• How can we support our children to be successful on the 2014
Common Core aligned English Language Arts State Exam?

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• Day One: 70 minutes (grades 3 and 4)/90 minutes (grade 5);
30/42 multiple choice questions (5/7 texts)
• Day Two: 70/90 minutes;
- Book 2A: 7 multiple choice questions (off 1 passage);
- Book 2B: 3 short response questions, 1 extended (off 2 texts)
• Day Three: 70/90 minutes:
- 3 passages, 5 short responses, 1 extended
• - 500/700 (grades 3,4) – 800/900 (grade 5)words in length
• - 2 point short response questions: test reading
• - 4 point extended responses: test writing from sources
• - Paired texts related by theme, genre, tone, time period, or other characteristics. For paired texts, students will be expected to synthesize ideas between and draw evidence from both texts.

Multiple-Choice Questions
• Multiple-choice questions are designed to assess Common Core Reading and
Language Standards. They will ask students to analyze different aspects of a given text, including central idea, style elements, character and plot development, and
vocabulary. Almost all questions, including vocabulary questions, will only be answered correctly if the student comprehends and makes use of the whole
passage. For multiple-choice questions, students will select the correct response from four answer choices. Multiple-choice questions will assess Reading Standards in a range of ways. Some will ask students to analyze aspects of text or vocabulary. Many questions will require students to combine skills. For example, questions may ask students to identify a segment of text that best supports the central idea. To answer correctly, a student must first comprehend the central idea and then show understanding of how that idea is supported. Questions will require more than rote recall or identification. Students will also be required to negotiate plausible, textbased distractors. Each distractor will require students to comprehend the whole
passage.
• (A distractor is an incorrect response that may appear to be a plausible correct response to a student who has not mastered the skill or concept being tested.)

Short-Response Questions
• Short-response questions are designed to assess Common Core Reading and
Language Standards. These are single questions in which students use textual
evidence to support their own answers to an inferential question. These questions ask the student to make an inference (a claim, position, or conclusion) based on his or her analysis of the passage, and then provide two pieces of text-based evidence
to support his or her answer. The purpose of the short-response questions is to assess a student’s ability to comprehend and analyze text. In responding to these questions, students will be expected to write in complete sentences. Responses should require no more than three complete sentences. A rubric is used to evaluate these types of responses.
Extended-Response Questions
• Extended-response questions are designed to assess Writing from Sources. They will focus primarily on Common Core Writing Standards. Extended-response questions
will require comprehension and analysis of a text or texts. Many extended-response questions will ask students to express a position and support it with text-based
details. Extended-response questions allow students to demonstrate their ability to
write a coherent essay using textual evidence to support their ideas. Student responses will be evaluated based on Common Core Writing Standards and a student’s command of evidence to defend his or her point.

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To build a foundation for college and career readiness, students:
• Must read widely and deeply from among a broad range of highquality, increasingly challenging literary and informational texts.
• Through extensive reading of stories, dramas, poems, and myths from diverse cultures and different time periods, students gain literary and cultural knowledge as well as familiarity with various text structures and elements
• By reading texts in history/social studies, science, and other
disciplines, students: build a foundation of knowledge in these fields that will also give them the background to be better readers in all content areas.
• Students can only gain this foundation when the curriculum is intentionally and coherently structured to develop rich content knowledge within and across grades.
• Students also acquire the habits of reading independently and closely, which are essential to their future success

To build a foundation for college and career readiness, students need to:
• Learn to use writing as a way of offering and supporting opinions, demonstrating an understanding of the subjects they are studying and conveying real and imagined experiences and events
• Learn to appreciate that a key purpose of writing is to communicate clearly to an external, sometimes unfamiliar audience, and begin to adapt the form and content of their writing to accomplish a particular task and purpose
• Develop the capacity to build knowledge on a subject through research projects and to respond analytically to literary and informational sources
• To meet these goals students must devote significant time and effort to writing, producing numerous pieces over short and extended time frames throughout the year.

