7th grade writing rubric staar

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STAAR Writing Test Mastery: A Parent’s Guide to Preparation

When your child is aged 9 to 13, The State of Texas Assessment of Academic Readiness looms large in their lives. And naturally so, as it assesses how ready they are to move to the next level in the education system.

The assessment is also significant in the parents’ or guardians’ lives. Children might struggle to prepare for the assessment on their own, so naturally, helping them prepare is going to fall on your shoulders.

However, that is more easily said than done. Especially if it is some time since you sat in a classroom or it’s your first time putting a child through the education system.

So if your child struggles with writing, or you just want to make sure they get the best grade they can, read on. We provide more information on the STAAR assessments and resources you can use to help your child prepare.

Take Practice Test

Table of Contents

What is tested in the STAAR Writing Assessment?

From grades 3 to 8, children must take the reading test. In grades 4 and 7, they must also do the writing test. Other subjects are added to the list as students move forward in the grades.

The STAAR writing tests are challenging.

Students are tested on their knowledge of the mechanics of the English language.

They can expect to be tested on:

• Punctuation
• Capitalization

They are also asked to write two types of essays:

• An expository essay
• A persuasive essay

In the expository essay, they have to investigate an idea, discuss the evidence for it, and set forth an argument for the idea.

In the persuasive essay, they have to persuade the reader to accept a point of view through their use of rhetorical language and supporting points.

For a twelve-year-old 7th grader, writing these demanding essays may present less of a challenge than it does for the nine-year-old at grade 4. However, the bar is considerably higher at this level in terms of the language they should to use.

The tests vary in difficulty level between the two grades, but things they have in common are:

• Writing the composition
• Revising it

For a child to reach the standards expected, a lot of preparation is required. Inevitably, given the child’s age in each grade, enforcing study falls on the parent or guardian.

How can I help my child prepare for the STAAR Writing Test?

Helping your child prepare for any exam is demanding. You need to become familiar with the exam and find the best resources to help you.

You also find yourself combining the roles of caregiver and educator. However, when you can gain access to the tools required, your job becomes easier.

Reaching out to an examinations preparation company that helps children prepare for school examinations is your best course of action. They are familiar with the tests and have the know-how to approach them.

For children preparing for the STAAR assessments, we recommend using the services of Test Prep Online , a reputable test preparation company with many years of experience in helping children prepare for school tests. Using their services, you get accurate information and exam preparation materials.

Their materials come in a test prep pack containing sample test papers modeled on the real tests, helpful explanations for questions and answers, and a method to check your child’s scores as they work through the tests.

The materials provide practice writing tests modeled on the real thing so they can become familiar with the format and feel calm and prepared.

What else is tested in STAAR tests?

Reading tests increase in difficulty level as your child progresses through the grades.

Students are assessed on material that plays an important role in preparing them for the work at the next grade level. Hence the term “Academic Readiness.”

Reading tests assess their abilities in understanding the plot of a text, deciding on the central meaning of the text, and their understanding of the literary genre. To do well in the test, children need to have a wide vocabulary and analyze a text.

How is the STAAR Writing test scored?

To move on to the next grade, students have to score above Level 11 Performance Level in the test. If the child fails the first time, they get two more chances to pass the STAAR tests.

How can I help my child with the STAAR Writing Test?

Here are some things you can do in your day-to-day life with your child.

Encourage the child to read from a variety of age-appropriate books. Challenge them by introducing them to more difficult books as their reading improves.

Libraries are great places for this information. Bring them with you or on a visit to a bookstore.

Practice reading

Reading regularly will increase the child’s vocabulary.

Children are curious so expect to be bombarded with questions about the meaning of words. Better still, equip them with a dictionary written for their age group.

Increased vocabulary and familiarity with the written word will make them more comfortable writing.

Write down vocabulary

Another useful tactic is to encourage them to keep a notebook for new words and meanings. If they are willing, encourage them to incorporate those words into their conversation or use them in some written work.

Similarly, you know how easily children mimic what they hear adults saying. You will hear the words you use when talking to your child replicated in how they might talk to you.

Ask them to do some written work for you. They could perhaps write about a topic that interests them or keep a diary. Encourage them to ask you about the words they are using or look at their grammar and spelling.

4th graders, in particular, will benefit from having you check over their written work as their test asks them to correct written pieces in a range of multiple-choice questions.

Don’t be afraid to suggest how they might change some of the vocabulary they use.

Encourage them to use their vocabulary notebook as a resource when writing. You could play a game to see who can find the most words to describe something they see or feel.

How do I get my child exam-ready?

Being a parent, you recognize the importance of not allowing exam preparation to eat into too much of the child’s free time or to cancel out activities they enjoy.

The following points should make the process easier:

• It is important to set up a preparation timetable that allows the child to continue to have fun and avoids the build-up of resentment against anything school-related.
• Start the preparation work as early as you can. It will reduce the stress levels if you allow more time to prepare and avoid the panic that comes with a last-minute rush.

