Who is to say what is accurate?

AGLI Text – Compose clear sentences to answer literal questions (e.g. who, what, where, when, how, and/or why) or to present information about explicit informational text.

Task – The student will answer who, what, where, when, how, and why literal questions in clear and complete sentences to a given reading passage. 

The verifying evidence is three paragraphs about skunks followed by 6 questions one each of why, where, how, what, when, and who. 

The teacher includes an explanation for grading which is the grading system she uses for this type of ELA activity.

Explanation for Grading

The student will lose ½ credit if the sentence needs additional words to make it complete and clear, as well as missing punctuation at the end of each sentence. All sentences must begin with a capital letter. Modifying a word (such as past or present tense or plural) will not be given a deduction unless it changes the answer from being correct.

The student lost ½ credit for not capitalizing  a proper name.

The student lost ½ credit for not writing a complete sentence.

Even with the Explanation for Grading – the thinking was the student should get full credit for the missing capital letter but the student should lose full credit because the sentence was not complete – “When he is being chased.”

RESPONSE: We've typically said as long as the student response is a basic sentence (noun and verb) any additional level of detail regarding the completeness or complexity of the sentence is up to the teacher based on typical classroom instruction. It would be good practice for the teacher to create a rubric to determine student performance; for example a certain number of points for a logical response, a certain number of points for a sentence that contains a noun and verb in logical sequence, a certain number of points for correct capitalization, and a certain number of points for correct punctuation. The teacher seems to have done this. Whether the teacher took off points for capitalization is something that you can work out with him or her, the administration guidelines do not require a certain way to score performance with regard to this aspect of “clear sentences.”

Is this acceptable for evidence?

AGLI TEXT: Create picture(s), symbol(s), object(s), etc. to communicate information.

Task:  The student  will create picture(s), symbol(s), object(s), etc. to communicate information about a text or a personal experience/preference.

Data Collection Sheet for Discrete Trial Data was used.

Trial #1 Created picture to communicate what he ate for lunch. Trial #2 Created picture to communicate one special activity. Trial # 3 Created picture to communicate second special activity of the day.

RESPONSE: The guidance has typically been that if the assessment task produces any sort of a “product” that it would be best practice to include that “product” as the verifying evidence. The teacher could submit the created pictures as the supporting evidence for the Data Collection Sheet if he or she is set on using the Data Collection Sheet. Overall, it does seem that the steps on the discrete trial Data Collection Sheet do describe what is being expected as the student action. 

Science – HS

AGLI 32104   Identify weather conditions

Task- The student will identify weather conditions by completing a simple weather calendar.

The verifying evidence has three days when the student completed a weather calendar. During that week, one day was a school holiday and one day the student was absent.

RESPONSE: The evidence appears to connect to the AGLI, but you haven’t indicated that the student is being assessed on identifying weather conditions. If he/she is identifying the weather conditions then it seems that this evidence would be okay. Only one date with student performance data can be taken from the chart or calendar so the second piece of evidence would need to be another calendar from a different week that shows the student identifying weather conditions.

Math Gr 7 AGLI and Touch Math

Grade 7 Math – AGLI 12107 – Add and/or subtract one or two digit whole numbers

Is it acceptable for the student to use a Touch Math worksheet to solve the the addition and/or subtraction problems?

RESPONSE: In this case, it would be fine to use a Touch Math worksheet with AGLI 12107 because the student needs to figure out the number and the amount it represents, then add the two together. Many times they count to get the value but they still need to know what each represents and put them together. A notation indicating that the student counted each number individually and then added the two numbers together to obtain the sum would be a good notation to add to the verifying evidence, since this AGLI doesn’t specifically have “use of a strategy” with it. Also, for assessment purposes the teacher could make up a worksheet for the student without the touch math dots and circles and see if the student can add without it.

Kelly Ickes, Measured Progress

Measured Progress Toll Free: 800.431.8901 |  Fax Toll Free: 866.283.2197

Is this a prompt?

ELA Grade 8 - AGLI 11104A – The student will relate fact(s) and or idea(s) to the chosen topic.

