PARCC
ELA/Literacy
Assessment
Are we ready for
2014-2015 ?
Jennifer Walker, ELA
Instructional Consultant
j.walker@mahoningesc.org
330.965.7828, 1116
The Future of
Assessments & the
Implications for
Our Teaching
PARCC Assessment Information
What Are the Three Shifts at the Heart
of PARCC Design (and the Standards)?
•
Complexity: Regular practice with complex text
and its academic language.
•
Evidence: Reading and writing grounded in
evidence from text, literary and informational.
•
Knowledge: Building knowledge through content
rich nonfiction.
See PARCC PowerPoint Overview of the New
ELA/Literacy Sample Items (scroll to the bottom of the page
for the link)
Assessment Design
English Language Arts/Literacy and Mathematics, Grades 3-11
2 Optional Assessments/Flexible Administration
Diagnostic Assessment
•Early indicator of
student knowledge and
skills to inform
instruction, supports,
and PD
•Non-summative
Mid-Year Assessment
•Performance-based
•Emphasis on hard-tomeasure standards
•Potentially
summative
Performance-Based
Assessment (PBA)
• Extended tasks
• Applications of
concepts and skills
• Required
Speaking And Listening Assessment
•Locally scored
•Non-summative, required
End-of-Year
Assessment
•Innovative, computerbased items
•Required
Round 1 – Performance Based
Assessments
Focus of the
Assessments
Performance
Based
Assessments
(PBA)
(administered
after
approximately
75% of the
school year)
Writing
effectively
when
analyzing text
Performance
Based
Components
Literary
Analysis
Research
Simulation
Narrative
Expectations
For each task, students will be
asked to read one or more
texts, answer several short
comprehension and vocabulary
questions.
Students will write an essay
that requires them to draw
evidence from the text(s).
Standards NOT Assessed in
the PBAs
Grade
RL
RI
W
SL
3
RL 6
RI 6
W9
SL 1-6
4
RL 6
SL 1-6
5
RL 6
SL 1-6
6
RL 6
SL 1-6
7-9
SL 1-6
10
RL 6
SL 1-6
11
RL 6
SL 1-6
• RL & RI 10 will be assessed through the complexity of the texts students
will be given to read.
• The Speaking & Listening Assessment has been postponed until 2015-2016.
Round 2 – End-of-Year Summative
Assessment
Focus of the
Assessments
End-of-Year
Summative
Assessment
(EOY)
(administered
after
approximately
90% of the
school year)
Performance
Based
Components
Reading
Session1
comprehen
-sion
Session 2
Expectations
The ELA/Literacy EOYs at each
grade level will include 4-5 texts,
both literary and informational
(including social
science/historical, scientific, and
technical texts at grades 6-11).
A number of short-answer
comprehension and vocabulary
questions will also be associated
with each text.
ELA/Literacy Assessment Times
Grade(s)
PBAs
3
4-5
6-11
EOY
Grade(s)
3
4-5
6-11
Estimated Time
on Task
(minutes)
Estimated Time
on Task
(minutes)
Estimated Time
on Task
(minutes)
Estimated Time
on Task
(minutes)
Estimated Time
on Task
(minutes)
Estimated Time
on Task
(minutes)
Literary
Analysis
50
Research
Simulation
60
Narrative
80
80
50
80
85
50
Session 1
60
Session 2
60
70
70
70
70
40
Reporting Categories
Results of the ELA/Literacy assessments will be reported
in three major categories:
1.Reading and comprehending a range of sufficiently
complex texts independently
2.Writing effectively when using and/or analyzing
sources.
3.ELA/Literacy based on a composite of students’
reading and writing scores.
•Students will receive both a scale score and performance level
scores for ELA/Literacy, and scale scores for the reading and
writing categories.
Performance Level Descriptors
Performance Level Descriptors or PLDs describe what
students at each performance level know and can do
relative to grade-level or course content standards
assessed.
PLDs capture how all students perform show
understandings and skill development across the
spectrum of standards and text complexity levels
assessed.
ELA/Literacy Grade Specific PLDs
5 Levels of Student
Performance
• Level 5: Students performing at this level demonstrate a
•
•
•
•
distinguished command of the knowledge, skills, and practices
embodied by the Common Core State Standards assessed at
their grade level.
Level 4: Students performing at this level demonstrate a strong
command.
Level 3: Students performing at this level demonstrate a
moderate command.
Level 2: Students performing at this level demonstrate a
partial command.
Level 1: Students performing at this level demonstrate a
minimal command.
Three Question Types
Evidence Based Selected Response (EBSR)
Rigorous multiple choice questions
Part A and Part B questions ask students to
show the evidence in a text that led them to a
previous answer.
Addresses multiple standards.
EBSR Questions
Scoring:
2 points are awarded when the student
correctly chooses the answer to Part A and the
answer to Part B.
1 point is awarded when the student correctly
chooses the answer to Part A but incorrectly
answers Part B.
No points are awarded when the student
answers both Part A and Part B incorrectly, or
the student answers only Part B correctly.
Part A Question:
In the excerpt from Brian’s Winter,
Brian comes to a major realization at
the end of the passage. Which
statement best describes his realization?
a. He needs to avoid confronting wild
animals.
b. He needs to prepare for the perils of
winter. *
c. He needs to create a better way to
store food.
d. He needs to find a new, safer shelter.
RL 8.3
Part B Question:
Which detail best supports the answer
in Part A?
a. “The bear...turned back to ransacking
the camp, looking for where that
delicious smell had come from.”
