Grade 4

Informational

Writing Extended Response

Compose Full Texts

Animal Habitats

Conventions

Evidence/Elaboration

Organization/Purpose

Missing and/or incorrect words in the first sentence cause confusion and make it difficult to assess the sentence formation. In addition, “Like how squirrels nest in trunks” is a sentence fragment.

The missing comma separating independent clauses (“…they fall to the ground and all the animals stuff…”) is the only grade-relevant punctuation error.

Only two sentences in the entire response begin with a capital letter.

There are several grammar usage errors including the incorrect reflexive pronoun “their self” instead of “themselves.” In addition, there is an error with the frequently confused word “your” instead of “you’re.”

There are many spelling errors (e.g., “puttle,” “me” (instead of “be”), “an” (instead of “and”), “squirrles,” and “where ever.” Note that “predators” is not a grade 4 word, although it is in the source materials.

Beyond the somewhat vague definition and example of an ecosystem (&#8220;where ever plant an animals live together&#8221; and &#8220;puddle&#8221;), the supporting information is limited to references to hawks, squirrels, and coral reefs. Some of the details are close copies of the original (e.g., &#8220;hawks swoop down looking for a mouse to eat&#8221;).

The text references are unattributed but do draw from more than one source.

Most of the details show limited attempts to elaborate or develop ideas beyond simple restatement of the information in the sources. However, there is a limited attempt to develop source information with commentary or obvious inference (e.g., &#8220;you may not know this but…&#8221;; &#8220;the animals stuff their self for winter&#8221;).

Vocabulary use is uneven. For example, the word “predator” is used in the source materials to describe beaver shelters, but the writer applies it here to describe fish in coral reefs. Other vocabulary, however, is very general (e.g., &#8220;…an ecosystem can be big or small even hot or cold&#8221;).

There is some attempted style (e.g., &#8220;you may not know this but…&#8221;; &#8220;the animals stuff their self for winter&#8221;).

The response has a narrow and obvious main idea (&#8220;plant [and] animals live is in the ecosystem&#8221;] and focuses on what an ecosystem is and how it helps animals survive.

There are some transitions (&#8220;when your walking…&#8221;; &#8220;like how…&#8221;; &#8220;every once in awhile&#8221;; &#8220;also&#8221;).

The introduction is weak and there is no conclusion.

Although the ideas seem somewhat randomly added, there is enough of a progression of task-appropriate ideas to move this response into the 2 scoring category.

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An annotation is the educator’s explanation of how a portion of the student’s response relates to the rubric and contributes to that trait’s score. For example, the educator might explain how the response meets the expectations of a specific score point. An annotation can also describe aspects of a student response that relate to multiple score points on the rubric to demonstrate nuance when determining a score.

Annotation

One of three traits scored for the ELA performance task full write, this trait measures a student’s ability to demonstrate command of grade-level conventions of standard English: grammar usage (including sentence formation), capitalization, punctuation, and spelling.

This trait measures students’ ability to select and integrate details that support, explain, illustrate, or develop ideas. Students should elaborate these details—that is, explain and connect them, guided by the writing purpose and audience needs.
For informative/explanatory and opinion/argumentative writing purposes, these details come from source materials.
For narrative writing, this trait is called Development/Elaboration, and students are expected to integrate and develop grade-appropriate story elements such as descriptive details and dialogue. For these tasks, events and experiences are inspired by source materials.

This trait measures students’ ability to establish and sustain a focus for the writing. This focus should be consistent with the task’s designated purpose and the intended audience. Strong introductions and conclusions (or, for narrative writing, beginnings and endings) and transitions help to create coherence.

Performance tasks measure a student’s ability to demonstrate critical-thinking and problem-solving skills by challenging students to apply their knowledge and skills to complex, real-world problems. In the performance task, students are presented with a collection of questions and activities connected to a single theme or scenario. These activities ask students to demonstrate capacities such as depth of understanding, writing and research skills, and complex analysis, which cannot be adequately assessed with traditional assessment questions. Performance tasks are taken on a computer (but are not computer adaptive) and take students one to two class periods to complete.

Performance Task

The prompt is the text provided to the student that requests their response. It includes some contextual information, but also includes a specific task that students complete in their writing response.

Prompt

For a deeper dive into the content behind this student response, navigate to the Sample Items Website to access the writing prompt or visit the Content Explorer to learn more about this content area.

Prompt & Target

“Purpose” is the context for a piece of writing, or what the writer intends to accomplish. Students write texts with the following purposes:
<ul>
<li>Narrative (grades 3–8): tell a story</li>
<li>Informational (grades 3–5): present facts or data using source material</li>
<li>Explanatory (grades 6–11): explain a topic or concept by analyzing source materials</li>
<li>Opinion (grades 3–5): present and defend a position</li>
<li>Argumentative (grades 6–11): present an argument using research to form and support claims</li>
</ul>
Purposes have subtle differences depending on grade, and each writing purpose has its own scoring rubric.

Purpose

This text was written by a student in response to a Performance Task writing prompt.

Response

A rubric is a set framework for scorers to reference when determining the quality of student writing. Each trait has its own rubric, and every point value is defined in detail with examples of what to expect from student writing at each level.

Rubric

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Sample Term One

Sample Term Two

Traits are different dimensions of a student response that educators evaluate when scoring. For example, an educator will assess grammar and spelling as part of the Conventions trait (maximum of two score points) but not take grammar or spelling into account when assessing the other traits. This approach ensures that scorers evaluate student writing from multiple angles.

Example for Grade 4: Informational – Animal Habitats - ID: 3955

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