Writing Module

1

Analysis of the Writing Rubric

Desired Outcomes:

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Reflect on your underlying beliefs about writing instruction in comparison to district and state standards

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Define and apply the Five Features of Effective Writing: focus, organization, support and elaboration, style, and conventions.

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Outline DPI’s writing rubric to assess student writing

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Evaluate student exemplars based on the NC Writing Rubric

Written Reflection

“The most successful teaching of writing that directly impacts student achievement comes when the strategies you use connects to the beliefs you hold AND correlate with the written, taught, and tested curriculum.”

 See graphic organizer attached, “Beliefs”, “Strategies”, and “State Standards”.  Write a list of all the beliefs you currently hold about teaching and assessing student writing and write them in the first column.

 In the next column, next to each belief, list a few strategies you use in teaching writing that reflect your beliefs about writing instruction.

 In the third column, list, if you can, a related state standard that aligns with each of your beliefs and strategies.

 Take a moment to look over your graphic organizer. Write a reflection based on the following guiding questions. 1. Are there indicators where your beliefs, strategies, and state standards mesh perfectly?

2. Are there gaps? Where do the gaps occur? Why do you think they occur?

3. What might those gaps indicate and what can you do to address these gaps?

Let’s Review our State Assessment Scoring Model

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The North Carolina Writing Assessment is assessed on two components; Content and Conventions.

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The North Carolina Writing Assessment Scoring Model was designed to assess student performance based on the English Language Arts Standard Course of Study.

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The Five Features of Effective Writing that compose the NC Writing Assessment Scoring Model details specific levels of mastery when applied to student writing.

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In order to demonstrate a reasonable level of mastery in any of the features, the student must write a sufficient amount.

NC Writing Assessment Scoring Model Two traits (content and conventions)

• • • •

Content Rubric

FOCUS ORGANIZATION SUPPORT AND ELABORATION STYLE • • •

Conventions Rubric

SENTENCE FORMATION USAGE MECHANICS

Let’s Take a Closer Look at each Feature……..

The Five Features of Effective Writing

• • • • •

Focus

Focus is the topic/subject established by the writer in response to the writing task.

The writer must clearly establish a focus as he/she fulfills the assignment of the prompt.

The writer may effectively use an inductive organizational plan that does not actually identify the subject matter at the beginning and may not literally identify the subject matter at all.

If the reader is confused about the subject matter, the writer has not effectively established a focus.

If the reader is engaged and not confused, the writer probably has been effective in establishing a focus.

Organization

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Organization is the progression, relatedness, and completeness of ideas.

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The writer establishes for the reader a well-organized composition, which exhibits a constancy of purpose through the development of elements forming an effective beginning, middle, and end.

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The response demonstrates a clear progression of related ideas and /or events and is unified and complete.

Support and Elaboration

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Support and Elaboration is the extension and development of the topic/subject.

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Two important concepts in determining whether details are supportive are the concepts of relatedness and sufficiency.

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Relatedness has to do with the directness of the relationship that the writer establishes between the information and the subject matter.

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The writer must present his/her ideas with enough power and clarity to cause the support to be sufficient.

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Undeveloped details, redundancy, and the repetitious paraphrasing of the same point often characterize insufficiency. Sufficiency has less to do with amount and more to do with the specificity and effectiveness of the support and elaboration provided.

Style

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Style is the control of language that is appropriate to the purpose, audience, and context of the writing task.

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The writer’s style is evident through word choice and sentence fluency.

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Skillful use of precise, purposeful vocabulary enhances the effectiveness of the composition through the use of appropriate words, phrases, and descriptions that engage the audience.

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Sentence fluency involves using a variety of sentence styles to establish effective relationships between and among ideas, causes, and/or statements appropriate to the task.

Take a Closer Look at the Five Features of Writing

1.

Print out the articles available via the links listed below 2.

Read the articles and make annotations directly on each article 3.

After reading the articles, write a reflection based on the following questions:

• • • What information presented in the articles fits with your current teaching practices and / or beliefs about writing instruction in your classroom?

Describe anything from the reading that changed or enhanced your perspectives on teaching writing and how it could impact your students? Explain. Use one or more of the following metacognitive sentence stems to reflect on the reading.

-I learned that… -Based on what I read, I will________because… -I figured out that….. -I started to think about… -I have a question about….

4.

Write a lesson plan that focuses on teaching one of the five features of writing, implement lesson with your students, and collect examples of student work 5.