(paragraph 15)
b. “He would have to find some way to
protect himself, some weapon.”
(paragraph 19)
c. “He kept putting wood on the fire,
half afraid the bear would come ack.”
(paragraph 20)
d. “...he had missed the warnings that
summer was ending...and what was
coming would be the most dangerous
thing he had faced...” (paragraph 21)*
RL 8.1
Three Question Types
Technology Enhanced Constructed Response (TECR)
This ELA/literacy item uses technology to capture
student comprehension of texts in authentic ways
that have been historically difficult to capture using
current assessments.
Examples include using drag and drop, cut and
paste, and highlight text features.
Addresses multiple standards.
Sample TECR Question
Three Question Types
Prose Constructed Response (PCR)
Item type on the PARCC ELA/literacy assessments in
which students are required to produce written prose
(essay) in response to a test prompt.
These measure reading and writing claims.
The writing prompts are in response to the texts, and
are never isolated from the reading.
Sample PCR Prompt
Research Simulation PCR, Grade 3
You have read two texts about famous people in American
history who solved a problem by working to make a change.
Write an article for your school newspaper describing how Eliza
and Carver faced challenges to change something in America.
In your article, be sure to describe in detail why some
solutions they tried worked and others did not work.
Tell how the challenges each one faced were the same and how
they were different.
Standards Assessed on Grade 3
Research Simulation PCR Prompt
PARCC Assessment
Claim: Written
Expression
W 3.2
W 3.4
W 3.5
W 3.6
W 3.7
W 3.8
PARCC Assessment
Claim: Convention
and the Knowledge
of Language
L 3.2
L 3.3
PARCC Assessment
Claim - Reading
Information
RI 3.1
RI 3.3
RI 3.9
PBAs- What Are the Expectations
of the Three Tasks?
Narrative Task
The Narrative Task broadens the way in which students may
use this type of writing. Narrative writing can be used to convey
experiences or events, real or imaginary.
Students will be given one text, either fiction or nonfiction.
In this task, students may be asked to write a story, detail a
scientific process, write a historical account of important
figures, or to describe an account of events, scenes or objects,
for example.
Example of 6th Grade Narrative Task
PBAs- What Are the Expectations
of the Three Tasks?
Literary Analysis
Students will be given two literary texts with a common
theme or subject. This task will ask students to carefully
consider literature worthy of close study and compose an
analytic essay.
The Literature Task plays an important role in honing
students’ ability to read complex text closely, a skill that
research reveals as the most significant factor
differentiating college-ready from non-college-ready readers.
Example of 10th Grade Literary Analysis Task
PBAs- What Are the Expectations
of the Three Tasks?
Research Simulation
Students will demonstrate the career- and collegereadiness skills of observation, deduction, and proper use
and evaluation of evidence across text types.
Students will analyze an informational topic presented
through several articles or multimedia stimuli, the first text
being an anchor text that introduces the topic.
Students will engage with the texts by answering a series
of questions and synthesizing information from multiple
sources in order to write two analytic essays.
Example of 7th Grade Research Simulation Task
Word Count Guidelines for ELA/Literacy
Assessment Reading Passages
Grade Band
Minimum/Maximum Passage Length for Literary
and Informational Text/Literary Nonfiction
3-5
6-8
9 - 11
200 – 800 words
400 – 1,000 words
500 – 1,500 words
Implications for teaching—Are we providing our
students with a balance of short and long texts?
Do our students have the stamina to read longer
texts during a standardized testing situation?
Next Steps…
What We Should Be
Observing in Classrooms
Class Materials
& Instructional
Resources
Reading lists should be balanced:
• literature (e.g. stories, novels, poetry, drama, myths,
Shakespeare, American and British lit.)
• informational texts (e.g. historical and scientific texts,
technical texts, literary nonfiction)
• short and long texts
• texts at students’ independent, instructional and
frustration reading levels
Teacher
Knowledge &
Practice
At least 80% of questions are text-dependent
Student Work
Student work demonstrates close encounters with text
demanding evidence through writing
Questions to Discuss…
Is our curriculum aligned to the CCSS? Continue to
deconstruct the CCSS and better understand how we
will ask students to demonstrate their knowledge and
skills.
How are we integrating fiction, nonfiction, media and
writing? Are our students able to synthesize multiple
texts?
What is the role of writing in our curriculum? Are
students able to write to texts rather than to isolated
prompts?
Questions to Discuss…
Use the Text Complexity checklist to evaluate the texts
used in your curriculum. What texts will remain
appropriate for our students, and which may need to
be moved to another grade level, or simply removed?
Are students being provided opportunities to read and
draft on the computers?
How can we use the PARCC testing philosophies to
guide some of the decisions we make in our instruction
and assessment?
Questions to Consider When
Looking at the PARCC Prototypes
What are the tasks students are asked to complete?
What do we need to understand about the tasks?
What kinds of texts are students being asked to read?
What kinds of questions are students being asked to answer?
What kind of writing are the students expected to construct?
How does the task align to the standards and reflect best practices?
Describe the response items and how they align to the standards and
best practices?
Other implications about this task…
Looking Further into PARCC
Contents of the Grade- and Subject-Specific
Performance Level Descriptors: ELA/Literacy
PARCC Grade and Subject Specific
Performance Level Descriptors (PLDs)
Frequently Asked Questions
PARCC ELA Testing Blueprint
Sample PARCC Online Test