Sample papers

Use the sample papers that come with the test prep pack.

• They will let you know what precisely your child is being tested on and give you and your child the confidence of knowing that the child is preparing using material that mirrors the real exam.
• This will give the child the confidence of knowing that nothing surprising will be waiting for them in the real test.
• It will train the child to work within the time allowed for the test, which will benefit them when doing the real test and the many more tests that await them in the future.
• The scoring system that comes with the tests also allows you to monitor the child’s progress from test to test.
• Keeping an eye on the scores will alert you to any difficulties your child may have and allow you to resolve the problems at an early point.
• With each test the child completes, they will gain confidence. Encourage them to compete with themself to increase their scores. Children rise to challenges, and the prospect of doing better than they did in the last test should motivate them to continue preparing.

Support them

Keep an eye out for signs of stress.

For young children embarking on the school testing level can at first be exciting. Suddenly they’re part of the group who do tests.

However, the magic can soon wear off, and they may become anxious as they see the challenge that lies ahead. Unfortunately, children won’t always tell you when they are anxious. This situation will make you combine the roles of caregiver and educator.

Your best option is to pre-empt stress-related problems:

• Ensure the child is getting adequate sleep and good nutrition. Regular breaks out of doors and fresh air also go a long way to keeping them relaxed and healthy and aids learning. A healthy mind in a healthy body is especially relevant for people preparing for tests.
• While you are helping them prepare, make it fun. Children learn best when they are enjoying themselves. Working on finding the correct answers to questions can be turned into a game between you and the child. A game that the child, of course, wins.
• Build in a reward system for the child and try not to limit the reward system to correct answers. A good effort is just as deserving of a reward as is the free time they are giving up for preparation.

You will, no doubt, be greeted with remarks along the line of, “My friend’s mother does it like this.” The most important approach here is to realize children are different, especially when it comes to learning.

What works for one may not for another.

The day before the STAAR Writing Test

The day before the tests begin should ideally be given up to some rest and relaxation. The temptation is to keep on working but a child will find it difficult to learn anything new prior to the test.

A free day is a better guarantee of good test performance than any last-minute cramming.

The child needs to approach the tests well-rested and clear-headed. Fresh air, reassurances that they have done the work, and an early night will help the child capitalize on all the work they have done.

Note: Access the individual STAAR test study guides, by clicking on the links below.

The STAAR Test Day

Test day can be demanding, so to make it a little easier, try the following tips:

• Prepare everything the child needs the night before.
• A solid breakfast will go a long way towards helping the child get through the day.
• Ensure you arrive at the school early.
• If allowed, ensure the child has snacks and a drink to consume during the exam and is wearing comfortable clothing.

After the test

When you pick the child up after the test, make sure you bring a reward, this time for having done the test.

You will want to give them the recognition they deserve for having overcome one of the big challenges of their young lives.

If you have a child preparing for the STAAR , you will find all the resources you need to help you here .

Recommended Reading

• What Grade Do You Actually Need to Pass The STAAR Tests?

Written by Elizabeth O Mahony

With 25+ years’ experience as a teacher and state examinations corrector, Elizabeth now writes for the education and careers industry. Her experience preparing students for examinations and running an academy for supplementary education give her invaluable insights into what it takes for job seekers and graduates to succeed in assessments.

Sarah is an accomplished educator, researcher and author in the field of testing and assessment. She has worked with various educational institutions and organisations to develop innovative evaluation methods and enhance student learning. Sarah has published numerous articles and books on assessment and learning. Her passion for promoting equity and fairness in the education system fuels her commitment to sharing insights and best practices with educators and policymakers around the world.

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Reading Language Arts STAAR Test Resources

As Texas teachers are well aware, the Reading Language Arts (RLA) STAAR test has new items for writing on this year’s 2022-2023 test including editing, revising, and constructed response. I highly recommend logging in to the practice test (if you’ve not already) and working through some of these. You can log in as a guest and access many different practice tests at every grade level just by clicking “Sign In.” Also, you may have seen some of the new STAAR resources I’m sharing already, but I’m going to share them here for context. And here is the Accompanying Guide to New Question Type Samples for RLA . All that said, let’s get going!

Student Typing: Stop the Pecking

Ok, so maybe we can’t actually teach typing. But if students can start off the year in a typing program that increases their speed, accuracy, and efficiency (in hopes of forever bidding adieu to the one-finger keyboard pecking) it will inevitably help them on the online STAAR. Learning to type will be beneficial when it comes to completing the new written response answers. Also, students can’t copy and paste text to revise it. They will have to retype it. Here are Seven Keyboarding Tutorials from Miguel Guhlin with some suggestions for typing programs, and here are 25+ Typing Apps from We Are Teachers for you to check out.

