How do I create my own rubric from scratch?

Creating a rubric from scratch involves selecting options, naming the rubric, and filling out criteria with specific descriptors. This process ensures clarity in grading and fairness in evaluation standards.

Start from scratch

Choosing the 4th tile on the New Rubric screen (access by selecting + Create New Rubric from the Rubrics Library takes you to the manual rubric creation workflow. You will first be presented with settings for Student level, Grading intensity, and Language. Hit continue and you will see a simplified version of the rubric editing screen with only one criterion and one scoring level.

1. Give your rubric a name

Provide a descriptive name that reflects the nature and level of the rubric. You will want to be able to identify it within your rubric library, particularly if you have a number of custom rubrics. Each should have a unique and descriptive name.

2. Add criteria

Presumably you already have a clear idea of the types of criteria that you want to apply to the grading for which this rubric will be used. Fill in the first Criteria title and then add additional criteria using the button at the bottom until you are satisfied with your list.

3. Add scoring levels

Before you add scoring levels within the software you will need to know how you want to score assignments using this rubric, whether all criteria will be equally weighted, and the total score.

You don't have to have equal numbers of levels within each of the criteria. And the scale for each of the criteria could be different as well.

For example, you might weight the various criteria by grading the first out of 5, the second out of 10, and the third out of 3. For the first you might have 6 levels (inlcuding 0 points), 4 for the second, and 6 for the third (0, 2, 4, 6, 8, and 10). How you choose to do this is up to you.

To add additional scoring levels, select the plus sign to the right of the existing level and you will observe another level pop up. Fill in the score for that level and move on to the next, again pressing the plus sign to add another and another until you have all you need. This is done for each of the criteria.

4. Add the descriptor text

Now that your overall structure is ready (you have your criteria listed, you have the scoring levels in place, and the scores for each level have been defined) it is time to add the descriptors.

Go through your rubric and fill in the detail that will instruct the AI on what kind of work, when evaluated against the criteria, will result in that scoring level. If you aren't sure how to make the correct adjustments to the text to reflect different scoring levels, take a look at some of the platform rubrics and see how they have been created in this regard.

5. Save your rubric

Click the Create rubric button at the bottom right of the screen to save your new rubric. Enjoy the on-screen confetti that celebrates your hard work and you will now see your new rubric in the My Rubrics list within the rubric library.

Updated on: 09/19/2025