Messy Minutes Assessment Edition Special Proficiency Scale Series Episode 3 - I love the smell of task neutral criteria in the morning

The Embrace the Messy Podcast with Shannon Schinkel

TRANSCRIPT: Welcome back to Messy Minutes: Assessment Edition! I’m your host, Shannon Schinkel, from the Embrace the Messy Podcast. Over the last two episodes, we’ve tackled backward design and unpacking standards—all while hiking through Hiking 101.

Today, we’re taking the next step: creating task-neutral criteria. It’s time to move beyond task-specific assessments and focus on the skills at the heart of our standards. Using our Hiking 101 standard, we’ll explore how to write criteria that work across different tasks, ensuring assessments measure what really matters: student learning and skill mastery. Ahhh, "I love the smell of task-neutral criteria in the morning."
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Here’s the Issue:

Most criteria focus too much on specific tasks. Think about it—when you create an assignment, you likely write criteria for that particular assignment:
• “Body paragraphs clearly develop the theme from the novel.”
• “The birthday cake’s lettering is evenly spaced and legible.”

While these may seem clear, they tie assessment to a single task, a thematic essay for a novel and decorating a birthday cake. Once the task is done, so is the learning. Even if students redo or revise their work, the feedback focuses on improving the task, not developing the broader skills the standard demands.

Here’s where this becomes a problem: Learning isn’t about just completing tasks. It’s about building skills that students can apply across different situations. To do that, we need task-neutral criteria—criteria that focus on the standard, not the assignment.
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Visualize This Scenario:

If you haven’t listened to Episode 2 yet, I highly recommend going back—it provides the foundation for everything we’re diving into today.

In the last episode, we worked with the Hiking 101 standard, “Apply appropriate strategies and tools to complete a hike, ensuring safety, pacing, and environmental awareness.” We rephrased it to make it clearer: “Complete a hike safely by using tools, pacing yourself, and being mindful of the environment.” This simplified version aligns with Bloom’s Taxonomy at the application level, focusing on using skills in real-world situations.

Now, imagine your instructor gives you the following task:
“Plan and complete a hike up Teapot Mountain on a summer afternoon in August. The hike is expected to take approximately 3 hours round-trip, with temperatures ranging from 24-30 degrees Celsius.”

The instructor provides a rubric, and here’s what it includes:

o “Brought enough water.”
o “Used a map or trail markers to navigate the route.”
o “Demonstrated pacing by taking breaks during the ascent.”
o “Followed Leave No Trace principles to protect the environment.”
o “Prepared a detailed journal entry post-hike.”
o “Took photos of at least five scenic spots along the trail.”
o “Brought snacks to share with the group.”

Looking at this rubric, it’s clear that some criteria align directly with the standard, while others are task-specific or completely unrelated. For example, bringing enough water is essential for ensuring safety and pacing—both key elements of the standard. However, criteria like “Took photos of at least five scenic spots” don’t connect to the standard at all. While they might enhance the experience, they don’t assess whether students applied the strategies and tools required by the standard.

This highlights why task-neutral criteria are so important. By focusing on the skills outlined in the standard, you can assess students’ learning across multiple tasks—not just one specific hike.
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Let’s Break It Down:

Here’s first step in how to create task-neutral criteria from the Hiking 101 standard. I am going to use four levels here but you can use anywhere from 2 to 7. I strongly recommend however many levels you use, you are consistent:

Start with the Standard:

Remember, the goal is to align with:
“Apply appropriate strategies and tools to complete a hike, ensuring safety, pacing, and environmental awareness.”

Create performance-focused statements

In other words, what do you expect at each level? This step is often a transitional phase in criteria development, where the focus moves:
• From defining what the student should do (the standard)
• Toward describing how well it should be done (performance quality).

To do this you need to use words that will distinguish one level from the next.

Words like, foundationally, beginning, minimally, marginally, partially, emerging, signal early stages of learning or partial application.
Words like, moderately, developing, sufficiently, adequately, reasonably, acceptably, competently convey satisfactory performance.
Words like, strongly, proficiently, effectively, skillfully, thoroughly, clearly, appropriately, convey acceptable or intermediate performance.
Words like, advanced, expertly, exceptionally, masterfully, precisely, with excellence, reflect advanced, polished, or exemplary performance.

Here's what it might look like for our standard:
Level 1: Is beginning to apply strategies and tools for safety, pacing, and environmental awareness.
Level 2: Applies strategies and tools for safety, pacing, and environmental awareness with limited effectiveness.
Level 3: Applies strategies and tools for safety, pacing, and environmental awareness effectively.
Level 4: Demonstrates expert application of strategies and tools with thoughtful precision.

Avoid Task-Specific Language even if you have a task in mind. This is hard but it our goal here is to design criteria that can be used over and over again. By making criteria task-neutral, you ensure assessments focus on what students know and can do, promoting skill transfer across different contexts rather than tying success to one specific task.

In episode 5, we’ll discuss how to use task-neutral criteria for a specific standard.
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Let’s Recap:
In this episode, we took the first step in designing task-neutral criteria by adding in performance quality language that distinguishes one level to the next. While not the end goal, it does help us shift the focus from tasks to skills so we can measure what matters most: student learning and growth.
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Closing:
Now it’s your turn to embrace the messiness of task-neutral criteria. Grab a standard and try writing task-neutral criteria for it using the suggested quality words. Need help? Use AI tools like ChatGPT to brainstorm or refine your language. These tools can provide examples, suggest alternative phrasing, and support criteria development by offering fresh perspectives and ensuring clarity.

And remember, this is a process. Start small, give yourself time, and collaborate with others.

The transcript for this episode will be available for you to review in the show notes. Don’t forget to listen again if needed—and I’d love to hear from you! Share how your journey is going by commenting on this episode. And while you’re at it, why not like, share, and subscribe so you never miss an episode?

See you next Friday for part four in this series: "I feel the need – the need for detailed criteria."

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