To build a foundation for college and career readiness, students:
• Must gain control over many conventions of standard English grammar, usage, and mechanics, as well as learn other ways to use language to convey meaning effectively.
• Must also be able to determine or clarify the meaning of
grade-appropriate words encountered through listening, reading, and media use.
• Come to appreciate that words have non-literal meanings, shadings of meaning, and relationships to other words, and expand their vocabulary in the course of studying content.

• While Speaking and Listening Standards will NOT be assessed on the state test, they remain two of the most important components of college and career readiness and critical building blocks in students’ ability to read and write at grade level.
To build a foundation for college and career readiness, students:
• Must have ample opportunities to take part in a variety of rich, structured conversations—as part of a whole class, in small groups, and with a partner.
• To be productive members of these conversations requires that students contribute accurate, relevant information
• (Shift 4: Text-based Answers); respond to and develop what others have said; and make comparisons and contrasts, analyzing and synthesizing a multitude of ideas in various domains (Shift 2:
Knowledge in the Disciplines).
• The complete CCLS for English Language Arts & Literacy are available at
• http://engageny.org/resource/new-york-state-p-12-common-core-learningstandards/.

Retold by James Bruchac and Joseph Bruchac
• What did Measuring Worm do differently from the others that made her able to save the three bears? Use two details from the story to support your response.

• http://www.engageny.org/sites/default/files/resource/attach ments/grade_4_ela_released_questions.pdf
• Page 19

Students need to be alert for what kind of people characters are:
• What do they want?
• Why do they feel certain ways about situations or other characters?
• What challenges do they face?
• How do they overcome these challenges?
• How do they change?
• What do they achieve?
• What lessons are learned?
• Follow up with: How do you know? What evidence from the text supports your thinking?

• Students should be comfortable making inferences about the
setting and time period based on the details in the text.
• Students will likely need to infer a lesson or theme from the story. They will probably answer a question about how the character changes and how that change happens.
• They will also likely be asked to consider the author’s
perspective, perhaps inferring about what the author hopes to show about the time period, a character, or a lesson.

• Furthermore, across all genres, you’ll want to make sure that students are not only able to discuss an author’s intent, but
to identify the actual craft or structural moves the author made to convey that purpose. For example, the way the text is structured, word choice, use of figurative language or description, and so on).
• • How does the ____ scene contribute to the overall story?
• • Why did the author likely describe ____ as “....”?
• • Which of the following best describes the way (the text) was organized?

When students are asked about big ideas in texts, they might see questions such as:
• • What is the central message of this text? (Third Grade)
• • What is a theme/central message of this text? (Fourth
Grade)
• • Which piece of dialogue supports the story’s main theme
(Fourth Grade)
• Which sentence best describes a theme of this text? (Fifth
Grade)

When students are asked about characters, they might see questions such as:
• • As she waits her turn, how does ____(character) feel about
______(an upcoming event)? Use two details from the story to support your answer. (Third Grade short response)
• • _____ (character) gets angry with ____(other characters) because he thinks they are being…. (Fourth Grade)
• • Which sentence suggests that ____(character) feels it is a bad idea to trust the ____(other characters)? (Fourth Grade)
• • What makes ____(character) ____ (feel a certain way)
_____(while in a specific situation)? Use two details or examples from the passage to support why _____(character)
____(feels this way). (Fifth Grade)

When students are asked questions about words/phrases used in context they might be asked:
• Why is ___(character) “swelling like a blowfish” (description that uses non literal language) in paragraph 39? Use two details from the story to support your response. (Third grade short response question)
• Read these sentences from paragraph 23 of the story. “...”
What does the word “resist” (to figure out the contextual meaning, students need to interpret the character’s feelings and the character’s negative response) mean in these lines?
(Fourth Grade multiple choice)
• When ____(character) says in paragraph 6 that ___(another character) is “not wanting in intelligence,” (a word or phrase that must be determined from context and is likely unfamiliar) he means that she ...(Fifth grade multiple choice)

