Writing Rubrics
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Rubric for Essays
Possible Points Earned Points
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Purpose 15 ______
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Exemplary 14-15
Thesis and conclusion are clear and engage reader’s interest; purpose is addressed consistently throughout essay.
Competent 12-13
Thesis and conclusion are clear and fairly interesting; purpose is addressed in most of the essay.
Acceptable 10-11
Thesis and conclusion are present but difficult to pinpoint; writer strays from purpose frequently.
Unacceptable 0-9
Thesis and/or conclusion are not discernible or are inappropriate or unworkable; writer frequently wanders from point of essay.

Rubric for Essays (continued)
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Organization and Development 15 ______
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Exemplary 14-15
All parts of essay flow logically in sequence; transitions are clear and appropriate; essay is a united and interesting entity.
Competent 12-13
Most parts of essay flow logically in sequence; transitions are usually clear and appropriate; for the most part, essay is not disjointed.
Acceptable 10-11
Parts of essay are apparent but not well sequenced; transitions are sometimes missing or inadequate; essay is disjointed in several areas.
Unacceptable 0-9
Parts of essay are missing or so ill-sequenced that reading is difficult; transitions not used and/or are inadequate; essay is a jumble of ideas with little organization.

Rubric for Essays (continued)
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Content/Quality of Ideas 40 ______
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Exemplary 36-40
Paper addresses writing assignment engagingly, using interesting and appropriate details and examples.
Competent 32-35
Paper addresses prompt, but with uneven supportive detail and examples.
Acceptable 28-31
In most instances, paper addresses prompt, but support detail and examples are sometimes inadequate.
Unacceptable 0-27
Paper does not address prompt and/or shows little or no supportive detail and examples.

Rubric for Essays (continued)
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Thought and Style 15 ______
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Exemplary 14-15
Quality of ideas and evidence is excellent and sometimes original; vocabulary is appropriate and diverse; tone is appropriate.
Competent 12-13
Quality of ideas and evidence is very good; vocabulary is appropriate and usually diverse; tone is appropriate.
Acceptable 10-11
Quality of ideas and evidence is mediocre; vocabulary is sometimes repetitive and/or inappropriate; tone is sometimes inappropriate.
Unacceptable 0-9
Ideas and evidence are passé or incomplete; vocabulary is repetitive and/or lacking in academic appropriateness; tone is often inappropriate.

Rubric for Essays (continued)
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Exemplary 14-15
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Competent 12-13
Acceptable 10-11
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Unacceptable 0-9

Rubric for Essays (continued)
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Audience 15 ______
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Exemplary 14-15
Vocabulary and examples reflect a thorough knowledge of audience.
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Competent 12-13
Vocabulary and examples usually reflect an adequate knowledge of audience.
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Acceptable 10-11
Inconsistent use of language level and examples for audience.
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Unacceptable 0-9
Inconsistent use of language level and examples reflects little or no knowledge of audience.

Rubric for Essays (continued)
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Objectivity 15 ______
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Exemplary 14-15
Evidence is presented without bias or inappropriate emotion in every circumstance.
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Competent 12-13
Evidence is usually presented without bias or inappropriate emotion.
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Acceptable10-11
In three or more instances, evidence is presented with bias or inappropriate emotion.
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Unacceptable 0-9
Evidence is consistently presented in a biased or inappropriately emotional tone.

Rubric for Essays (continued)
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Exemplary 14-15
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Competent 12-13
Assigned process is followed as prescribed with just one or two deviations.
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Acceptable 10-11
Assigned process is followed as prescribed in three to four deviations.
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Unacceptable 0-9
Deviation from assigned process occurs consistently.

