instruction. In general, written tests and quizzes are not used to assess the products, processes, and student performance that result from projects. Instead, student performance on projects should be evaluated using multiple strategies. Several are described below. Several assessment tools are described on the following pages. Teacher observation of students' performance while conducting projectrelated tasks (e.g., use rubrics or other tools to assess inter-personal skills, leadership skills, attitude, contributions to team tasks, and other SCANS skills) Self-, peer- and/or teacher-assessments (e.g., use evaluation forms to assess interpersonal skills, leadership skills, attitude, creativity of solutions, contributions to team tasks, and other SCANS skills) Grading of verbal presentations (e.g., use rubrics or other scoring methods to assess student performance while delivering products such as sales presentations, advertisements, videotapes, demonstrations) Grading of written documents (e.g., use rubrics or other scoring methods to assess products such as manuals, marketing plans, procedures, journals, reports of recommendations, booklets, brochures, fliers, and posters) Assessment Tools Several of the tools that can be used to assess the SCANS skills and other skills employed throughout PBL are described in this section. They are: portfolios, rubrics, team-, self-, and instructor-evaluation forms, and mystery shopper evaluations. Portfolios Portfolios can be developed by students to reflect their cosmetology-related knowledge, skills, and attitudes. See the Getting a Cosmetology Job project in this book for a list of cosmetology student portfolio components. Rubrics VVhat is a rubric? A rubric sets criteria or standards that can be used to evaluate student learning, and gives observable indicators of various quality levels. Some teachers say, "I know good work when I see it," but they have a hard time putting those criteria or standards into words. The descriptions of quality levels included in a rubric allow you to identify what a specific level of work looks like. What purpose do rubrics serve? Rubrics are especially suited to assessing project-related processes, products, and/or student performance. What are some of the benefits of using rubrics? Rubrics allow you to customize project assessment by choosing the most appropriate criteria. Rubrics provide clear, accurate, and observable definitions of 3-5 quality levels. Rubrics allow you to be accurate and consistent in your assessment of processes, products, and/or student performance. Students can understand what is expected of thembefore, during and after project participation. (To encourage student buy-in to the criteria included in rubrics, students can be involved in developing those criteria.) Rubrics accept and do not penalize creativity. What are the components of rubrics? To gain an understanding of the components of rubrics, take a few minutes to examine the rubric on p. 20. Notice from the title that the purpose of the rubric is to assess oral presentations. The left-hand column includes four criteria that will be used to assess a product related to a project (informative, 18 0 0 0 0 o a 0 accurate, interesting, creative). The remaining columns describe different levels of student performance (i.e., observable indicators of quality). To use this specific grading scale, you would observe a presentation made by a student (or team of students) and assign scores to the criteria. Then combine / the scores to determine a letter grade. 0O 0 0 o o 0 In addition, a rubric can be more general, so it can be used to assess both the team's process and individual students' contributions to the team effort. In these cases, rubrics like the Project Assessment Rubric on p. 17 can be used. This rubric uses the criteria of reasoning, presentation, feasibility, attention to detail, and team dynamics. Here are a few examples of how you could use the quality ratings included in this rubric: If a team came up with a strategy (solution) that is valid but may not be easily replicated or implemented, the team would earn a rating of "3" (acceptable). If the team's presentation does not include major points related to the topic and is delivered unprofessionally, the team would earn a rating of "2" (marginal). All team members could be evaluated on-their contributions to the team dynamics. A student who barely participated would earn a "1" (unacceptable) and a student who successfully took on a leadership role would earn a "4" (exemplary). By doing this type of rating, the team ratings could be combined with the individual rating to give each team member a separate ratingone that represents both the team's shared performance and the team member's contribution to the team's performance. Can rubric criteria be weighted? Sometimes you might want to give some criteria greater weight than