The Highlighter: Your Students’ Best Friend

I will tell you, and this is my personal opinion, that the tools on the online STAAR test are not great for elementary students. They are clunky and don’t make it easy for them to annotate text or take notes. And there is no pencil/annotation tool outside of sticky notes to type on. So, there’s that. The easiest tool for them will likely be the highlighter. You can practice using other digital tools with highlighters, like Edji , outside the test to help students prepare to use it on the test itself. I’d also recommend using the practice test with students to familiarize them with tools.

To use the highlighter on the test, students will need to first select all the text they want to be highlighted with their mouse, right-click on top of the text, and choose a highlighter color. Once they click the color, the text will highlight. To reset the text, they can right-click on the highlighted text and choose “Reset Highlighting.”

The Highlighter for Editing and Revision Questions

When STAAR test questions refer to specific sentences that have errors, when students are asked to rewrite a specific sentence or sentences, and when they are asked to change a word in a sentence, the highlighter can help them see the sentence as a whole. As you can see, the questions break up sentences with a drop-down menu and don’t restate the sentence(s) for students.

STAAR Written Response Resources

Short constructed response – reading, scoring guides with exemplar texts for responses to reading.

• RLA Grades 3-5 Constructed Response  
• RLA Grades 3-5 Constructed Response-Spanish  
• RLA Grades 6-8 Constructed Response  
• English I and II Constructed Response  

*Updated October 7, 2022

In grades 3-8, students will be asked to write short responses to reading (worth two points) to demonstrate understanding of the content. I’d recommend taking a look at the rubrics and the scoring guides with exemplar texts to see exactly what they are looking for in these responses.

For these questions, I really like the RACES and RAPP strategies which can be applied to shorter or longer writing assignments. They will work well for any grade level and can be adapted! Use color coding when you’re practicing with students to help them recognize and check the different parts of their responses. For example, have students highlight the section restating the question in green, the answer in yellow, the text evidence in orange, etc. Here are some templates for you to download and/or edit to your heart’s content!

Short Constructed Response – Writing

Editing and revising sample items.

• Grade 3 Sample Writing Items
• Grade 4 Sample Writing Items
• Grade 5 Sample Writing Items
• Grade 6 Sample Writing Items
• Grade 7 Sample Writing Items
• Grade 8 Sample Writing Items

Also in grades 3-8, will be short and extended constructed responses for writing. Short responses (worth one point) are meant to assess specific skills in editing and revision . Students may be asked to write a new sentence, rewrite a sentence, or make an inline choice (choose a correct response from a drop-down style menu).

Extended Constructed Response – Writing

Staar writing rubrics.

• Grades 3-5 Opinion  
• Grades 3-5 Informational
• Grades 6-English II Opinion
• Grades 6-English II Informational

*Updated October 18, 2022.

Extended responses (worth up to ten points; five-point rubric scored by two scorers) are more complex and are meant to assess a student’s ability to analyze, explain, and evaluate the information given to them in a text. For the extended response, you can use and/or adapt the RAPP or RACE checklists above to help students practice. But here is a RACERR checklist that I created which has been adapted for extended writing based on the writing rubric:

Additional STAAR Test Redesign Resources

• Online Testing and Accommodations
• New Question Types
• Cross-Curricular Passages  
• Evidence-based Writing

I hope you find this information and these resources helpful. What do you want to know about STAAR testing? What would be helpful to you? Let us know in the comments or send me an email !

Additional STAAR and TEKS Articles You May Find Useful

STAAR Prep: A K-5 Argumentative/Opinion Writing Strategy

STAAR Prep: Spelling Strategies, Resources, and Downloadable Posters

The K-5 ELAR TEKS and Free, Editable Spreadsheets

The K-5 Math TEKS and Free, Editable Spreadsheets

A Practical Strategy for Teaching Editing Skills

A Powerful and Easy Strategy for Teaching Text Evidence

Emily has been in education since 2008. Prior to joining TCEA in 2021, she worked as a preK-8 grade principal for four years. Additionally, she taught middle school music, preschool, prekindergarten, and second grade in a trilingual school setting. Before that, she was a K-8 technology integrator and taught second through fifth grade enrichment classes and kindergarten, fifth, and sixth grade technology classes. She has a master’s degree in teaching, specializing in elementary education, and her Certificate of School Management and Leadership (CSML) from Harvard Graduate School of Education. Outside of work, she enjoys seeing movies, attending concerts, going camping and hiking, and spending time with her two cats.

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These are great!! Thanks for sharing. The RACES poster template links to the RACERR poster. I would love the RACES poster if that can be shared.

Hi Ashlee! So sorry for the wrong link. I’ve correct it now, so you should be able to access the template! Thanks so much for commenting so I could fix this. Really appreciate it!

How do you sign in to practice tests? It says link is broken.

Hi Austin! Thanks for your comment. Here is an updated link: https://login6.cambiumtds.com/student_core/V70/Pages/LoginShell.aspx?c=Texas_PT I’ve also corrected it in the post. Thanks for bringing it to my attention!

the link for the practice test is still not working.

Hi Veronica! It should be working now in the article. So sorry about that! Here is the link for you.

