Descriptive Essay Scoring Rubric

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Score of 6:
 Score of 6: Excellent
  • Develops ideas well and uses many specific, relevant details throughout the essay.
  • Is well organized with clear transitions; maintains focus.
  • Sustains varied sentence structure.
  • Exhibits many specific word choices.
  • Contains little or no errors in grammar and conventions; errors do not interfere with understanding.

Score of 5:
 Score of 5: Skillful
  • Develops ideas with some specific, relevant details.
  • Is clearly organized; information is presented in an orderly way, but essay may lack transitions.
  • Exhibits some variety in sentence structure.
  • Displays some specific word choices.
  • May contain some errors in grammar and conventions; errors do not interfere with understanding.

Score of 4:
 Score of 4: Sufficient
  • Provides clear ideas, but sparsely developed; may have few details.
  • Provides a clear sequence of information; provides pieces of information that are generally related to each other.
  • Generally has simple sentences; may exhibit uneven control over sentence structure.
  • Consists mainly of simple word choices, but may contain some specific word choices.
  • Contains errors in grammar and conventions that generally do not interfere with understanding.

Score of 3:
 Score of 3: Uneven
  • Provides limited or incomplete information; may be list-like or have the quality of an outline.
  • Is disorganized or provides a disjointed sequence of information.
  • Exhibits uneven control over sentence structure.
  • May have some inaccurate word choices.
  • Contains errors in grammar and conventions that sometimes interfere with understanding.

Score of 2:
 Score of 2: Insufficient
  • Provides little information and makes little attempt at development.
  • Is very disorganized or too brief to detect organization.
  • Exhibits little control over sentence structure.
  • Contains inaccurate word choices in much of the essay.
  • Is characterized by misspellings, missing words, and incorrect word order; errors in grammar and conventions are severe enough to make understanding very difficult in much of the essay.

Score of 1:
 Score of 1: Unsatisfactory
  • Attempts a response, but may only paraphrase the prompt or be extremely brief.
  • Exhibits no control over organization.
  • Exhibits no control over sentence structure.
  • Contains inaccurate word choices throughout most of the essay.
  • Is characterized by misspellings, missing words, and incorrect word order; errors in grammar and conventions severely impede understanding throughout the essay.