The CCSS Reading/Writing Connection
Lisa Shirley Camp, M.Ed., NBCT
A LOT!
Recently released information includes:

A testing blueprint

Item specifications

Phase 1 items and task prototypes
Stay informed by regularly checking the
website: http://parcconline.org
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3.
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.
http://www.parcconline.org/samples/item-taskprototypes
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http://www.parcconline.org/samples/item-task-prototypes
Nine Specific Advances in the
PARCC ELA/Literacy Assessment
Demanded by the Three Core
Shifts. . .
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1.
PARCC builds a staircase of text complexity to ensure students
are on track each year for college and career reading.
2.
PARCC rewards careful, close reading rather than racing
through passages.
3.
PARCC systematically focuses on the words that matter most—
not obscure vocabulary, but the academic language that
pervades complex texts.
http://www.parcconline.org/samples/item-task-prototypes
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4.
PARCC focuses on students rigorously citing evidence
from texts throughout the assessment (including
selected-response items).
5.
PARCC includes questions with more than one right
answer to allow students to generate a range of rich
insights that are substantiated by evidence from text(s).
6.
PARCC requires writing to sources rather than writing to
de-contextualized expository prompts.
7.
PARCC also includes rigorous expectations for narrative
writing, including accuracy and precision in writing in
later grades.
http://www.parcconline.org/samples/item-task-prototypes
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8.
9.
PARCC assesses not just ELA but a full range of
reading and writing across the disciplines of science
and social studies.
PARCC simulates research on the assessment,
including the comparison and synthesis of ideas
across a range of informational sources.
http://www.parcconline.org/samples/item-task-prototypes
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SO. . .
Two standards are always in play—whether
they be reading or writing items, selectedresponse or constructed-response items on any
one of the four components of PARCC. They
are:
 Reading Standard One (Use of Evidence)
 Reading Standard Ten (Complex Texts)
http://www.parcconline.org/samples/item-task-prototypes
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•
•
Evidence-Based Selected Response (EBSR)—Combines a traditional
selected-response question with a second selected-response
question that asks students to show evidence from the text that
supports the answer they provided to the first question.
Underscores the importance of Reading Anchor Standard 1 for
implementation of the CCSS.
Technology-Enhanced Constructed Response (TECR)—Uses
technology to capture student comprehension of texts in authentic
ways that have been difficult to score by machine for large scale
assessments (e.g., drag and drop, cut and paste, shade text, move
items to show relationships).
Range of Prose Constructed Responses (PCR)—Elicits evidence that
students have understood a text or texts they have read and can
communicate that understanding well both in terms of written
expression and knowledge of language and conventions. There are
four of these items of varying types on each annual performancebased assessment.
http://www.parcconline.org/samples/item-task-prototypes
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
Students must grapple
with works of
exceptional craft and
thought whose range
extends across genres,
cultures, and centuries.
English Language Arts

Reading is critical to
building knowledge in
history/social studies as
well as in science and
technical subjects.
College and career
ready reading in these
fields requires an
appreciation of the
norms and conventions
of each discipline.
Science, Social Studies,
and Technical Subjects

Along with highquality contemporary
works, student texts
should be chosen
from among seminal
U.S. documents, the
classics of American
literature, and the
timeless dramas of
Shakespeare.
English Language Arts

The vast majority of
reading in college and
workforce training
programs will be
sophisticated
nonfiction.
Science, Social Studies,
and Technical Subjects

Students gain a
reservoir of literary and
cultural knowledge,
references, and images;
the ability to evaluate
intricate arguments;
and the capacity to
surmount the
challenges posed by
complex texts.
English Language Arts

Students pay attention
to precise details; they
develop the capacity to
evaluate intricate
arguments, synthesize
complex information,
and follow detailed
descriptions of events
and concepts.
Science, Social Studies,
and Technical Subjects

Student writing is a key
means of asserting and
defending claims,
showing what they
know about a subject,
and conveying what
they have experienced,
imagined, thought, and
felt.
English Language Arts

Student writing is a key
means of asserting and
defending claims,
showing what they
know about a subject,
and conveying what
they have experienced,
imagined, thought, and
felt.
Science, Social Studies,
and Technical Subjects

Students must take
task, purpose, and
audience into careful
consideration, choosing
words, information,
structures, and formats
deliberately, combining
elements of different
kinds of writing to
produce complex and
nuanced writing.
English Language Arts

Students must take
task, purpose, and
audience into careful
consideration, choosing
words, information,
structures, and formats
deliberately. They need
to be able to use
technology strategically
when creating, refining,
and collaborating on
writing.
Science, Social Studies,
and Technical Subjects

Students have to
become adept at
gathering information,
evaluating sources, and
citing material
accurately, reporting
findings from their
research and analysis of
sources in a clear and
cogent manner.
English Language Arts

