Core Content for Writing Assessment

Academic Expectation 1.11:      Students write using appropriate forms, conventions, and styles to communicate ideas and information to different audiences for different purposes.

Introduction 

The ability to communicate ideas clearly through writing will benefit the student throughout formal education and life.  Fluency and proficiency in writing are essential in an age of complex communication systems.  Writing can express learning across content areas and serve as an effective learning tool.  Writing in schools consists of three broad categories:  writing to learn, writing to demonstrate learning to the teacher, and writing to communicate ideas to authentic audiences for authentic purposes.  The state writing assessment focuses on writing in a variety of real-world forms for a variety of realistic purposes and audiences.  To generate and develop their ideas, students will engage in a writing process: prewriting, drafting, revising, editing, and publishing. Criteria for good writing are applied throughout the grade levels and content areas to help students develop effective communication skills.  The Kentucky writing assessment requires students to perform in on-demand writing as well as in writing portfolios.  On-demand writing requires students to produce, within time constraints, a single response to a prompt.  The writing portfolio requires students to produce writing relevant to their learning across the curriculum.  For the portfolio, students select samples of different kinds of writing produced over time: reflective, personal, literary, and transactive.

On-Demand Writing Assessment

The purpose of Kentucky’s on-demand writing assessment is to determine if students can independently apply skills and knowledge of the writing criteria.  Under supervision in a testing situation, students produce a single response to a prompt, written in a single, limited time frame.  Prompts provide a context which includes an audience, purpose, and form for the piece of writing.  The prompts are structured to elicit student writing which narrates an event, persuades, or responds to text, graphic, or chart.  Students in grade 4 respond to the prompt in the form of a letter or article.

Portfolio Writing Assessment

Students choose from their best writings, produced in all of their classes over several months or even previous school years, pieces for the writing portfolio part of the assessment.  Kentucky educators established the writing portfolio content requirements to broaden the writing experiences of Kentucky students.  Students in grade 4 will include four pieces in the writing portfolio, one piece from each category (reflective, personal, literary, transactive).  At least one of the four pieces must come from a study area other than English/language arts. 

NOTE: Kentucky student samples of the four kinds of writing at each performance level may be found in the Writing Portfolio Scoring Teacher’s Handbook, Grade 4, March 1999.

WRITING CATEGORIES

 Reflective Writing

Reflective writing includes the writer’s examination of his/her writing skills, abilities, approaches, and products. The    reflective form in the portfolio is the Letter to the Reviewer, which contains discussion of the student’s personal growth as a writer and reflection on pieces in the portfolio.

Characteristics of reflective writing/Letter to the Reviewer may include discussion of:

·         goals as a writer

·         growth as a writer through the years

·         influences (who and/or what) on the writer’s progress and growth 

·         strategies used during the development of pieces

·         selection of portfolio pieces 

·         application of writing process (prewriting, drafting, revising, editing, publishing)

Personal Writing

Personal writing focuses on the life experiences of the writer. Personal forms in the portfolio may include a personal narrative (focusing on the significance of a single event) or memoir (focusing on the significance of the relationship of the writer with a particular person, place, animal, or thing).

Characteristics of personal writing may include:

·         development of ideas based on personal experience

·         sensory details

·         writer’s thoughts and feelings

·         first person point-of-view

·         dialogue where appropriate

Literary Writing

Literary writing artfully communicates with the reader about the human condition. Literary forms in the portfolio include poems, short stories, and scripts. 

Characteristics of literary writing may include:

·         literary elements of the selected form (e.g., short story--character;  poem--rhythm; script--stage directions)

·         descriptive language

·         literary devices (e.g., personification, end rhyme, similes, metaphors)

·         effective ordering of events, impressions, and descriptions

·         creation of an effect (e.g., comedy, suspense, horror)

·         focus on engaging an audience

Transactive Writing

Transactive writing is informative/ persuasive writing that presents ideas and information for authentic audiences to accomplish realistic purposes like those students will encounter in their lives. In transactive writing, students will write in a variety of forms such as the following:

·         letters

·         speeches

·         editorials

·         articles in  magazines, academic journals, newspapers

·         proposals

·         brochures

·         other kinds of practical workplace writing

Characteristics of transactive writing may include:

·         text and language features typical of the selected form

·         information to engage the reader and to clarify and justify purposes

·         idea(s) to communicate the specific purpose for an intended audience

·         explanation and support to help the reader understand the author’s purpose

·         well-organized idea development and support (e.g., facts, examples, reasons, comparisons, anecdotes, descriptive detail, charts, diagrams, photos/pictures) to accomplish the specific purpose

·         effective conclusions