1. Elementary PARCC Practice Tests Instructional Implications
PARCC has posted practice test for both English Language Arts and Mathematics for every grade level/course in high school mathematics
In English Language Arts they items are Performance-based Assessments; in mathematics, the items are end-of-year.
They are on the PARCC website

2. Click Maryland Professional Learning Resources
Session Materials
msde.blackboard.com
Click Maryland Professional Learning Resources

3. Session Materials
Click Here

4. Click Session Information
Session Materials
Click Session Information

5. For this session select A103
Click A103

6. Session Focus
Explore PARCC sample assessments and collaborate to determine instructional implications

7. Questions
If you have questions any time during the session, feel free to ask.
If we are unsure we will put the question in the PARKING LOT and consult a MSDE representative for an answer.

8. Who are we? Beth Brandenburg Dr. Nicole Gavin
Central Office Lead Teacher for Ele. Math
Lead teacher/ staff developer
Washington County Public Schools
Baltimore City School
Twitter: @brandeli1974

9. Who are we?
PK-2 Teacher 3-5 Teacher Support teacher Administrator Central Office Other…

10. https://www. polleverywhere. com/multiple_choice_polls/FFbqkv6bodIsxrw

11. Keep in Mind…
We are in transition to PARCC, we don’t have all of the answers, but we have resources to support all stakeholders as we make this transition.

12. https://www. polleverywhere. com/multiple_choice_polls/zyaovGCowEDdhUT

13. Purpose of the Practice Tests
Format
Types of Assessment Items
Professional Learning
Familiarizing stakeholders with the PARCC assessment.
It is important that the practice tests not be seen as “teaching to the test”. In fact, by providing practice tests, teacher should be looking at them through the lens of instructional implications.
Here is the link to the practice tests for those that have laptops and tablets.
In terms of format: reading text on line, information presented in multiple media, Part A and B questions… Have participants discuss what other format issues might require instructional changes
Developing assessment items, (like the assessment items on PARCC,) that require students to apply their content knowledge, think critically, and explain their thinking. Have participants discuss how their assignments, questions, and activities may need to change
Messaging for students that they must read text carefully, closely, and more than once. Messaging for students that they must know math content and be able to apply it in authentic situations, and what fluency in mathematics means.
Professional Learning: Providing teachers the opportunity to analyze assessment items:
What knowledge and skills students must master
What type of instruction is required for students to master the skills and knowledge
The importance of time for insuring students can develop conceptual understanding
The need for all teachers to see what is being asked of students…

14. PARCC Tutorial
At your own pace, go through the PARCC tutorial to familiarize yourself with the available tools.
Click on TUTORIAL

15. Tutorial – Think about…
Do you feel that the tutorial could be beneficial to different stakeholders (parents, teachers, students, etc…)? Why or why not?

16. Accessibility Features
Available to all students (i.e., not limited to students with IEPs, 504 plans, or ELs), but will be selected and “turned on” by a school-based educator prior to the assessment, based on each student’s Personal Needs Profile (PNP).
Based on each student’s individual needs, a PNP is created for the student to ensure that he or she receives appropriate access without the distraction of other tools and features that are not required by the student.
Although a school-based educator will enable specific accessibility features for students, the student will decide whether or not to use the feature. Accessibility features will be readily available on the computer-delivered testing platform.
Individualizing access needs for the assessment provides increased opportunities for each student to accurately demonstrate knowledge and skills, and will reduce the chances of giving students incorrect accommodations or supports on the day of the test. Examples of accessibility features include: answer masking, background/font color, line reader, etc.
Expanding Access: A Teacher’s Guide

17. MATHEMATICS

18. Thinking About Math
As we explore the content of the math items, think about…
Which mathematical practices would students apply to each test item to reach proficiency?
What are the implications for instruction?

19. PARCC Task Types I II III Task Type Standards Scoring
Task Type
Test
Standards
Scoring I
Tasks assessing concepts, skills, and procedures
PBA
EOY
Major Content/Clusters
Supporting Content/Clusters
Additional Content/Clusters
Machine Scored II
Tasks assessing expressing mathematical reasoning
Practices 3 & 6
All Major Content Standards
Hand Scored
III
Tasks assessing modeling/applications
Practices 4
All Content Standards
Practices (1, 2, 5, 7, and 8)

20. PARCC Assessment
Performance Based Assessment (PBA) March 2 to 27, 2015 Math Task Types – I, II, III End of the Year Assessment (EOY) April 20 to May 15, 2015 Math Task Type – I only

21. What is available from PARCC for Math?
Sample Items – These are grade banded (3-5) with some performance based tasks for math.
Practice Test – Grade leveled, End of the year only practice assessment (task type 1 – machine scoreable).