Journal 2: Introduction to Literature
Due Date: Monday, January 21
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Choose one of the following poems and explicate it in a paper of 500-750 words. Include a title page, a typed copy of the poem, your explication (with your own title), the text of your paper, and a works cited page. The 500-750 words required are not to include the words in the poem or the words on the works cited page. Print a word count at the end of the text of your paper. If you are caught plagiarizing on this paper, you will receive a 0 for the assignment.
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George Herbert. “The Pulley,” pp. 884-85
Yeats, William Butler. “The Wild Swans at Coole,” p. 1023
Hardy, Thomas. “The Darkling Thrush,” pp. 969-70
Edwin Arlington Robinson. “Richard Cory,” p. 996
George Herbert. “Redemption.” (Not in your text—I will supply a copy if you wish to review it)
John Donne. “Death, be not proud,” p. 892
John Crowe Ransom. “Bells for John Whiteside’s Daughter,” p. 990

Journal 2: Introduction to Literature
(continued)
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Read the poem several times. Pick out words and phrases that you are unfamiliar with and look them up. You may be able to find the information you need in a dictionary, but you may have to go to an encyclopedia or the Oxford English Dictionary. Consider etymology as well as meaning.
Also, remember the meaning of a word may have been different in the historical period in which the poem was written.
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It will help you to paraphrase the poem before you start writing about it so you have a good grasp of what is happening in the poem.
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In class we talked about imagery and figurative language. Think about these elements of poetry and how they work in the poem of your choice if they are of importance in the poem. Include this information in your paper.
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Read about the author to see whether his or her life may have some significance in the poem.
Remember, though, that poetry is usually not autobiographical, so you may find no apparent relationship between the poem and the author’s life. If you include biographical information in the paper, use it only briefly and only to shed further light on a particular part of the poem. Do not make it a major part of your paper.
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You may use critical sources if you wish, but you are not required to. If you choose to do this, you must properly document your materials. Use MLA style.

Journal 2: Introduction to Literature
(continued)
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Here are some other things you can do to help understand the poem you have chosen.
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Pay close attention to the title. Often the title is a key to the meaning of the poem.
Select striking images that seem crucial to the sense of the poem. Categorize them and try to analyze why they are important. Notice repetitions.
Notice dramatic conflict or the relationship between contradictory ideas, characters, moods, images.
Focus on points in the poem that intimate character transformation, change of attitude, different moods. Analyze the process leading up to a transformation and explain the reason for the change.
Notice contradictions, juxtaposition of opposites (characters, images, moods), areas of tension, differing sounds.

Journal 2: Introduction to Literature
(continued)
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Some things to remember:
Use present tense as you discuss incidents in a piece of literature.
When citing poetry, indent and put in poetry form if the quote is over three lines long.
If it is fewer than three lines long, quote the poetry within your text; use a space, a slash, and another space to show where lines begin and end, e.g., “I’ve eaten a bag of green apples, / Boarded the train there’s no getting off.”
Include a title (not in all caps, not in italics, not underlined). The title should be your title; do not use the author’s title, although you may incorporate the author’s title into your title if you wish, e.g., “An Explication of ‘The Road Not Taken’ ” (try to be more creative than that, though).
When referring to the title of a short poem, place it inside quotation marks (see my usage in the list of choices of poems); longer works such as books are italicized.
Rules for capitalization of titles follow: 1) Capitalize the first letter of the first and last words; 2) Capitalize the first letter of all other words except articles (a, an, the), prepositions, the to in infinitives, and coordinating conjunctions—unless they are the first or last words (Scott Foresman Handbook 593-94).
It is wise to refer to the title of the poem you are discussing in the first or second sentence of your paper—don’t assume that your reader knows the poem or your purpose.

Journal 2: Introduction to Literature
(continued)
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Chapter I in your text discusses writing the literary paper. You may need to read the chapter, or portions of it, in preparation for writing your paper. Portions that are especially apropos to your needs are pages 7-16. If you have forgotten how to use quotations or summaries within a paper, pages 16-23 will help you with that problem.
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Your journal must be typed. Simply staple the paper and turn it in with no binder or covering. Use 1-inch margins on the sides, top, and bottom of the paper. Doublespace. Do not justify margins on the right side. Use MLA style for documentation.
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The third page of your syllabus shows pictures of what the paper should look like. If you do not use outside sources, the only entry on your works cited page will be the poem you are discussing. Following is a sample of the entry form to use for the entries from an anthology:
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Donne, John. “A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning.” Perrine’s Literature: Structure,
Sound, and Sense. 9th edition. Eds. Thomas R. Arp and Greg Johnson. Boston:
Thomson, 2006. 729-30.