I like what you provided. I have a question: do you have something for the Spanish LA ? Thanks

Hi Dalila! The practice tests are available in Spanish, and I linked to the Spanish TEA resources in the article. Let me know if there is anything specific you’re looking for! Everything should be applicable to the Spanish test.

On the RACERR diagram, it only has one body paragraph listed. Is this just to represent the checklist needed for each body paragraph, or is this because there is only one body paragraph? To clarify, is STAAR expecting a 5 paragraph essay? Just wondering what would be best to teach my students to do.

Hi Amber! I would recommend looking at the links to the linked “Scoring Guides with Exemplar Texts for Responses to Reading” for your grade level. These show you examples of scored writing and will give you an idea of exactly what it expected for your grade level.

Do you have a poster of the RACERR that’s not the checklist?

Courtney, I’ll make that and let you know when I’ve posted it! 👍🏻

Here you go: https://www.canva.com/design/DAFYIARgGBE/R1x5e9nv2XDOCUqogXQmtg/view?utm_content=DAFYIARgGBE&utm_campaign=designshare&utm_medium=link&utm_source=publishsharelink&mode=preview

Hello, do you have by any chance RAPP and RACE check list in Spanish?

At this time, I don’t. I’m so sorry! I am adding it to my list and will get it out to you as soon as possible.

Hi Emily, Thank you for these beautifully produced resources. The links for the RAPP checklist and the RACES poster seemed to be duplicating one another at this time. Could you possibly check these, as I would love to have copies of them all. Thank you in advance.

Beth, thank you so much for letting me know! This has been corrected. Please let me know if you have any trouble with it!

Hello! When I click on the link for the RAPP student checklist, it takes me to the RACE checklist.

Hi Melissa, thank you so much for letting me know. This has been fixed! So sorry about that.

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RACES and RAPP strategies can be applied to shorter or longer writing assignments. They will work well for any grade level and can be adapted. Give it a try! 

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2023 STAAR: Understanding the STAAR Redesign

• March 17, 2023
• CCMR , Early Education , Educators , News , Parents , Staff Blog

By Michelle Nguyen

Director of System and Schools Support

As Houston public school students return from Spring Break, they will be preparing to take their  State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness , commonly known as the STAAR. These assessments are administered in the Spring to measure student mastery and growth in the following subjects and grades: 

• Mathematics (Grades 3–8)
• Reading language arts (RLA) (Grades 3-8)
• Science (Grades 5 and 8)
• Social Studies (Grade 8)
• End-of-course (EOC) assessments for Algebra I, English I, English II, Biology, and U.S History

With the passing of  House Bill (HB) 3906  by the 86th Texas Legislature in 2019, there have been several  changes  to the assessment (intended to better align the STAAR to classroom instruction and experiences). While some of these changes have been piloted or previewed in earlier years, the full  STAAR Redesign  will be implemented this school year, 2022-23.

STAAR Redesign Changes

The full STAAR Redesign includes four main changes: 1) Online testing, 2) New question types, 3) Cross-curricular passages, and 4) Evidence-based writing. Read on to learn more about each and ways you can prepare and support your student.

Online Testing

This year, all STAAR assessments will be administered online with the exceptions of students taking the STAAR Alternate 2 assessment and students who require accommodations that cannot be provided online. According to the Texas Education Agenda’s (TEA) website: “Online administration allows students to receive accommodations like those they get in the classroom, provides faster test results, improves test operations, and allows new non-multiple-choice questions.”

Tips for preparing and supporting your student:  Provide students with opportunities to use a computer or laptop. This can help a student feel more comfortable navigating with a keyboard, mouse or touchpad, or touchscreen. Additionally, it is important that you and your student understand their accommodations and how to access them via the STAAR assessment platform (for example, text-to-speech, dictionary use, and calculation aid). To review accommodation options, take a look at the following resources developed by TEA:

• Online STAAR Accommodations
• Accommodations Available on Online STAAR Tests for Eligible Students 
• Practice using these tools by taking a  full-length online practice test

New Question Types

Part of the legislation (HB 3906) also established a cap on the number of multiple choice questions that can be asked on the STAAR test. In its place, new question types, that are non-multiple choice, have been created to allow students to show their understanding in different ways. Question types will vary by grade level and content area but examples include open-ended responses and selecting multiple correct answers.

Tips for preparing and supporting your student:  One of the goals of this change is to better reflect questioning and thinking that your student engages in as part of learning. It can be helpful to encourage your student to explain or demonstrate their thought process and consider multiple possible solutions to a question or problem. To see what type of questions will be on your student’s STAAR exam, take a look at the following resources developed by the TEA:

• New question type online samplers
• New question types by grade level and content area  (PDF posted 09/08/22)

Cross Curricular Passages

In the STAAR reading language arts (RLA) assessments, there will be an increase in informational passages that reference other content areas such as social studies, science, mathematics, and fine arts. As a result, students may need to leverage relevant background knowledge and vocabulary from these subjects to support their reading fluency and comprehension. 