22. SAMPLE ITEMS Take a look at the 6 sample items for 3-5 math.
Which questions are performance based questions?
Note: Performance Based Tasks for math will be released this fall.
Click on SAMPLE ITEMS

23. #3
Grade 3 (3.NBT.2, 3.OA.4, 3.MD.7B)

24. #5
Grade 4 (4.OA.1,2,3)

25. #6
Grade 5 (5.MD.5c)

26. PRACTICE TEST Practice tests are end-of-year (EOY).
Let’s take a look at some examples from the practice test for grade 4.
The examples represent some of the focus clusters
If participants have tablets or laptops they can actually look at all of the items online. Hard copy examples are provided for discussion purposes or for those who do not have access to a tablet or laptop. The items selected reflect two of the focus domains/clusters: Ratio and proportional reasoning and expressions and equations.
Click on PRACTICE TEST

27. PBA, EOY, or Both?
How do we know which assessment each standard will be tested on? PARCC BLUEPRINTS & TEST SPECS ALSO CALLED THE EVIDENCE TABLES

29. Thinking About Math
As we explore the content of the math items, think about…
Which mathematical practice would students apply to each test item to reach proficiency?
What are the implications for instruction?

30. Standards for Mathematical Practices

31. ENGLISH LANGUAGE ARTS/LITERACY

32. Optional/Flexible Assessments
PARCC Assessment Design English Language Arts/Literacy and Mathematics, Grades 3-11
Optional/Flexible Assessments
Performance-Based
Assessment (PBA)
Extended tasks
Applications of concepts and skills
End-of-Year
Assessment
Innovative, computer-based items
Diagnostic Assessment
Early indicator of student knowledge and skills to inform instruction, supports, and PD
Mid-Year Assessment
Performance-based
Emphasis on hard-to-measure standards
Potentially summative
Direct participants to locate ELA Session 10 Handout #2.
This graphic represents the PARCC gr assessment design. The PARCC design calls for 4 assessments throughout the school year plus a speaking and listening assessment in ELA. Several states felt like 4 assessments would be too costly and time consuming so the model was rewritten to allow some flexibility. Now there are required components and optional components.
Point to the area circles in red. This indicates the Two summative, required assessment components designed to:
Make “college- and career-readiness” and “on-track” determinations, 
Measure the full range of standards and full performance continuum, and
Provide data for accountability uses, including measures of growth.
The first two non-summative, optional assessment components designed to:
Generate timely information for informing instruction, interventions, and professional development during the school year.
An additional third non-summative component will assess students’ speaking and listening skills
This graphic is printed on the participant handout.
Summative,
Required assessment
Interim, optional assessment
Speaking And Listening
Assessment
Locally scored
Non-summative, required
Confidential - Not for Distribution

33. PARCC Terms
Have teams share answers or use this slide to self-check.

34. PARCC Terms
Use this slide to self check. Encourage participants to use this resource sheet when meeting with their school team tomorrow. Let them know that their principal will also have a copy but the principal did not receive the indepth discussion on PARCC that the ELA representative received.

35. What type of question? Question type:
Ask: Is this an example of a TECR, an EBSR or a PCR? Answer: EBSR
Ask: What does EBSR stand for? Answer: Evidence based selected response item
EBSRs will appear on both the PBA and EOY assessments.
Alignment: Items can be aligned to more than one standard. A single EBSR may be aligned to 2 or more evidence statements.
This item measures two standards:
Standard RL.10.4: Determine the meaning of words and phrases as they are used in the text, including figurative and connotative meaning; analyze the cumulative impact of specific word choices on meaning and tone (e.g., how it sets a formal or informal tone).
Standard RL.10.1: Cite strong and thorough textual evidence to support analysis of what the text says explicitly as well as inferences drawn from the text.
Scoring: State that sometimes EBSRs can be scored for partial credit and sometimes they are scored for full or no credit only. In this particular case this question is not scored for partial credit so it is either all correct or partially correct.