Write a reflection that evaluates student work and the effectiveness of the lesson using the document attached. (Teacher Reflection Log)

Articles

Focus Article Includes:

• Click here to retrieve focus article More than just the main idea • Finding focus: before writing and during revision •

Composition Article Includes:

Click here to retrieve organization article • • Guiding questions for focus Text structures • Beginnings: Hooking the reader • What’s in the middle?

• Endings: beyond "happily ever after“ Cohesion: the glue that holds the structure together • Transition words

Support and Elaboration Article Includes: Click here to retrieve article

• Teaching support and elaboration • • Show, don't tell: support and elaboration in writing Finding the right information: support and elaboration in expository writing • Guiding questions for support and elaboration • For narrative writing • For informational writing • For argumentative writing

Style Article Includes: Click here to retrieve style article

•Not just right and wrong •Elements of style •Word choice •Sentence fluency •Voice •Teaching style •Read-alouds •Writing in different voices •Finding livelier words •Sentence combining

Content Rubric Points Descriptions Level Four

• Topics/subject is clear, though it may or may not be explicitly stated • Maintains focus on topic/subject throughout the response • Organizational structure establishes relationships between and among ideas and/or events • Consists of a logical progression of ideas and/or events and is unified and complete • Support and elaboration are related to and supportive of the topic/subject • Consists of specific, developed details • Exhibits skillful use of vocabulary that is precise and purposeful • Demonstrates skillful use of sentence fluency

Level 3

• • • • • • •

Topic/subject is generally clear, though it may or may not be explicitly stated May exhibit minor lapses in focus on topic/subject Organizational structure establishes relationships between and among ideas and/or events, although minor lapses may be present

•

Consists of a logical progression of ideas and/or events and is reasonably complete, although minor lapses may be present Support and elaboration may have minor weaknesses in relatedness to and support of the topic/subject Consists of some specific details Exhibits reasonable use of vocabulary that is precise and purposeful Demonstrates reasonable use of sentence fluency

Level 2

• • • • • • •

Topic/subject may be vague May lose or may exhibit lapses in focus on topic/subject Organizational structure may establish little relationship between and among ideas and/or events

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May have major lapses in the logical progression of ideas and/or events and is minimally complete Support and elaboration may have major weaknesses in relatedness to and support of the topic/subject Consists of general and/or undeveloped details, which may be presented in a list-like fashion Exhibits minimal use of vocabulary that is precise and purposeful Demonstrates minimal use of sentence fluency

Level 1

• • • • • • •

Topic/subject is unclear or confusing May fail to establish focus on topic/subject Organizational structure may not establish connection between and among ideas and/or events

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May consist of ideas and/or events that are presented in a random fashion and is incomplete or confusing Support and elaboration attempts to support the topic/subject but may be unrelated or confusing Consists of sparse details Lacks use of vocabulary that is precise and purposeful May not demonstrate sentence fluency

Non Scorable

• This code may be used for compositions that are entirely illegible or otherwise unscorable: blank responses, responses written in a foreign language, restatements of the prompts, and responses that are off- topic or incoherent.

• Non-Scorable (NS) designations are based on one of the following condition codes: – Illegible (entirely) – – – – Blank Written in a language other than English Restatement of the prompt Off-topic/Incoherent

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Conventions

Scores range from 0 – 2 (with 2 being the highest)

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The key words and phrases in this rubric are" reasonable control” for a 2; “minimal control” for a 1; “lacks control” for a 0.

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Conventions involve correctness in sentence formation , usage , and mechanics .

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Although there is one conventions rubric for all three grades, it is understood that the expectations for each grade are based on the standards set forth in the NCSCS.

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The writer has control of grammatical conventions that are appropriate to the writing task.

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Patterns are detected and noted throughout student responses. A single error will NOT affect a score point because the scorers are trained to look for patterns of errors.

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Errors, if present, do not impede the reader’s understanding of the ideas conveyed.

