| | | | | | | | |

Rate My Writing w/ Freebie Posters! :)

I have done a lot of planning over the summer to incorporate self-reflection and self-assessment from my students for this coming school year.  It’s something that I’ll admit, I lacked in past years. I am implementing a self-assessment chart for a focus “I Can” statement (more on that later), student data folders and goal setting, and a self-reflection piece for student writing pieces this year.  I’ve gone from little to no self-assessment to maybe-I’m-overdoing-it self-assessment. No surprise there – I usually don’t do well with the phrase “a little at a time.”   I do better with the “go big or go home” phrase when it comes to school. 🙂

I have seen many pictures on Pinterest of the “star writing rubrics” that teachers have created to give their students a visual aide of writing expectations.  I created my own posters and want to share them with you!  Again, I did not create this idea, I just created my own posters for my room because I couldn’t find printable ones that worked for me. 🙂

Here is a picture of my rating posters in my classroom this year:

Students can take their paper up to the board and self-assess their writing on a scale of 1-4. They will always rate their writing and mark it in the upper right hand corner of their piece when they are finished. They will take into account both their writing and illustrations.  Throughout the year, we will talk about what the qualities of each rating are in a writing piece.  After our routines are up and running, my students will periodically choose their best writing pieces to go into their data folders.  They will be required to explain to me why they rated their paper the way they did, encouraging them to use technical writing vocabulary that we discuss throughout the Writer’s Workshop process. 

It is one thing to talk about writing expectations but it’s another for the expectations and examples to be permanently posted in the classroom so that students can evaluate their own writing piece and assess it accordingly.  As the year progresses, these posters will change from narrative pieces to informational pieces to opinion pieces.  (And of course, I will be happy to share with you!) 🙂 The current one is very basic, building on what my students will most likely use as their beginning “topic sentences.” As we discuss writing with detail, the posters will become more developed. My hope is that my students will begin to think critically about the quality of their writing and be able to verbally explain their strengths and goals. 🙂

Click the picture below to download these rating posters from Google Docs. 
 Or, click {HERE}.
(Be sure to view the PDF at 100%.  I zoomed in and it looked like the font was floating. It’s not! 🙂 It prints out just fine. Just an FYI if you are OCD like I am! 🙂 🙂
On another note, remember when my puppy looked like a lion?  He looks MUCH better now after a trip to his favorite groomer. 
BEFORE (Weston the Lion)
AFTER (Weston the Dog)
I am off to type up my classroom handbook for the year.  My mom is coming to my school tomorrow see my classroom. 🙂 I’m excited for her to see it and visit. I’ll be back Saturday for some organization tips & tricks! Until then…

Similar Posts

17 Comments

  1. Awe~ Weston looks so adorable! Weston the Lion…that was funny. Thank you for the wonderful rating posters. This is such a great visual for students to do self-assessments on their writing and whether or not they need to add more details into their sentences.

  2. Believe it or not I saw something like this visual on Pinterest and printed off a copy to make my own posters. I have been procrastinating for about a week. Thank you for creating these, they are great! Pup is so cute!!

  3. Great writing idea… I will have to make something like that with D'Nealian writing! 🙂 My looks like a lion, too… she is a very furry Chow. But she is almost 15 so we are sparing her the haircuts (which she hates) and trying to keep her cool in the air conditioning…

    Lindsey at Forever First Grade

  4. Thank you, thank you, thank you! This is something that I have needed in my classroom for the longest time but just haven't made the time to create it myself. This is amazing and comes at the perfect time 🙂

  5. This looks great and I am so excited to use it in my classroom. Any plans to update with a version that has indents?

    1. I’m so glad you like it! Not at this time. This freebie resource will remain “as is” for the time being. I hope you enjoy using it!

Leave a Reply to Sandy Say Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *