USING RUBRICS IN AN OPERATING SYSTEMS COURSE

Abstract

Grading students in a technology intensivecourse as Operating Systems is troublesome. The usual wayof grading is asking short open questions. Students have toexhibit enough mastery of the Operating SystemsBackground to elaborate on the topic. It is difficult toovercome some misunderstanding on the depth of therequired answer and to avoid rote memorization answers. Inthe grading we used to mark students exams with long noteson where they failed to meet the expectations. However wehave no feedback on the use students make of the markings(or whether they actually read them). We found ourselveswriting the same marks over and over again. As a pilotproject we began using rubrics as a guide for grading.Sharing the rubric with the students we are letting themknow in advance the expected depth of the answers. In thispaper we present our experience using rubrics.Index Terms ⎯.rubrics, operating systems, classroomexperience.