Tips for preparing and supporting your student:  As a teacher or parent, it is important to expose your student to different types of text and varied topics. It can help students explore a particular interest via reading, but it can also challenge them to build knowledge and context in an area in which they are not as familiar. Cross-curricular reading will help students become stronger readers who read to learn, think critically, and make connections. You can preview examples of cross curricular passages using TEA’s online practice tests by grade level and content area (RLA):

• Full-length online practice test

Evidence-Based Writing

In the past, the STAAR had a writing assessment (tested in the 4th and 7th grades). This assessment has been phased out and now, RLA and English I and II STAAR tests will include both reading and writing components. These will include new question types and an extended constructed response, or essay, at every grade level. Rather than writing based on a standalone prompt, students will write in response to a reading selection in one of three possible modes: informational, argumentative, or correspondence. These essays will be scored using a 5-point rubric that includes two main components: idea development and language conventions. 

Tips for preparing and supporting your student:  The more practice students have with writing, the better! In particular, you can encourage your student to write in response to their learning. Writing is a great way to summarize, reflect and expand on something they read, watched, or experienced. It can also be helpful to refer to TEA’s STAAR writing rubric and constructed response scoring guides (which include Science, Biology, Social Studies, and US History examples) to provide feedback to your student – after all, writing is a process that involves refining ideas and language:

• RLA Writing Rubrics-English/Spanish
• RLA Grades 3-5 Constructed Response  (PDF posted 10/7/22)
• RLA Grades 3-5 Constructed Response-Spanish  (PDF posted 10/7/22)
• RLA Grades 6-8 Constructed Response  (PDF posted 10/7/22)
• English I and II Constructed Response  (PDF posted 10/7/22)
• Science Grade 5 Short Constructed Response-English/Spanish  (PDF posted 10/7/22)
• Science Grade 8 Short Constructed Response  (PDF posted 10/7/22)
• Biology Short Constructed Response  (PDF posted 10/7/22)
• Social Studies Grade 8 Short Constructed Response  (PDF posted 10/7/22)
• US History Short Constructed Response  (PDF posted 10/7/22)

Summary With any change can come feelings of uncertainty. As much as we hope to prepare students for the upcoming STAAR changes, we know that there will be an adjustment period. The ideals of the STAAR Redesign help us think about how we expect students to learn and be fairly yet rigorously assessed.  During this stressful season for teachers, students, and families alike, it will be important to support each other, encourage our students to do their best, and learn from the results. 

Additional Resources:

• TEA  STAAR Redesign February 2022 Presentation  (PDF, posted 3/7/22
• TEA  STAAR Redesign FAQ  (PDF, updated 8/30/22)

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STAAR Redesign Resources

State assessment changes from hb3906, new website.

Still Working on Those Short Constructed Responses....

After using the SCR writing guide to help "anchor" students in the rubric of the new response items for Reading, I decided that a "revise & reflect" guide was needed to guide them through applying the rubric to their own writing. It is in the SCR folder in all the resources, but I added a button to directly access it below. If you want a copy to revise for yourself, please "make a copy" in Google and change for your needs. Hang in there, RLA friends. Our students will be ready. ~TM

Constructed Response Resources Constructed Response Resources

Spanish Versions of the Elementary Rubrics from Caroline Sweet!

Posters for classrooms posters for classrooms.

Revise & Edit Guide for Extended Response Revise & Edit Guide for Extended Response

Using the new ecr rubrics to revise & edit.

It's in my rubrics folder, but here is the direct LINK .

Short Constructed Response

The short-constructed responses vary by content area, but they all have item-specific rubrics. This means that the test designers have created a rubric for the correct answer specifically for that question. These rubrics will be shared with the public when the tests are released.

3rd-4th grade

Biology , US History , English 1 & 2

STAAR Redesign Overview for LWISD STAAR Redesign Overview for LWISD

STAAR Redesign

STAAR Redesign 2022-23 LWISD 3rd-11th grades © Copyright Showeet.com 1 1

New Question Types Resources New Question Types Resources

New Question Type Slides for Teachers!

In your Google Drive, go to FILE and MAKE A COPY to get your own copy of the slides. Delete the slides that don't pertain to your students.

Online practice samplers by question type WITH links to the answer keys (with rationales).

New Question Type Slides for Teachers: Elementary

New Question Type Slides for Teachers: Secondary

New Question Types by Content Area

MATH New Question Types

RLA New Question Types

SCIENCE New Question Types

SOCIAL STUDIES New Question Types

TEI - STAAR Redesign New Question Types Video Series

State and federal laws require a redesign of the STAAR that will ensure it is more aligned with how students are learning in the classroom. Beginning with the spring 2023 STAAR administration, students who test online will interact with a variety of new question types in addition to traditional multiple-choice questions.

RLA Redesign Training Resources RLA Redesign Training Resources

Revision Vocabulary Things

FOLDER LINK

Composition Conversations Group Revising Lesson

RLA Redesign Resources for REVISING

Here is my elementary folder: LINK .

