Grade 5

Narrative

Writing Extended Response

Compose Full Texts

Whales

Conventions

Development/Elaboration

Organization/Purpose

There are some run-ons (e.g., “…they usually were out hunting during this time of day, it was odd”). There are also some sentences with missing/incorrect words, which are awkward but not errors per se: “All I could think about was who (how) amazing my first day of vacation (was).” Overall, given the length and complexity of the response, these do not show a pattern of errors.

Many commas are missing after introductory clauses (e.g., “Even though it was summer it was pretty cold…” and “When we got to the dock were the boat would depart we got told…”). There are also missing commas between compound independent clauses (e.g., “the safety speech was done and we could go on the boat”). There is also an unnecessary comma (&#8220;We waited for a while and then, a brown figure formed”), but it may have been intended to create a pause for effect.

There is a single missing capital to begin a sentence (“when we got on…”).

There are numerous errors with verb tenses (e.g., “we got told” and “We had just saw a whale”), and there are some errors with frequently confused words (where/were; seam/seem).

In addition to “how” misspelled as “who” (which is likely a typo), and “nobody” misspelled as  “no body,” there are other misspelled words.

Many details are exceptionally well-developed (e.g., cold Canada, so the narrator dons a sweater; the glass-bottom boat initially shows sea lions, which are whale prey, so it explains the sudden appearance of the whale; the helicopter rescue). Some details (e.g., beached whale) are derived from prior knowledge but work well in the narrative. There is one confusing detail (“The boat kept on hitting the bottom of the boat…”), but this one lapse does not keep the response from receiving a top score.

Details from source materials subtly enhance the story.

The story is effectively “shown” rather than told. One example of a creative way of integrating facts into the story is through dialogue: the boat captain tells the tourists “&#8217;This whale that you just saw was probably about 78 feet long and weighed probably 56 tons,&#8217;” adding “&#8217;You were very lucky.&#8217;”

There are many examples of effective concrete language use (e.g., “crisp day”; “spot some marine life”; “outrageously noisy”) and enough attempted sensory language to justify a score of 4 (“They had their mouths open in awe”; the sea lion licked the window, leaving a “giant slobber mark”).

While not distinctive, the style keeps the reader’s attention, especially with the rescue operation at the end.

The plot is well-established, with a family enjoying a whale-watching expedition. The initial event then becomes complicated when the whale beaches itself, with suspense building as a helicopter/crane attempts to lift the beached whale back into the ocean. The resolution is satisfying.

The setting is nicely established (Whale Side Hotel and Resort, cool Canada) and then further developed throughout the narrative. The narrator is also adequately established, although the family members are not established as individuals.

Mostly temporal transitions move the reader logically through the complex series of events (e.g., “Today”, “When”, “Suddenly”, “Finally”, and “Once we got”).

The events move seamlessly from the whale watching through the rescue of the beached whale. There are no extraneous details, and a combination of short and long sentences keeps the story moving (see paragraph 3 as an example).

The beginning sets the scene and establishes the situation. The final paragraph shows the narrator reflecting on the events of the day and closing with “I wondered what would happen tomorrow.”

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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 5: Narrative – Whales - ID: 5520

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