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Report Findings
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In the spring of 2000, student essays from several WSU courses were assessed
by faculty members trained as critical thinking readers. In the four courses
where the rubric was used variously for instruction and evaluation, the papers
received significantly higher ratings than in the four courses in which the
rubric was not used.
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In the fall of 2000, ten courses integrated the rubric variously. The papers
continued to have a statistically significant difference from the control group
which did not integrate the rubric.
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In this semester, we also compared student growth from the beginning of the
semester to the end of the semester in these courses, and looked at lower- and
upper-division courses. Growth was demonstrated in upper-division courses
between the first paper (written without much or any exposure to the rubric) and
the second paper (written with continued exposure to the rubric). Although the
overall growth was not statistically significant, individual courses did have
statistically significant critical thinking gains (seen
in this chart).
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In the spring of 2001, seven courses integrated the rubric. The papers continued
to receive statistically higher scores than the papers that did not use the rubric.
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In addition to these comparisons, we also examined papers from two separate courses
(one in entomology and one in world civilizations) whose instructors did not use the
rubric one semester and did use it the following semester. In both courses, the
critical thinking gains from the first semester to the second semester were
dramatic and statistically significant (seen in this chart of
results in an entomology course).
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Finally, faculty who used the rubric were surveyed on their experiences.
Unanimously, all the surveyed participants felt that the rubric helped clarify
their expectations of students, and that by using the rubric in their instructional
and evaluative methods, their students' critical thinking abilities improved.
Sixty-seven percent also believed that their teaching abilities improved using the
rubric, and eighty-eight percent will use the rubric again. Ninety percent of the
faculty members who were surveyed said that their students met their expectations
for critical thinking.
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