Here is my middle school folder: LINK .

Here is my high school folder. LINK.

This is an interactive training with cards and sorting. The focus of the training is how the revising & drafting TEKS are assessed...using the language of the TEKS and the resources from the Texas Gateway TEKS Guide. Teaching students the five specific things that they will "revise" for by having them revise for those same five things in their own writing will set them up for success.

RLA Redesign Resources for EDITING

K-5th Punctuation & Capitalization Vertical Alignment

3rd-5th Writing Sample Questions: Editing Analyzed

K-12 Editing TEKS: Vertical View

Types of Spelling Questions

Edit Triangle

(print on cardstock, laminate, and then have students use it as a guide as they go through their own writing for each "side" of the triangle)

Clocking Page

Punctuation Clothespins

2017 Secondary Language Arts TEKS

resources, links, and visuals for the 2017 RLA TEKS I'm working on academic vocabulary lessons for language of composition. I want to provide teachers with all the scaffolds and stems to get students talking and interacting with the terms that they will have to know when they are assessed on writing TEKS on the redesigned STAAR.

Resources for Teachers & Students Resources for Teachers & Students

Useful tea webpages.

LINK TO STAAR REDESIGN SITE

TEA also has an overview page for all the assessment changes that were called for in HB3906.

LINK TO HB3906 SITE

A Math-specific Resource from Irma Garcia A Math-specific Resource from Irma Garcia

Math STAAR Redesign Resources

The State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness (STAAR®) test is being redesigned to make the test more tightly aligned to the classroom experience. The redesign will be implemented in the Spring of 2022 I put the new question type from TEA by grade level in google sides.

Educator & Parent Resources for Online Testing Educator & Parent Resources for Online Testing

Accommodations resources accommodations resources, tosh mcgaughy.

Email: [email protected] Twitter: @ToshMcGaughy

Reading and Responding

It’s not enough for a person to generate a message for another person. It’s also not enough for a person to understand a message sent by someone else. Real communication in our lives depends on not just speaking, but also understanding and acknowledging what you hear.

When the communication is in print, and the two communicators are a reader and a writer, it’s not enough for a reader to signal, “Yep. I got that.” Or “Good story.”   Responses like this don’t demonstrate any understanding. And neither, really, do multiple choice questions. So what does demonstrate understanding? Putting into words , composing, thoughts I was having, mental images I was seeing, as I read. Of course, we could ask students to answer questions about the text, and we will when assessment time comes around, but aren’t students reacting mentally to their reading before they get questions?

If many of the questions involve how an author’s moves make an impact on a reader, students need to become acquainted with their own independent thoughts and reactions to their reading. We need to help students learn how to generate well-formed, thorough, composed reactions to a text. Text structures can help develop this ability. Have fun exploring kernel essays for reading and writing !

Crunchtime Lessons for STAAR 2.0

Generic Short-Answer Questions

Short Constructed Response Rubric

Reader Rubric for Extended Constructed Response STAAR 2.0

Writer's Tools and Impact on Reader

Extended Constructed Response Rubric

Color It Up with the Extended Constructed Response by Maureen Ucles

Colorealo con REL en Espanol by Maureen Ucles

Truism Braid Lesson from Text Structures from Picture Books

Chart of STAAR Prompts Grades 3-10 by Rene Jackson

Text structures for responding to reading.

In order to build their comprehension muscles, students read and then use these text structures to comment on the content of their reading.

Basic Text Structures for Responding to Reading

Reading Response Bookmarks

Text Structures for Great Lines

Text Structures for Writing about Literature

Q & A for Constructed Responses about Understanding the Reading

Q & A for Constructed Responses about Author’s Choices

Text Structures for Common ECR Prompts

Five handy ways to respond to what you read.

These five additional structures represent a variety of graphic layouts beyond sentences and are especially useful for teachers of the content areas.

5 Handy Ways to Respond to Reading

QA12345 Script

QA12345 Comic Book Page by Paul Erickson

QA12345 Student Checklist: English and Spanish

Cubing Exercise for Infoshots

10 Ways to Use Ba-da-bings

Three Things Response

Show Me You Did Your Reading

Short answer questions.

Starting in 2023, all Texas students from grades 3-10 will be taking the revised STAAR assessment in which they will compose answers to text-based questions. The answers will have to be supported with well-chosen, clearly explained evidence from the texts. To prepare, the students write their own questions, choose a text structure, and write their answer. This practice breaks the process into concrete, simple steps.

Simple Questions for Practice

More Generic Short Answer Questions

OER Questions for The Wizard of Oz

How to Teach OERs Step by Step

Reading with lenses and stemology.

Jennifer Martin discovered that her struggling high school students made remarkable gains when she used this process with them, and they also gained valuable annotation skills.  

After students annotate their reading, Jennifer has them use the released questions from the STAAR reading tests to create their own original questions and multiple-choice answers. It’s a huge success.

