the students become so dependent on them that they can't decide for themselves what would make an assignment good any longer without them.
I've been reading all the responses and really trying to think this through, but the statement above really summarizes what I keep coming back to. I can see where rubrics can be beneficial in some ways, but at the same time, I see it becoming a crutch. The latest one DS has is very detailed - for a top grade, the project will answer at least 13 questions, it will be neatly written or typed, report is in paragraph format and in complete sentences, answers have little/no mistakes in punctuation, spelling or grammar, and so on. For the next lower grade, the project will answer at least *10* questions, report is paragraph format with *some* complete sentences, etc... And it goes on from there.
In our personal experience - I see the rubric as...limiting(?) in that DS probably won't go above and beyond what's expected of whatever grade he wants to get. However, without it, he'd do his project, receive his grade and (hopefully) learn from the critiques/criticisms of his teacher and apply them to the next project. I think he'd internalize that experience more than looking at a checklist and making sure he's included them all. And then, of course, there's the question of what happens when he doesn't have a rubric?
