficiency. Once you define an assignment and enter grades for your students, it automatically uses backend calculations to complete the right columns for the overview tab. This saves you time while keeping your feedback constructive.
2. ClickUp Project Assessment Template
If you’re looking to evaluate the success of a project after its completion, ClickUp’s Project Assessment Template is a great place to start. It allows you to evaluate your project’s performance against your original project management goals, identify areas for improvement, and even gather feedback from other stakeholders on what to do better next time.
The best part: It’s all available in a simple narrative within ClickUp Docs, allowing any reader to quickly and easily jump to the section most relevant to them.
For example, some stakeholders may need to read the entire evaluation. But others may only want to see the holistic rubric highlighting your overview’s quantitative part. With the Project Assessment template, you can satisfy both needs, helping you assess your projects while learning important lessons for the future.
3. Project Assessment Report Template
Designed as a more comprehensive evaluation report, the ClickUp Project Assessment Report Template is especially valuable for assessing your student or employee at the end of a specific milestone, such as a semester or fiscal year.
As a result, this rubric template is largely narrative, focusing more on the circumstances and outcomes of individual grades, as opposed to more analytically inclined templates. But that doesn’t make it any less valuable, particularly when evaluating classroom performance against original expectations.
At the beginning of each evaluation, you can create a report outlining the details of the assignments or projects in question. From there, the template provides an opportunity to share your thoughts in a quick and organized manner, keeping descriptions short and to the point. You can even include details such as how your students respond to your teaching style.
4. Performance Rubric Template
Writing a performance evaluation can be difficult, especially when you don’t have a pre-set scale or criteria to measure everyone against. That’s what makes the ClickUp Performance Review Template such a valuable addition to this list.
This rubric template helps you track and assess employee performance. But you can use it as a rubric to evaluate your students as well, thanks to an easy layout and customizable criteria that make it a perfect fit for teachers.
At its core, like most performance review templates, it starts with a single document with a few pre-defined categories, such as employee details, discussion points, feedback, and key priorities. But where this template really shines is the Performance Management sheet with criteria, such as skills and job understanding, to help both you and your employee score their performance.
The result, especially when you use the same template for multiple employees or students, is a straightforward analytic rubric that can become the foundation of any performance review.
5. Performance Report Template
ClickUp’s Performance Report Template judges projects against goals and expectations using a quantitative rubric to create an overview of a program’s or assignment’s performance.
The core of this template is a visual overview of a project’s or program’s performance against defined goals. But it can go far beyond that, thanks to functionality such as tagging, comments, and even file notifications that allow you to add further context for a more comprehensive assessment.
In addition, this template benefits from its integration with larger ClickUp functionality. Your takeaways can go straight into a ClickUp workflow with tasks, Lists, and calendars that take action according to the evaluated performance. As a result, it’s the perfect foundation for any performance improvement plan template you’re also looking to implement.
6. Evaluation Form
Especially in more standardized processes, creating a rubric template as a form with pre-set criteria to fill in can be helpful. That’s exactly what the ClickUp Evaluation Form Template provides, allowing for an objective evaluation while minimizing the effort you need to complete each form.
The forms in the field focus on simplicity, including quantitative metrics, such as the number of completed tasks, alongside open-ended fields for evaluating skills and accomplishments. Ultimately, it all combines to help you judge all your employees (or students) on objective criteria and in an equitable fashion, taking any subjective judgments or biases out of the equation.
You can use this rubric template for various needs, such as an individual assignment or an annual employee evaluation. Especially when you connect its contents to your KPIs or grading metrics, it can become a helpful teaching tool that saves time and improves efficiencies.
7. Evaluation Report Template
ClickUp’s Evaluation Report Template works so well because of its categorization options. It’s not just a blank rubric template without context; it offers an easy way for teachers and supervisors to evaluate their team members or students.
The existing sections of this rubric template include:
- An evaluation summary that outlines the name of the person you’re evaluating as well as their role, department, and evaluation period. For students, this can easily change to student name, class, and semester
- A quick-selection option of the type of evaluation, such as promotion, annual appraisal, or suspension
- The actual performance evaluation, including a grading rubric that includes both individual sections and an overall rating or grade
- Additional space for supervisors or teachers to include comments on new skills and anything else that doesn’t fit into the rubric
Because this rubric template works so well for regular evaluations, it’s also a great option to hook into your KPI software. You can track individual performances back to your program or project rubric for a clear overview.
8. PDF Oral Presentation Rubric by BrightHubEducation
Especially for teachers looking to evaluate their students on a presentation assignment, the PDF Oral Presentation Rubric by BrightHubEducation can be immensely helpful. It’s a simple, one-page template that allows the teacher to evaluate each student on content, eye contact, volume and clarity, flow, and visual aid.
Of course, this grading rubric template is customizable beyond those pre-set categories, allowing teachers to edit the categories and rating scale to their liking. But even in its pre-set stage, it’s one of the most holistic rubrics you can find specifically for online oral presentations.
9. Word Analytic Rubric by the University of Nebraska
An analytic rubric is a type of rubric template that helps students quantify their work and ultimately improve their learning in the process. The Word Analytic Rubric by the University of Nebraska is a great place for any teacher to begin that process, allowing them to build a task or project rubric quickly their students can use to evaluate their work.
This is a blank rubric template with a focus on individual customization. Teachers can also benefit from a learning activity where students create their blank rubric template, allowing for more immersive and comprehensive learning.
10. Word Debate Rubric by EducationWorld
Debates are a vital part of modern life, encompassing political debates shaping presidential elections and courtroom debates helping to persuade audiences and juries about justice. The Word Debate Rubric by EducationWorld can help any law school or political science student create their rubric template to learn more about the criteria that help any debate participant win their argument.
Unlike most blank rubric templates, this is not necessarily a teaching tool. Instead, it’s a self-learning tool for students and anyone interested in understanding the nuances of rhetoric. For that purpose, though, it can become a vital tool to help understand how some of the world’s noblest professions make their arguments.
Improve Your Grading and Evaluation Rubric Templates
If you’re looking for the right grading rubric template to optimize your work and evaluations, you’ve come to the right place. ClickUp’s extensive template library is a great place to start, whether you’re looking for a simple blank rubric template or more comprehensive options with different criteria.
The templates will help your students understand how you organize your feedback. Whether you provide qualitative feedback on skills like communication or more quantitative assessments, they’ll always know where they stand and where they can make relevant improvements.
Even better: The templates integrate with ClickUp for Education, a comprehensive project management software that goes far beyond a simple grading rubric. Turn performance reviews into tasks and workflows, making the learning process more efficient and successful.
ClickUp is the perfect start not just for your blank rubric template but for creating a comprehensive performance evaluation system designed to meet and exceed your (and your students’) expectations. In the process, you’ll become more consistent in your efforts to score performance and take the relevant next steps.
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