Four-level (0-3) Historical Thinking Skills rubrics for scoring teacher activities and student work¶

Element · All elements
Evidence · 4 claims (3 for, 1 against) · 1 study (1 design), q2 · 0 of 1 report an effect size · 4 claims rest on one study

Description¶

Digital Promise developed two sets of rubrics: one to evaluate the potential of teacher-assigned activities to provide opportunities to learn historical thinking skills, and one to assess the extent to which students used those skills in the resulting work. Each rubric scores six dimensions on four levels: "0 indicated the absence of a historical thinkingpractice/skill in the activity/student work, 1 indicated emergence, 2 indicated presence, and 3indicated rigorous presence." The highest level was drafted from national frameworks' age-appropriate expectations for secondary students, and the lowest applies when a skill is not called for or not employed.

Design Implications¶

Context¶

Requirements¶

• Scorer observation of a teacher activity or student work to make an inference that the assessment target was met

Constraints¶

• Reading and writing literacy skills are not included as distinct rubric categories; the interdependence of historical thinking concepts can make independent claims about individual skills difficult

Target Learners¶

• U.S. high school world history students

Target Learning Goals¶

• Historical argumentation, causation, comparison, contextualization, continuity and change over time, and sourcing

Affordances¶

• Evidence Centered Design Rubric Development

Claims¶

• Trained scorers applied the historical thinking skills rubrics with good overall inter-rater consistency [+W]
• Two rubric dimensions (claims and evidence, comparison) showed low inter-scorer consistency in the pilot [-W]
• Scorers found all rubric dimensions important, with feedback bearing mainly on the scoring and training process rather than rubric design [+W]
• World History Project assignments scored higher on most learning opportunity rubric dimensions than other assignments [+W]

Related Elements¶

• Rubrics for Examining Historical Thinking Skills in High School World History Activities and Student Work

Examples¶

-

Key Sources¶

• Hardy, A., Iwatani, E. (2021). Rubrics for examining historical thinking skills in high school world history activities and student work: Construct validity evidence from the literature. Digital Promise. https://doi.org/10.51388/20.500.12265/113