Grade 6

Narrative

Writing Extended Response

Compose Full Texts

Robots

Conventions

Development/Elaboration

Organization/Purpose

There are many run-on sentences from beginning to end, including the second sentence in paragraph 1 (e.g., &#8220;…all went well he made a robot…&#8221;), the first sentence in paragraph 2 (&#8220;he thought to himself&#8230;he sighed…with that he rushed inside…&#8221;), and run-on sentences with dialogue (&#8220;&#8216;…we have to destroy him so the rest will power down&#8217; with that they were…&#8221;).
There are also some “on-and-on” sentences (e.g., the final sentence of the response) that interfere with fluency; however, these there are style weaknesses (with faulty punctuation) but not conventions errors.

There are too many punctuation errors to list; however, the following are representative examples of these errors. Errors with commas are the most obvious, including but not limited to the following: missing commas with the nonrestrictive appositive phrase describing Danny in the first sentence: &#8220;an average young scientist born in Rhode island.&#8221; There are many missing commas in compound sentence constructions (e.g., the final sentence of the response) and/or many missing commas after introductory elements (e.g., &#8220;Danny then fainted and as he woke up he thought to himself…&#8221;). Some missing commas, especially after introductory elements, cause confusion (&#8220;Once they got to it his friends distracted the robot…&#8221;). There are commas missing in a list (&#8220;the TV blared to life stood up and ran off…&#8221;) and missing commas to introduce and finish a quote (&#8220;…news saying &#8216;breaking news…'&#8221; and &#8220;&#8216;…destroy those machines&#8217; Danny said&#8221;). There is a missing question mark (&#8220;how much damage can he do in one hour&#8221;), and some end marks with quotes are misplaced (&#8220;&#8216;were all gonna die&#8217;.&#8221; instead of &#8220;die&#8221; ).

There are some missing capital letters at the beginning of sentences (&#8220;then he realized…&#8221; in paragraph 3 and &#8220;he realized…&#8221; in paragraph 4) and with dialogue (&#8220;…he thought to himself &#8216;hmm how much damage…;&#8221;).

There are errors with frequently confused words, most notably &#8220;we’re,&#8221; which is written as &#8220;were&#8221; and &#8220;where.&#8221; There are some minor shifts in verb tense (e.g., &#8220;he made a robot that acts…&#8221;). There are some minor problems with pronoun references including a confusing reference in the last sentence of paragraph 2 (&#8220;as it ran off&#8221;) and inconsistent pronoun references for the robot, which is referred to as both “he” and “it.”

There are no spelling errors, despite some typos that occasionally cause confusion (e.g., the “y” is missing in “they” in the first sentence of paragraph 4).

Although there are some questions (e.g., why the narrator decided to &#8220;try to make his own HRP-4c robot&#8221;?; how did his robot create/control the other robots?), overall the narrative details develop the events adequately.

Some general details reflect information from source materials (e.g., &#8220;[the robot] was able to play sports with him, watch TV with him, and even ride on him as a car with the click of a few button&#8221;) and adequately contribute to the story.

A variety of dialogue types are used to show the events: Inner dialogue (&#8220;…he thought to himself &#8216;hmm how much damage can he do in one hour'&#8221;); dialogue from the TV (&#8220;&#8216;breaking news an army of electrical units are attacking the state leaving us trapped here on Rhode island. Someone please help us!'&#8221;); and outer dialogue (&#8220;&#8216;There are too many&#8217; Danny yelled over the sound of the blasters&#8221;). Description is adequate. For example, more description would help readers understand some events (e.g., &#8220;the TV blared to life stood up and ran off along with all of his electrical units including his I phone&#8221;; and &#8220;[the robot] acts like a middle age man&#8221;).

Some concrete language enhances the response (e.g., &#8220;[the robot] transformed into an eight foot giant&#8221;; &#8220;the TV blared to life…&#8221;). There is some figurative/sensory language used (e.g., &#8220;an army of electrical units…&#8221;).

The adventure story style is appropriate and mostly maintained (&#8220;That all changed…&#8221;; “Someone help us!”; &#8220;The town was saved…&#8221;).

The conflict occurs when Danny spills coffee on the robot’s manual controls (&#8220;That all changed one day…&#8221;), and the plot is adequately sustained from there with a clear resolution. There are some plot lapses (why did coffee trigger a weaponized robot; why would his first instinct be to run to turn the TV on?), but the narrative structure is overall adequate.

The beginning of the narrative includes sufficient context for the story and introduces the main character Danny (&#8220;an average young scientist born in Rhode island&#8221;).

Basic sequence transitional words/phrases (&#8220;Five minutes later&#8230;&#8221;; &#8220;Then…&#8221;; &#8220;A while later…&#8221;) and more subtle transition strategies (e.g., inner dialogue such as &#8220;How are going to defeat those giant monsters he thought&#8221;) advance the action.

The events are adequately sequenced from beginning to end. There is an introduction of the robot prior to the transformation from the coffee spill. Then we are introduced to the coffee-transformed robot and learn other machines are affected by Danny’s robot, although we don’t know how; Danny contemplates what to do, and he and his friends arm to fight; while fighting the machines, Danny realizes his robot is the source of the machines (the other robots); while distracting Danny’s robot, Danny disables the robot and saves the town. While some of the events are far-fetched (e.g., blasters and armor are conveniently stored in the basement), and there are some minor gaps between events (&#8220;Five minutes later&#8221;: what did Danny do during the 5 minutes before his friends came?), the sequencing is still logical.

The beginning of the narrative adequately establishes the narrator and the robot, although there are some questions about the narrative situation (e.g., why did the narrator decide to make the robot?). Although the closing action is somewhat rushed (Danny dismantled the robot and everything went back to normal), the ending does wrap up remaining questions regarding injuries, damage, and the late-in-life death of the narrator.

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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.

Evidence/Elaboration

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 6: Narrative – Robots - ID: 4142

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