Conventions

North Carolina Writing Assessment Scoring Model Grades 4, 7, and 10 Conventions Rubric Points Descriptions

• • • • • • • • • • • • •

2 Exhibits reasonable control of grammatical conventions appropriate to the writing task Exhibits reasonable control of sentence formation Exhibits reasonable control of standard usage including agreement, tense, and case Exhibits reasonable control of mechanics including use of capitalization, punctuation, and Spelling 1 Exhibits minimal control of grammatical conventions appropriate to the writing task Exhibits minimal control of sentence formation Exhibits minimal control of standard usage including agreement, tense, and case Exhibits minimal control of mechanics including use of capitalization, punctuation, and spelling 0 Lacks control of grammatical conventions appropriate to the writing task Lacks control of sentence formation Lacks control of standard usage including agreement, tense, and case Lacks control of mechanics including use of capitalization, punctuation, and spelling

Let’s Take a Closer Look

1.

Refer to attachment, “Common Errors” 2.

Review common errors evident on the NC Writing Assessment 1.

Write 3 mini lessons on the most common errors and implement mini lessons with students

• • •

Focus on the Following: Sentence Formation: A sentence is an expression of an assertion, explanation proposal, question, or command.

Usage: Standard usage includes agreement, tense, and case.

Mechanics: Mechanics involves the use of capitalization, punctuation, and spelling.

Before you begin scoring,

read the following information on reader bias Reader Bias refers to personal factors that may affect a reader’s perception of a student’s response, but have no basis in a scoring guide. Below are factors that affect some readers but must not be allowed to have an impact on scoring.

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Appearance of Response

The quality of the handwriting, the use of cursive or printing, margins, editing marks, cross outs, and overall neatness are NOT part of the scoring criteria.

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Length of Response

The length of a student’s paper is NOT part of the scoring criteria. Readers should take into consideration only whether the finished piece feels complete and has the components required. The size of a student’s handwriting can make a paper look longer or shorter on the page than it actually is.

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Repetition of Response

Although readers may tire of reading several papers on the same topic, it is important to remember that for each student the response represents a unique attempt.

Reader Bias Continued….

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Offensive or Disturbing Content

If a student adopts a sexist or racist point of view, or perhaps takes a naïve or narrow approach to a topic, readers should not let the student’s point of view affect the score.

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Unusual Approaches to the Prompt

It is tempting to want to reward an especially creative approach to a prompt, a poem for example, or a slant on the topic no one else has used. Readers should remember that an unusual or creative attempt alone does not necessarily constitute an upper level paper.

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Response to Prompt

For this assessment, students are free to respond any way they choose. There is no right or wrong “answer” as long as the student is attempting to reply to the prompt.

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Reactions to Style

A reader’s own grammatical biases should not play a part in assigning a score if the student has not violated standard writing conventions.

Online Interactive Scoring System

• • • The purpose of the Online Interactive Scoring System is to provide teachers, administrators, parents, and students the opportunity to practice applying the North Carolina Writing Assessment Scoring Model to student responses. This program intends to assist stakeholders in the application of the North Carolina Writing Assessment at Grades 4, 7, and 10 Scoring Model.

Link to the website below and review student exemplars that exhibit levels 1 – 4. (Choose grade level taught) Based on the NC Writing Rubric, write a brief synopsis of why each student exemplar received the assigned score according to state standards. Then, read the state annotations and make comparisons to your own evaluation. Note similarities and differences and refer back to the rubric for documentation.

Click here to retrieve the Online Interactive Scoring System

You Have Completed Module 1!

In order to receive CEU credit, the following must be completed and submitted to Anna Frost at Fuller via the courier:

(Total CEU Credit = 1.5)

• Complete the graphic organizer, “Beliefs, Strategies, and State Standards” (.05) • Read the articles, make annotations directly on each article, write a reflection based on the articles, write a lesson plan, implement with students, and write a reflection on its effectiveness (.8 CEU’s) Note: Include annotated articles and examples of student work for full credit • Read the attachment, “Common Errors”, write 3 mini lessons on the most common errors (sentence formation, mechanics, usage), implement with students, and include examples of student work (.45 CEU’s) • Read student exemplars that exhibit levels, write a brief synopsis on each student exemplar, and make comparisons to your own evaluation. (.2 CEU’s)

Additional Modules Available!



Use Student Exemplars to Improve Student Writing

(.5 CEU’s) 

Simulate the Scoring Process Using Writing Benchmarks

(.4 CEU’s) 

Hooking the Reader – The key to mastering the writing test!

(.4 CEU’s) 

Using Appropriate Transitional Words and Phrases (

.3 CEU’s) 

Create Writing Prompts using “RAFTS”

(.3 CEU’s) 

Create Vivid Noun and Verb Combinations

(.3 CEU’s)

NOTE: Videotape a lesson and receive an additional 2 hours per lesson