Students have to
become adept at
gathering information,
evaluating sources, and
citing material
accurately, reporting
findings from their
research and analysis of
sources in a clear and
cogent manner.
Science, Social Studies,
and Technical Subjects
In Reading:



building knowledge
ability to evaluate intricate
arguments
the capacity to surmount the
challenges posed by complex
texts
In Writing:



asserting and defending claims,
showing what they know about
a subject, and conveying what
they have experienced,
imagined, thought, and felt
take task, purpose, and
audience into careful
consideration, choosing words,
information, structures, and
formats deliberately
become adept at gathering
information, evaluating
sources, and citing material
accurately, reporting findings
from their research and
analysis of sources in a clear
and cogent manner
PARCC RUBRIC
PARCC RUBRIC
 Using
a highlighter, note the changes in
scoring criteria from 4 to 0 for each writing
trait.
 Take a moment to compare this writing
rubric to rubrics you may have used in the
past to score student writing (a 6 traits
rubric, etc.). Make a t-chart of similarities
and differences in order to discuss your
observations with your table group.
 Choose a person to share your group’s
observations with the whole group.
Those documents describe complex ideas with these
words and phrases:
 Quality, substance, critical, evaluative, self-directed
 Diverse perspectives, multidimensional, multiple
levels of meaning, multiple ideas that intersect,
possibly from multiple texts
 Ambiguous or considers ambiguity, not literal,
nuanced, subtle, abstract
 Depth/breadth, developed over the course of a text
 Express new language/knowledge/mode of thought
Look at the passage “Lincoln’s Second Inaugural
Address,” part of a unit that uses Walden as its
central text. In the unit Lincoln’s speech is
paired with “Civil Disobedience.”

Examine the close reading questions for that
text. Using three different colors, highlight
questions that:
Probe for comprehension
 Ask students to analyze ideas from the text
 Ask students to analyze author’s craft and its impact
on meaning and tone

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PARCC Redefines the Narrative:
 Includes weaving details from the source text
accurately into an original narrative story (students
must draw evidence from the text—character traits
and the events of the story—and apply that
understanding to create a story).
 For students who struggle to create original stories,
the source text provides ideas from which to begin;
for those students who readily create imaginative
experiences, the source provides a means to “jump
off” and innovate.
 Focuses on students applying their knowledge of
language and conventions when writing (an
expectation for both college and careers).
 RSI.2.
Determine two or more central ideas
of a text and analyze their development over
the course of the text, including how they
interact and build on one another (in order)
to provide a complex analysis; provide an
objective summary of the text.
 Make
notes on how this text develops ideas
related to:


The rightful role of government in society
The responsibility of man to address injustice
 Analyze
Lincoln’s treatment of these two
ideas: How are they developed separately?
How do they interact and build on one
another: are they interdependent?
 Your essay should state and support a thesis
that considers how Lincoln uses words and
phrases to deliver a message about these two
ideas. Be sure to support your ideas with
evidence from the text, including noting
places where the text leaves matters
uncertain or unstated.
 Working
with your table group, brainstorm
ideas for a narrative prompt matched to this
text: review the PARCC guidelines for
narrative essays.
 Working
with your table group, brainstorm
ideas for a research task matched to this
text: what other sources might you pair with
Lincoln’s speech?
Read the excerpt of “The Memory Place” by
Barbara Kingsolver.
 In
your table groups, construct close reading
questions that:
Probe for comprehension
 Ask students to analyze ideas from the text
 Ask students to analyze author’s craft and its
impact on meaning and tone
*Kingsolver, Barbara. “The Memory Place.” Of Woods
and Waters: A Kentucky Outdoor Reader, edited by
Ron Ellis. University Press of Kentucky (Lexington,
KY), 2005.

 Using
Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address
and/or the Kingsolver excerpt, work in your
table groups to create writing prompts of the
three types:



Narrative
Literary analysis
Research-based analysis: what sources could you
pair with one or the other of these texts?
 Check
your prompts against the PARCC Rubric
and the CCSS for reading informational texts.
 Write your prompts on chart paper and post
them for a gallery walk.
 Using
sticky notes, read the other groups’
prompts and provide feedback:
 As you make your comments, consider these
questions:



Does the prompt demand a deep understanding
of the text?
Does the prompt give students a chance to meet
the PARCC Rubric criteria? Does it require
development of complex ideas requiring deep
inferences?
Does the prompt appear to connect with at least
ONE of the CCSS for reading informational texts?
 Take
a moment to reflect on our session. Jot
down your thoughts and prepare to share
them. When making notes, consider:




Realizations
Plans to shift instruction
Celebrations of effective current practice
Unanswered questions