Evaluation Rubric for Blog Posts

0: The blog was not submitted.

1: A post was attempted, but has serious and inexcusable flaws. Analysis may be cursory, reflecting only minimal attention to the good reading habits we have talked about in class. Alternately, the post does not fulfill the demands of the assignment by focusing primarily on irrelevant subject matter (such as personal experience rather than the poem itself) other otherwise failing to analyze the poem in question.

2: The post either does not fully fulfill the demands of the assignment (such as by being too short), or the author has attempted a cursory analysis of the poem, but this analysis is severely flawed, due perhaps to a grievous oversight in reading, failing to read the text completely, or otherwise misunderstanding the poem or its context. The post reflects that the author made some attempt to understand the poem, but clearly has not mastered the skills we have been working on in class.

3: This post fulfills the literal demands of the assignment, but fails to move beyond the surface level of the poem. The author may attempt to support his or her argument with concrete details about the text, but does so awkwardly, incompletely, or erroneously. Alternately, the author may make a surprising or compelling comment about the poem, but fail to convince the reader of his or her interpretation with reference to direct evidence in the poem.

4: This is an all-around solid post that makes a tenable (though perhaps unsurprising) argument about the poem and supports this argument with particular concrete details from the text. The post meets the length requirement specified in the assignment and shows that the author has a strong grasp on the analytical skills we have been working on in class.

5: This post makes a truly surprising and original argument about the poem that would prompt even an advanced and experienced reader to consider the poem in a new light. The argument is strongly supported with concrete details about the text that are tied back directly to the post’s thesis statement. The post itself reflects not only a full internalization of the analytical skills we’ve talked about in class, but also a profound sensitivity and attention to detail in the author’s reading of the poem in question.