Reading with Lenses

Salt to the Sea excerpt

Reading Question Stems from Released STAAR Tests

3rd Grade Reading STAAR Stems 2013-2021

4th Grade Reading STAAR Stems 2013-2021

5th Grade Reading STAAR Stems 2013-2021

6th Grade Reading STAAR Stems 2013-2021

7th Grade Reading STAAR Stems 2013-2021

8th Grade Reading STAAR Stems 2013-2021

English I Released STAAR Stems 2013-2021

English II Released STAAR Stems 2013-2021

Persuasive writing in response to literature.

What happens if you combine responding to literature and persuasive writing? Here’s an easy three-step process that will yield surprising results!

Moments of Persuasion in The Odyssey

Visual prompts for themes from major literary works.

These collections of visual prompts are especially useful if your students are reading major works like Romeo and Juliet . What do you do with the visual prompts? No doubt you’ll think of many ways to use these for freewriting or discussion, but you could also use them to write 11-minute essays .  

Visual Prompts for Themes from Julius Caesar

Visual Prompts for Themes from Lord of the Flies

Visual Prompts for Themes from The Odyssey

Visual Prompts for Themes from Romeo and Juliet

Visual Prompts for Themes from To Kill a Mockingbird

All materials copyright © 2024 Trail of Breadcrumbs. All rights reserved. Website by Websy Daisy .

Almost half of Texas fourth graders scored a zero on the STAAR writing composition last year

Erika De La Rosa was excited when she heard about the sweeping changes to the STAAR exam .

"When they initially announced it, as an English teacher, it sounded like a fantastic idea because writing should be incorporated everywhere," De La Rosa said.

She teaches seventh grade in Houston ISD. Before last year, writing was only tested on a separate exam in fourth and seventh grade, as well as in high school.

"What I saw for years was that because it was only tested in fourth and seventh grade, students would only get explicit writing instruction in fourth and seventh grade," she said. "And so as a seventh-grade teacher, I would be scrambling to try to figure out how can I cover all of these grammar mechanics? How do I cover all of these writing techniques? What can I drop? What do we need to focus on?"

For the first time last year, every public school teacher in Texas from third through eighth grade had to grapple with those questions. The STAAR 2.0 redesign was complete, including a complete shift to an online testing platform, instead of the traditional paper exam. It also marked the end of the separate writing exams in fourth and seventh grade; instead, writing was included at every grade level.

The results were eye-popping. Before the changes, about 5% of students across the state scored a zero out of 8 on "constructed response" writing questions, which are similar to essay prompts. After the changes, 46% of fourth graders scored a zero out of 10 — 20% in seventh grade, and 25% in high school.

"I'm not fully surprised because the test is so new and so different from how things have been in the past," De La Rosa said. "Because years prior, the task was simply composition. Can they compose something that makes sense, that is all organized, that is grade-level writing? It didn't require, like, a literary analysis."

Students also performed poorly in grades where writing was assessed for the first time. Last year, 42% of third graders scored a zero on constructed response questions — along with about 25% of students in fifth, sixth and eighth grade.

Teachers, researchers and school leaders argue the new approach to writing assessment could kill creativity and curiosity in the classroom, especially with the way test scores tie into the TEA's more stringent school accountability system. The TEA continues to project confidence about the changes, arguing the shift is intended to align the test with how teaching happens in the classroom.

‘Comparing apples to celery'

Chris Rozunik with the Texas Education Agency argued that year-to-year comparisons of constructed response scores are "kind of comparing apples to celery in some ways."

As she pointed out, the shift from paper to online was not the only change. The writing composition questions are also different. They now include cross-curricular reading passages that reference multiple subject areas, and the grading rubrics for writing questions are more stringent.

"We are asking students to think differently about answering these questions," Rozunik said. "When we set those standards last spring, we like to think about it as a very different world."

It's also important to note that an increase in zeros on writing compositions doesn't necessarily mean an increase in the number of students who failed the STAAR. For example, 78% of fourth graders passed the RLA STAAR last year compared to 77% the year before.

Before the redesign, students had to get about half the questions on the test correct to "approach" grade level (to pass the test). Now, there are more types of questions , including ones that allow partial credit , and students only have to get credit for about a third of the questions to "approach" grade level.

"It's not a percentage as we think of in school — you know, 70% is passing," Rozunik said. "You need to step away from that scale entirely and think about the test as a whole, keeping in mind that we're required to measure every student in the state of Texas, including the most high-flying, smartest kid on the planet. Within the scale which we generate, you need a lot of room above the approaches category, which is that very first level that students can be considered on track for success in the future."

The TEA insists the online shift didn't make the test more difficult, but researchers still have questions about that. With the exception of pre-approved accommodations for kids with disabilities, all students from third grade through high school now take the exam on a computer.

Jodi Pilgrim is associate dean with the College of Education at the University of Mary-Hardin Baylor. She's also a former fourth-grade teacher.

"We're wanting to assess how good they are at writing, but there's a possibility that we're also assessing how well they can type," she said. "Those that are really good typers are going to do better on it."

