Written Response to Text Institute

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• Written Response to Text Institute
• Massachusetts Department of Education
• August 1 2, 2007

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• Do not hire a man who does your work for money,
  but him who does it for love of it.
• Henry David Thoreau (1817 - 1862)

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Agenda Day One

• Welcome and Overview
• Focusing on the Massachusetts English Language
  Arts Curriculum Framework
• Grapes of Wrath
• NCS Mentor
• Lunch

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Agenda Day One (continued)

• Written Response to Narrative Text
• Henry Hikes to Fitchburg
• Written Response to Informational Text
• Bone

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Agenda Day Two

• Meet in your core specific rooms
• Harcourt Trophies
• Led by Mary Ellen Caesar,Nicole Mancevice, Lenore
  Metter and Cathy Buendo
• Peabody/Hawthorne
• Houghton Mifflin
• Led by Susan Kazeroid, Marybeth Keane, and Tracey
  Martineau
• Presidents Room
• Open Court and Scott Foresman Reading Street
• Led by Kathleen Lord and Heidi Delisle
• Walden One

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Agenda Day Two (continued)

• Meet in your core specific rooms
• Scott Foresman, 2003 series
• Led by Geri OBrien
• Emerson
• Lunch
• Work in groups to create written responses to
  text
• Plenary Session
• Debrief Next steps for planning your instruction

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Objectives

• Revisit core selections with colleagues to
  identify important themes, concepts, and main
  ideas.
• Construct written response questions that measure
  students understanding of these important
  elements and require text-based evidence to
  support their answer.
• Develop scoring guidelines with expectations for
  accuracy, evidence from the text, and convey
  understanding.

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Cognitive Skills Related to Reading

• To guide your work as you create questions
• Three Levels
• Identify/Recall
• Usually multiple choice, short-answer questions,
  answered with a phrase or a sentence
• Infer/Analyze
• Beginning of this in grade 3, but mostly grades 4
  and up
• Evaluate /Apply
• Usually in upper grades

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Cognitive Skills Related to ReadingTurn Talk

• To what extent does your core program at grades K
  and 1 provide questions that you would label
  Level 2?
• How often are students in grades 1-3 writing in
  response to reading, answering questions at
  Levels 2 and 3? Do teachers require their
  answers to include evidence from the selection?

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Performance Level Definitionsat Grade 3

• Proficient on MCAS
• Comprehension
• Understands concrete ideas and has a beginning
  awareness of implied ideas in grade-appropriate
  texts
• Connects ideas within texts and provides basic
  supporting evidence
• Above proficient
• Demonstrates mastery of concrete ideas and a
  general awareness of implied ideas in
  grade-appropriate texts
• Connects ideas within texts and provides
  substantial supporting evidence
• MCAS Technical Report

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Performance Level Definitionsat Grades 4-8 and 10

• Proficient on MCAS
• Comprehension
• Demonstrates an understanding of many concrete
  ideas and most abstract or implied ideas in
  grade-appropriate texts
• Connects ideas within texts and provides
  supporting evidence
• Advanced
• Demonstrates an in-depth understanding of
  concrete ideas and abstract ideas and complex
  meanings in in grade-appropriate texts
• Connects complex ideas within texts and provides
  well-reasoned and well-supported arguments
• MCAS Technical Report

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Large-Scale Assessment vs. Classroom Assessment

• The context of our work for the next two days
• Classroom assessment tests
• Usually a small amount of material
• Tests a small familiar group of children
• Tests students taught by the same teacher, using
  the same materials
• Scoring is flexible
• Teacher can clarify questions for students
• Can use any type of questions

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Large-Scale Assessment vs. Classroom Assessment

• Whereas.
• Large scale assessment
• Tests all of the learning standards for a
  particular grade, a years worth of material
• Tests virtually all students with entirely
  diverse backgrounds from all over the state
• Tests about 70,000 students taught by different
  teachers using different curricula and materials
• All written response questions are worth 4
  points, MC worth 1 point
• No clarification of test questions.

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Staying Focused on the ELA Framework
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Grapes of Wrath

• Begin with the end in mind
• Massachusetts English Language Arts Curriculum
  Framework is recursive. Students at every grade
  level apply similar language skills and concepts
  as they use increasingly more complex materials.
  In this way, students build upon and refine their
  knowledge, gaining sophistication and
  independence as they grow.
• ELA framework, page 2

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Grapes of Wrath

• Read selection silently
• Read selection aloud
• Review question
• Review scoring guide
• Read sample papers and scoring guidelines
• Review Written Response template it will serve
  as our model

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Grapes of WrathAt your tables

• Question begins with a quote and asks students to
  make an inference based on the characterization
  Steinbeck drew of Ma Joad.
• How does Steinbeck describe Ma Joad physically?
• How does Steinbeck describe Ma Joads role in the
  family?
• What does Ma Joad know?