36. What type of question? Question type:
Ask: Is this an example of a TECR, an EBSR or a PCR? Answer: TECR
Ask: What does TECR stand for? Answer: Technology Enhanced Constructed Response
These questions can take many different forms. Drag and drops, highlights, graphic organizers, etc. are just a few types. TECRs will appear on both the PBA and EOY assessments.
Alignment: Items can be aligned to more than one standard. A single TECR may be aligned to 2 or more evidence statements.
This item measures two standards:
Standard RL.6.3: Describe how a particular story’s or drama’s plot unfolds in a series of episodes as well as how the characters respond or change as the plot moves toward resolution.
Standard RL.6.1: Cite textual evidence to support analysis of what the text says explicitly as well as inferences drawn from the text.
Scoring: State that sometimes TECRs can be scored for partial credit and sometimes they are scored for full or no credit only. In this particular case this question is scored for partial credit. 2 points are awarded if the 2 sentences provide evidence for an adjective that correctly describes the character. 1 point is awarded if only 1 sentence provides evidence for an adjective that correctly describes the character.

37. What type of question? Question type:
Ask: Is this an example of a TECR, an EBSR or a PCR? Answer: PCR
Ask: What does PCR stand for? Answer: Prose Constructed Response
Alignment: Items will be aligned to both reading and writing standards. A single PCR may be aligned to 2 or more evidence statements. Consult Task Generation Models to see how the reading standards can be used in combination for the creation of PCRs. Remember that PCRs also measure writing and language standards.
This item measures:
5 writing standards: W.7.2, W.7.4, W.7.7, W.7.8, W.7.9
3 language standards: L.7.1, L.7.2, L.7.3
2 reading standards: RI.7.1 & RI.7.8
Scoring: PCRs will be scored for both reading and writing. See the rubric for details.

38. PARCC ELA/Literacy Assessments
The ELA/Literacy PBAs at each grade level will include three tasks: a research simulation, a literary analysis, and a narrative task. For each task, students will be asked to read one or more texts, answer several short comprehension and vocabulary questions, and write an essay that requires them to draw evidence from the text(s).
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.
As Handout #2 shows, the summative assessment is made up of two parts. The ELA/Literacy Performance Based Assessment administered in a window that is approximated ¾ of the way through the school year and an End of Year assessment given closer to the end of the school year. The PBA will have both machine and human scored items and the EOY will be made up of all machine scored items.
Discuss the information about each of the types of assessments that appears on the slide.

39. Approx. Min./Max. Passage Length
Grades 3 – – 800 words
Grades 6 – – 1,000 words
Grades 9 – – 1,500 words
Extended =
Upper End
The assessment designers are using the following guidelines for passage length when selecting text for the assessments. The reading selections that approach or exceed the upper end of the range are considered extended selections.
In addition, passage reviewers are rating the texts to assure that the selections a student meets during assessment meets the criteria for a range of text complexity within a grade band. When selecting texts they rate each piece as readily accessible, moderately complex or very complex.

40. Designing the ELA/Literacy PBAs
Three types of tasks
Narrative Writing
Literary Analysis
Research Simulation
PARCC assessment designers created Task Generation Models (TGM) for each type of task above to guide and focus test development
In this slide we call out the 3 types of tasks that each student in grades 3-11 will complete during the PBAs. These were also on slide 6.
Click: We introduce the term Task Generation Models on this slide. These TGMs are like recipes and can help us see how we can integrate the standards to create meaningful experiences for students.

41. Task Generation Model (TGM)
For each type of task on the PBA test the TGM tells how many texts, how many EBSRs (Evidence Based Selected Response), TECR (Technology Enhanced Constructed Response), and PCR (Prose Constructed Responses) for each grade level.

42. PBA - 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. 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.
Let’s explore each of the 3 types of tasks more closely and then look at sample TGMs to see how they will focus the assessment.
The first type of task that we will discuss is the narrative task. Talk through the information on this slide.