• Paragraph 3 is most important to the plot of the story because it shows …. (Third Grade multiple choice)
• The story has a third person point of view. Explain why this is a good choice for the story. How does the author develop the characters of____ and ____? (Fourth grade short response)
• Both stories are told from the perspective of an ______ . How does this perspective affect how the stories are told? Compare and contrast how ____ and ______ view their surroundings.
(Fifth Grade)
• The author uses flashback at the beginning because …. (Fifth
Grade multiple choice)

Questions will address grade-specific expectations of the CCSS and may each be designed to assess understanding of more than one standard.
• For example, when students are asked about big ideas in texts, they might see questions such as:
• • What‘s the main idea of this part of the text? (Third Grade)
• • Which details help support the main idea of the text?
(Fourth Grade)
• • Which of the following best summarizes a main idea of the passage? (Fifth Grade)

When students are asked about relationships or interactions between individuals, events, or concepts in a text, they might see questions such as:
• What causes __________ to _________? (Third Grade)
• What can NASA learn from studying people living in Antarctica that would help astronauts? (Fourth Grade)
• The most important feature of a wind tunnel used to test vehicles that can land on Mars is the ability to test how….
(Fifth Grade)

(questions about words/phrases used in context)
• Read this sentence from paragraph 6 of the passage:
If soil crumbles between your fingers, then the weather has probably been dry.
Based on the text, the word crumbles means (Third Grade)
• • What is the meaning of the word “...” as it is used in paragraph 1? (Fourth Grade)
• • Which phrase helps you understand what the word “...” means? (Fifth Grade)

• Read these two sentences from paragraph 5: “Soil in a forest might be gritty, which means more sand.” “Soil in a meadow might be smooth, which means more silt.” Which of the following describes the relationship between these two sentences? (Third Grade)
• How does the author of the “_____” organize her ideas in paragraph ___? (Fourth Grade)
• Explain why the author might have used an _______ to start this informational text. (Fourth/Fifth Grade short response)
• Which statement from “...” gives information about the text structure? (Fifth Grade)

• For third graders
• This work will involve looking at the relationships between sentences to see how authors make points. The CCSS does not yet expect them to think about how an author uses reasons and evidence to support points. Third grade teachers focus the work around argument texts much as they have done around informational―(What is this mostly about? Why does the author seem to have written this? ) in addition to looking closely at how one sentence relates to another, how one part relates to another, etc.

• Read the sentence from the article. “...” (paragraph 3) How does paragraph 7 support this sentence? (Third Grade―this sort of question may be seen in any informational text not necessarily only in an “argumentative text”)
• What reason does the author give to support her point that…?
(Fourth Grade―this sort of question may been seen in any informational text not necessarily only in an “argumentative text”
• Which sentence from the passage best explains why NASA uses wind tunnels to test spacecraft models? (Fifth Grade―this question is asking students what information best supports a central point in the text―it relates to standard 5.8 which is about analyzing the author’s argument. This type of question may be seen in any informational text not necessarily only an “argumentative text”)
• Which sentence supports the reason for the evidence the author discusses in paragraph 10? (Fifth Grade―this sort of question may been seen in any informational text not necessarily only in an
“argumentative text.”)

• What are the first two stanzas of the poem mainly about?
(Third Grade)
• • Which statement supports the idea that the poem uses a particular type of meter to help make its rhythm? (Fourth
Grade)
• • State what the poet tells the readers in the last stanza to make the early stanzas seem even funnier. Explain your answer, referring to both events and elements of the poem.
(Fourth Grade short response)
• • How has the poet created the tone of this poem? (Fifth
Grade)
• • Read this line from the poem. “....” What is the poet describing in this simile? (Fifth Grade)
• • What choice best describes how what happens in stanza ___ is important to the rest of the poem? (Fifth Grade)

Guidelines for Answering Short Response Questions:
• Read the question carefully.
• Ask: ‘What is the question asking me to do?’ Mark up the question to highlight key words and phrases.
• Answer the question, making sure to address all parts.
• Use details from the text to support your answer. Make sure these are specific details and that they clearly reference the text (either by quoting or using the precise vocabulary from the text). You will probably write a sentence that answers the question, then a sentence with specific text-details giving evidence to support one part, then another sentence with specific text-details giving evidence to support another part, and a final sentence about how the evidence connects with your answer.
• Write in complete sentences.
• Your response is not a full essay―it is just 3-5 sentences. Do not restate the question or attempt a fancy introduction or conclusion.

