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👋 We've put together a Getting Started Guide to help you navigate using NoRedInk!

How to Create a Writing Benchmark

❗ The ability to create Benchmarks requires access to our Admin Tools. Check out this article to learn how to gain administrator access in NoRedInk!

Once you've decided that Writing Benchmarks are aligned with your school or district's educational goals for the year, you can follow these steps to create a Writing Benchmark!
  1. After receiving administrative access in NoRedInk, log in to your account and select Admin Tools at the top of your dashboard. 
  1. Select Writing Benchmark on the left-hand side and then select Create new Writing Benchmark.

Create an Unscaffolded Writing Benchmark

Unscaffolded activities provide students with a prompt and associated texts. Unscaffolded activities can serve a range of purposes, from building writing fluency and developing specific writing skills to assessing understanding of course content. To create an Unscaffolded Benchmark, you can follow these steps:
  1. Select Unscaffolded at the top of the Create Benchmark page.
  2. You can administer either a pre-made prompt or create a custom-made Writing Benchmark. 
  3. We recommend using our curated list of Grading Assistant-enabled prompts. These prompts are marked with a wand icon and can be automatically graded using NoRedInk’s AI-powered grading capabilities. 
 
 
You can select the View Grading Assistant rubric to quickly see the rubric the AI-powered grader will use. 

💡Grading Assistant is available for NoRedInk prompts and some Test Prep prompts. Keep in mind that NoRedInk set rubrics are only available for grades 6-12 at this time.

  1. You can select the eye icon next to a pre-made prompt to preview the experience students will have while writing their submissions.
  2. If you select a pre-made prompt, the next page will pre-fill each field. You can customize certain fields and edit the prompt.
  3. If you select a Grading Assistant-powered prompt, you can customize the rubric by deselecting the available criteria. Additional rubric items can’t be added for automatic or manual grading. 
  4. If you select Create your own, the next page will guide you through all of the fields you can customize. You can also enable automatic grading by selecting one of the available rubrics. Keep in mind that the follow-up benchmark will also be graded using the Grading Assistant. 
You can add your prompt or source that students can reference while they write, select the minimum length of the essay, customize the grading rubric, and choose the grading method you'd like teachers to use. 
  1. Once you've finished customizing the Benchmark, you'll be prompted to create a follow-up Benchmark. This follow-up Benchmark will automatically use the grading method and rubric from the initial Benchmark you created.
  1. You can skip the follow-up by selecting Skip follow-up at the top of the second Benchmark's page.

❗You can always create a follow-up Benchmark later by selecting Add a follow-up Benchmark to this series found on the Writing Benchmark landing page. You can add as many follow-ups as needed. 

 
  1. After creating the follow-up Benchmark or choosing to skip creating one, you'll select the schools that will be administered the Benchmark.
  1. Once finished, select Finalize Benchmark.
  2. On the final page, you'll fill out the remaining fields to finalize your Benchmark. You'll enter:
    • The name of the Benchmark
    • The grade level of the Benchmark
    • The open and close dates of the initial Benchmark. We recommend a 3-month gap between benchmarks with a minimum of 4 weeks to allow time for targeted instruction and measurable student growth. 

🍎 We recommend giving teachers two weeks to administer the benchmark, plus another two weeks to grade student submissions.

  1. When you've finished finalizing the Benchmark, select Send to teachers at the bottom of the page. 
Once it's sent out to teachers, the Benchmark will appear as a recommendation in the Assignment Library and their teacher dashboard 3 weeks before the administration window opens. Teachers must assign the Benchmark manually; it isn’t automatically assigned.

❗ If any teachers are not seeing the recommendation on their account, please ensure that they have the appropriate grade levels set on their Manage Classes page in NoRedInk! 

 

Reviewing Writing Benchmark Results 

You can track the status of the Benchmark, check how many classes have been assigned the assignment, and review both grading progress and final results. 
 
  1. Log in to NoRedInk and select Admin Tools at the top of your dashboard. 
  1. Select Writing Benchmark on the left-hand side. A list of all Benchmark series will load. 
  2. On this page, you can view high-level metrics that provide an overview of performance on each Benchmark.
  3. Classes Assigned shows how many classes have been assigned the Benchmark by teachers out of all classes in the targeted grade level. 
  4. Submissions Graded shows how many student submissions have been graded so far out of all assigned students. 

❗You can select either participation metric to view detailed participation data. Rows with participation less than 50% will be highlighted to help identify where additional outreach may be needed to meet district participation goals. 

  1. Select View full results in the top corner of the Benchmark series card to review detailed Benchmark results. 
  1. At the top of the results page, choose which Benchmark within the series you’d like to review. Selecting the benchmark card will display detailed results for each rubric item
 

❗You can view results at the district level or filtered by school or teacher.

 
  1. Select Download all data to receive an exported file via email containing detailed scores for the Benchmark series.  

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