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Grapes of Wrath

• Scoring Guidelines
• 0 is irrelevant or incorrect
• 1 is minimal statement about what Ma Joad knew
• 2 is a partial explanation of what Ma Joad knew
  and how that knowledge influenced her actions.
• 3 is an adequate explanation of what Ma Joad knew
  and how that knowledge influenced her actions.
  Includes supporting information from the excerpt
• 4 is an insightful explanation of what Ma Joad
  knew and how that knowledge influenced her
  actions. Includes specific supporting
  information from the excerpt

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Grapes of Wrath

• Student work samples. Relevant part of the
  response is highlighted, and then an analysis
  follows each work sample.
• 0 PAPER
• No explanation, student recopied the question.
• Irrelevant or inaccurate information.

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Grapes of Wrath

• 1 PAPER
• Literal minimal explanation of what Ma Joad knew.
• Ma Joad knew her son was home. She knew he might
  have broken out of jail.
• The remainder of the response retells part of the
  excerpt, neither adds nor detracts from the score.

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Grapes of Wrath

• 2 PAPER
• Partial understanding of the excerpt.
• Ma Joad knew her son Tom was telling the truth
  about being home and having his parole papers.
• Response focuses on emotions Tom was feeling
  rather than Ma Joads role in the family.
• The reason he bit his lip was to hold back his
  emotion from his mother.
• The remainder of the response is a detail from
  the plot that neither adds nor detracts from the
  score.

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Grapes of Wrath

• 3 PAPER
• Demonstrates an adequate understanding of the
  excerpt.
• A general explanation about Ma Joad knowing her
  family depends on her is provided. Ma Joad was
  the leader of her house she was the role model to
  all of her children.
• There is some evidence that there is confusion
  about her reaction.
• Her hand dropped because her stiff, tenseness
  loosened. Ma Joad had to make sure things were
  safe but then she knew they were, her control
  comfort grew.

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Grapes of Wrath

• 4 PAPER
• Demonstrates an insightful understanding of the
  excerpt.
• An explanation about Ma Joad knowing that she
  provides her familys emotional stability is
  given
• Ma Joad was the citadel of the family meaning
  that the entire family depended on her as a
  source of strengthshe knew that if she ever
  really wavered or despaired the family would
  fall.
• Clear connection to Tom and the scene where her
  arm drops her outburst of emotion when Tom came
  back moved Tom so much that he bit his lip to
  restrain his emotionsshe knows that for the sake
  of her family, she could not show any emotions.

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Grapes of WrathTurn Talk

• Reread the sample papers
• What level of cognitive skill is required to
  answer this question?
• What ideas must be connected in order to answer a
  3 or a 4 on this question?
• What evidence is found in the passage to support
  these ideas?

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NCS Mentor Overview
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Henry Hikes to Fitchburg

• Read the selection silently
• Read the selection aloud
• Review the rubric and anchor papers
• Score the student work samples

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Bone

• Read the selection silently
• Read the selection aloud
• Review the Written Response to text sheet
• Identify the main idea
• Identify the standard being measured
• Read the written response question
• Read the scoring guidelines to determine what
  needs to be included in a response

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Take a Moment

• Share one important idea or piece of information
  that you learned during the institute.
• Take turns sharing with your colleagues at the
  table until time is called.

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Back at School

• With your colleagues at the table, please discuss
  the following questions.
• What information do you need to share with the
  school principal?
• What support do you need from the principal in
  order to disseminate the information?
• What information do you need to share with your
  colleagues in the classroom?
• How and when will you share this information with
  your colleagues initially? How and when will you
  follow-up?

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Survey of Technical Assistance Interest Needs

• Part I
• I am confident in this area.
• I would like some additional help in this area.
• I would like a lot of additional help in this
  area.
• Part II
• This practice is in-place and fully implemented
  at my school.
• This practice is partially implemented at my
  school.
• This practice is not/minimally implemented at my
  school.

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• Youve learned the things you needTo pass that
  test and many more-Im certain youll
  succeed.Weve taught you that the earth is
  round,That red and white make pink,And
  something else that matters more-Weve taught
  you how to think.
• (Suess Prelutsky, 1998)