Death, be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so;
For those whom thou think’st thou dost overthrow
Die not, poor death, nor yet canst thou kill me.
From rest and sleep, which but thy pictures be,
Much pleasure; then from thee much more must flow;
And soonest* our best men with thee do go, *readiest
Rest of their bones and soul’s delivery.
Thou art slave to fate, chance, kings, and desperate men,
And dost with poison, war, and sickness dwell;
And poppy or charms can make us sleep as well,
And better than thy stroke. Why swell’st thou then?
One short sleep passed, we wake eternally,
And death shall be no more; death, thou shalt die.

Rubric for Essays
Possible Points Earned Points
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Purpose 15 ______
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Exemplary 14-15
Thesis and conclusion are clear and engage reader’s __ref to poem’s title interest; purpose is addressed consistently and author in intro throughout essay.
Competent 12-13
Thesis and conclusion are clear and fairly interesting; purpose is addressed in most of the essay.
Acceptable 10-11
Thesis and conclusion are present but difficult to pinpoint; writer strays from purpose frequently.
Unacceptable 0-9
Thesis and/or conclusion are not discernible or are inappropriate or unworkable; writer frequently wanders from point of essay.

Rubric for Essays (continued)
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Organization and Development 15 ______
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Exemplary 14-15
All parts of essay flow logically in sequence; __explication follows transitions are clear and appropriate; essay is a united and interesting entity. logical order
Competent 12-13
Most parts of essay flow logically in sequence; transitions are usually clear and appropriate; for the most part, essay is not disjointed.
Acceptable 10-11
Parts of essay are apparent but not well sequenced; transitions are sometimes missing or inadequate; essay is disjointed in several areas.
Unacceptable 0-9
Parts of essay are missing or so ill-sequenced that reading is difficult; transitions not used and/or are inadequate; essay is a jumble of ideas with little organization.

Rubric for Essays (continued)
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Content/Quality of Ideas 40 ______
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Exemplary 36-40
Paper addresses writing assignment __identification of apostrophe engagingly, using interesting and __identification of personification appropriate details and examples.
__explication is thorough
Competent32-35
Paper addresses prompt, but with uneven supportive detail and examples.
Acceptable28-31
In most instances, paper addresses prompt, but support detail and examples are sometimes inadequate.
Unacceptable 0-27
Paper does not address prompt and/or shows little or no supportive detail and examples.

Rubric for Essays (continued)
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Thought and Style 15 ______
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Exemplary 14-15
Quality of ideas and evidence is excellent and sometimes original; vocabulary is appropriate and diverse; tone is appropriate.
Competent 12-13
Quality of ideas and evidence is very good; vocabulary is appropriate and usually diverse; tone is appropriate.
Acceptable 10-11
Quality of ideas and evidence is mediocre; vocabulary is sometimes repetitive and/or inappropriate; tone is sometimes inappropriate.
Unacceptable 0-9
Ideas and evidence are passé or incomplete; vocabulary is repetitive and/or lacking in academic appropriateness; tone is often inappropriate.

Rubric for Essays (continued)
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Mechanics, Usage, and Format
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Exemplary14-15
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Few if any errors in mechanics, __use of documentation if needed grammar, and/or usage. __title is used and is interesting
Format is adhered to exactly. __word count is adequate
__present tense used when referring to incidents in poem
Competent12-13
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Some errors in mechanics, grammar, and/or usage. Format is usually adhered to.
Acceptable10-11
Errors are systematic and detract from the sense of the
Format incorrect.
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Unacceptable 0-9 essay.
Errors occur almost sentence by sentence. Format is incorrect in numerous instances.