43. Now let’s look at the Task Generation Model for Narrative writing
Now let’s look at the Task Generation Model for Narrative writing. In this case, there is only one Task Generation Model for all grades To orient ourselves to the organization of a TGM we’ll move from top to bottom of this example. This is Handout #3 for this session. The top of the TGM always has the type and specific coding for the task. Under this blue heading is the overall focus of the task. Who can tell me the focus for this task? Task type reiterates which of the 3 types of task this matches. The next row identifies the grade level. In this case it is used in all grades. The next row identifies the number and type of texts that will be read or viewed in this task model. Here we see that the students will read one short text. The next rows tell us how many PCRs will be written and what standards they will measure. Text complexity is determined and entered in the next row. Texts selected for these tasks may meet one of the three text complexity levels described earlier. Next we see the total number of EBSR and TECR items that will be used to measure comprehension of the text. The last row, is the recipe. It takes the ingredients from the earlier rows and tells you how to put them together. Call on an individual to read the narrative task recipe.

44. PBA - Literary Analysis Tasks
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. This task will ask students to carefully consider literature worthy of close study and compose an analytic essay.
The second type of task on the PBA is the Literary Analysis Task. Go over the info on this slide.

45. Grade 4 Literary Analysis Tasks
Task Generation Models
Analysis of structural elements
Central Idea/Lesson of literature
Character(s), setting(s) or event (s)
Authors’ study
Connecting a text and a companion visual or oral presentation of that text
ELEMENTARY ONLY SLIDE
In narrative writing, we only had one focus. The students will always be writing a narrative that is stimulated by the short reading that proceeds it.
In literary analysis, the task can be focused in a number of ways. The grade level standards determine that focus. We will look at this through the lens of one grade in our grade band. Look at the different ways that the Task Generation Models can focus the task. Each student will be doing only one of these tasks but in the variety of test forms, your students as a whole body will be experiencing tasks from all of these models.

46. Elementary Slide Only
Direct students to Handout #4 for this session. Go through this task using the top down method introduced in the narrative TGM. Draw attention to the targeted standards in both the PCR and in the EBSR/TECRs. We didn’t see this in the narrative task. The ingredients are much more specific. Ask how these make sense and work together. Engage participants by having them recount the recipe in the bottom row.
Emphasize that we are viewing only 1 example of the literary analysis tasks. They can view the TGM for each focus by accessing the full document on the PARCC website.

47. PBA - Research Simulation Task
The Research Simulation Task is an assessment component worthy of student preparation because it asks students to exercise the career- and college- readiness skills of observation, deduction, and proper use and evaluation of evidence across text types.
In this task, 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 one/two analytic essays.
The third type of PBA task that each student will complete is a research simulation task. Discuss information on this slide.

48. Grade 4 Research Simulation Tasks
Task Generation Models
Analyzing the relationship between a series of concepts
Analyzing the role of illustrations
Elementary Slide Only
The research simulation tasks will be focused around the emphasis of the standards for the grade that they are being designed to assess. Look at the areas of focus for this grade.

49. Elementary Slide Only
Take a close look at Handout #5 for this session. How many readings would this task be based on? Note that the extended reading would be based on the upper end of the guidelines for text selection. Also note that one of the readings could be multi-media. What are the standards that must be covered in the PCR? What are the standards that must be covered in the EBSR and TECRs? Read the recipe for construction of the task.

50. Thinking About ELA
As we explore the content of the ELA items, think about..
Which ELA strands/standards would students apply to each test item to reach proficiency?
What are the implications for instruction?

51. Research Simulation – Gr. 4
The example we will look at is from fourth grade. It is a research simulation that reflects the literacy standards for science and technical subjects. There are three texts for students.

52. The Texts “The Wild Horses of Assateague Island” Video
“Wild Ponies of Chincoteague”
Read/view the texts, and answer the questions.
Discuss the skills and knowledge required by students to respond to the questions and essay

53. Thinking About ELA
As we explore the content of the ELA items, think about..
Which ELA strands/standards would students apply to each test item to reach proficiency?
What are the implications for instruction?

54. Putting it all Together…

55. Think About…
Now that we have explored the PARCC website and talked about implications for instruction, how do you see this resource being used with ALL Stakeholders?

56. Other Resources
PARCC Prototypes
Mathematics
ELA/Literacy

57. New PARCC information

58. PARCC Update Alerts
Click Sign Up

59. Thank you! Questions?