General Categories:
• Narrative: called “ literary ” – may include literary nonfiction
• Informational
• Argumentative

To understand the author’s point of view and purpose
To be able to discern well-supported arguments from those that are not.
To read and analyze opinions and theories with which not all readers may agree.
To find and analyze the author ’ s supporting evidence in subjects that they will encounter both in other academic classes and in their daily lives.

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– Student will need to refer closely to the text to answer selected response and constructed response questions.
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- Students will confront transferable Tier II vocabulary in the passages, in the questions, and in the possible multiple choice responses – their understanding of this vocabulary will support them. They will also confront domain-specific vocabulary and will need to be able to determine meaning within the context of the passage.

Grades
Main Idea
Relationships
3rd 4th 5th main idea of a text main idea of a text two or more main ideas relationship between procedures relationships or interactions
Theme
Scene
Point of View
Arrangements central message theme /central message scene
Communicate
Sequence theme
Multiple scenes Contrasting scenes
Perspective Multiple perspectives
Chronological Classification

3 4 5
3.4 Determine the meaning of words and phrases as they are used in a text, distinguishing literal from non-literal language.
4.4 Determine the meaning of words and phrases as they are used in a text, including those that allude to significant characters found in mythology
5.4 Determine the meaning of words and phrases as they are used in a text, including figurative language such as metaphors and similes.
3.4 Determine the meaning of general academic and domain- specific words and phrases in a text relevant to a grade 3 topic or subject
area.
4.4 Determine the meaning of general academic and domain- specific words or phrases in a text relevant to a grade 4 topic or subject
area.
5.4 Determine the meaning of general academic and domain- specific words and phrases in a text relevant to a grade 5 topic or subject
area.

3.8
Describe the logical connection between particular sentences and paragraphs in a text (e.g., comparison, cause/effect, first/second/third in a sequence).
Read these two sentences from paragraph 5:
“Soil in a forest might be gritty, which means more sand.” “Soil in a meadow might be smooth, which means more silt.”
Which of the following describes the relationship between these two sentences?
A The sentences make a comparison.
B The sentences describe
4.8
Explain how an author uses reasons and evidence to support particular points in a text.
5.8
Explain how an author uses reasons and evidence to support particular points in a text, identifying which reasons and evidence support which point(s).
How does the author of the
“Dust Bowl” Dairy organize her ideas in paragraph 1?
A.By giving her the cause of the Dust Storm and some of the effects
B.By listing some of the areas damaged by the Dust
Storms
C.By listing why dishes and clothes were so dirty
D.By comparing current dust storms with other dust storms
Both stories are told from the perspective of an animal. How does this perspective affect how the stories are told? Compare and contrast how Black
Beauty and the robin view their surroundings

Writing Scoring for the English Language Arts:
• Meaning—the extent to which the response exhibits sound understanding, interpretation, and analysis of the task and text
• Development—the extent to which ideas are supported through the use of specific, accurate, and relevant evidence from the text
• Organization—the extent to which the response exhibits direction, shape, and coherence
• Language Use—the extent to which the response exhibits clear and effective use of vocabulary and sentence structure
• Conventions—the extent to which the response exhibits correct spelling, punctuation, paragraphing, grammar, and usage

• What is the most important thing I should be doing at home?
**The goal is to create flexible and resilient readers who can transfer and apply what they know about reading to a variety of genres and text types. **

• Grade 3: Level O is grade level
• Grade 4: Level R is grade level
• Grade 5: Level U is grade level

• There will be a folder of resources to support your child on the
PS166.org website