Concerns about creativity

Pilgrim also worries the new approach to writing could stifle creativity.

Before the STAAR 2.0 redesign, in the spring of 2021, fourth graders were given this quote: "Good teachers know how to bring out the best in students." Their writing prompt: "Write about the best teacher you know."

"I liked this a lot as a teacher," Pilgrim said. "It was open-ended. Because if the prompt was a personal experience, any student can write about that. We tend to start our school years writing personal narratives because all students can tell about themselves."

All students now read longer passages, and then write a response.

Last year, the fourth-grade passage was 500 words about salamanders, Barton Springs and the Edwards Aquifer. Fourth graders were then asked to write about the importance of the aquifer.

"‘Explain why the aquifer is important in the article,' so I would just take that exact same sentence and say, ‘The Edwards Aquifer is important because ...' Well, that didn't take much thought," Pilgrim argued. "One of the things we really focus on in schools right now is critical thinking. The world we live in requires the critical thinker. I don't really have to think critically to write these responses."

Rozunick said the TEA intended to make the writing questions more universally accessible through the redesign.

"There's enough information in that prompt, in any prompt, in any text we have moving forward to be able to really get enough information in order to answer the question," Ruzunick said. "You do not have to bring in other life experiences or emotions in order to answer these questions. And quite honestly, they're probably more fair and equitable to students than, you know, ‘what's your favorite teacher' or ‘what you did last summer?'"

Pilgrim expects teachers will develop and teach a writing formula for students, especially with the rollout of "machine scoring" for writing questions this year. Most student writing is now graded by a computer, not a person, as first reported by the Dallas Morning News . According to the TEA, machine scoring is not significantly different from human scoring, but it is cheaper and faster.

De La Rosa believes teachers will still have to spend time teaching to the test, but she doesn't think the pressure will kill creative writing entirely — at least not in her classroom.

"I've been really fortunate to be on the campus that allowed me that flexibility or kind of trusted me to make those calls," De La Rosa said. "There are plenty of campuses that I know and plenty of teachers in situations where they're not trusted and they're told exactly what they are allowed to do and what they're not allowed to do."

"So I think that is a very valid fear that STAAR being this way will limit a lot of creativity," she continued. "Because as much as we would love to say, like, ‘Oh, don't teach to the test,' it really is circumstantial to what campus and what district you're in because not all of us are at campuses that allow us the freedom, and not all of us are in districts that trust us to make those decisions for our kids."

This debate is not new

The pressure to teach to the test doesn't come from the STAAR exam itself — it comes from the way the state holds districts accountable for test scores.

One extreme example is the state takeover of Houston ISD, which was partially motivated by low test scores at one school. The TEA-appointed management board of Houston ISD wants to significantly increase the percentage of students across the district who meet grade-level standards on the STAAR, and TEA-appointed superintendent Mike Miles has implemented a centrally-created curriculum in dozens of schools that previously struggled with the test.

The pressure to improve test scores is a consistent presence across the state.

"Yeah, accountability can do that — those pressures of teaching," Pilgrim said. "The district feels the pressure of it, the principal feels it. It trickles down, and the teachers feel it. What's really unfortunate is when the students feel the pressure."

In many ways, the test is now low-stakes for students. They do not have to pass the STAAR to move on to the next grade level. But STAAR remains high-stakes for teachers, schools and districts.

The Texas Education Agency assigns school districts and campuses an A through F accountability rating, based largely on students' test scores and post-graduation readiness. As the STAAR 2.0 redesign unfolded, the TEA also overhauled its A through F system.

At a press conference about the A through F revamp in May 2023, Texas Commissioner of Education Mike Morath explained the reason for the more stringent approach.

"We want to eliminate achievement gaps by race and by class, and we want to ensure that Texas is a leader in preparing students for postsecondary success across the nation," Morath said. "This is kind of the rigorous expectation Texas needs to be a national leader in preparing students for postsecondary success."

More than 100 school districts sued the TEA , and the new ratings are currently held up in court.

Tension over test-based accountability has been around for a while, as Duncan Klussman with the University of Houston's College of Education explained.

"Over the last 20 to 25 years, this has been a constant process where the state establishes a testing system, gives it a name, and then establishes an accountability system," Klussman said. "And what you see typically is in the first few years of a new system, you see kind of lower scores overall. Then districts start to understand it better, and teachers understand better, and you see scores kind of grow over time."

Throughout that time, debates raged over whether tests measure social inequality more than school quality, to what degree policymakers should use test scores to dictate how teachers work in the classroom, and whether there are more meaningful ways to measure "student achievement" than one test on one day of the year.

H.D. Chambers is the executive director of the Texas School Alliance.

"I don't want to dismiss any superintendent or any board member or any elected leader who is hyper-focused on student achievement," Chambers said. "But is that student achievement being defined by just one thing?" Copyright 2024 Houston Public Media News 88.7. To see more, visit Houston Public Media News 88.7 .