A teacher has a worksheet titled – The Pool – with the following directions:  Choose the pictures that go with this topic. Next to the directions is a picture of a pool.  The student is given a number of pictures to choose from some that fit the topic (swimsuit, towel, splash, goggles, life jacket, etc. and some that don’t (distractors) eat, drink, house, car, etc.

Would the picture of the pool near the directions be considered a prompt?  The only picture that has any vague resemblance to the pool is a picture of a boy swimming. 

Please advise.

Thanks!

Jo Ann

Hi Jo Ann,

Thank you for the question. No, the picture of the pool next to the title “The Pool” would not be considered a prompt. It is okay for pictures to be used and based on the information you provided it appears the student is relating the fact(s) and/or idea(s) to the topic indicated on the worksheet.

Thank you,

Kelly Ickes  |  Assistant Director  |  Client Services - Special Education

Word Banks

I have received a number of questions as to whether putting a word bank on a worksheet is a prompt. Can you give a general, overall answer to this question, or could it be AGLI/worksheet dependent.

Examples - AGLI involves labeling parts of a plant

Thank you for the question. In general, word banks would be allowed and do not necessarily prompt a student. If there is a question on a specific AGLI, task, and piece of VE please let us know.

Thank you,

Kelly

Kelly Ickes  |  Assistant Director  |  Client Services - Special Education

AGLI Questions from Collegial Reviews

Questions from our collegial review today:

Grade 3 ELA 34107 - Show respect by attending to what the speaker is saying.

VE - A time segmented data collection sheet, with time segments of 1 second each

Question: How does the teacher demonstrate that the student specifically "showed respect", or is this AGLI saying that attending to what the speaker is saying automatically means they demonstrated showing respect? Attending to a speaker, especially for a 1 second interval, is measuring "attending", not necessarily that the student is showing respect. RESPONSE: The AGLI is indicating that to demonstrate showing respect the student will attend to the speaker. The use of a time segment DCS is acceptable VE.

Grade 4 Science 12101 - Recognize tool(s) that are used in a scientific investigation.

This AGLI has resulted in a number of instances in No Scores in the past where the VE did not connect to the task as the VE pertained to scientific tools, but did not show any link to them "being used for scientific investigations." You and I spoke about several of these during scoring last year.

We saw 2 instances of this AGLI at collegial today:

1. Directions on worksheet from teacher 1: Match the correct tool used for each scientific investigation.

• Questions: Tool used to measure temperature (thermometer or pan), tool used to measure weight (stove or balance scale)

RESPONSE: This VE appears to connect to the AGLI and task.

2. Directions on worksheet from teacher 2: Recognize the scientific tools used in simple investigations

• Student circled from the following choices: telescope, chalk, books, goggles

Teacher #2 is concerned about whether she needs to revamp her worksheets to the level of specificity used by teacher #1.

RESPONSE: This VE would need to have a clear indication of the scientific investigation that the tool(s) would be used for in order for the VE to connect.

Grade 7 ELA 12213 Recognize characters in multiple literary stories (multiple plurals - characters & stories)

What was confusing here was how to structure the worksheets when there are multiple plurals, as there could be several possible ways of doing this. Please confirm if all of the below would connect:

Option 1

• worksheet #1 - student recognizes 1 character from a story
• worksheet #2 - student recognizes 1 character (a different character) from a different story

Option 2

• worksheet #1 - student recognizes more than 1 character from a story
• worksheet #2 - student recognizes more than 1 character from a different story

Option 3 - both worksheets contain multiple characters and multiple stories

• worksheet #1 - Has the titles of 3 different stories and pictures of 3 characters. Student matches the picture of the character to the story
• worksheet #2 - has a picture of a character, with the titles of 3 different stories. Student circle the name of the story title that matches the character. Student then has another character picture (from a different story) and the same 2 story titles to choose from. 

Are all 3 acceptable options? RESPONSE: Each of the three options appears to connect to the AGLI and task.

Grade 6 ELA 21310 - Compose the answers to literal questions about explicit text in an appropriate organizational format.

Question.....does the teacher have to grade spelling, punctuation etc ? RESPONSE: The teacher does not have to grade for spelling or punctuation unless that is part of what he/she has indicated the VE will demonstrate in the task. For the Sample Assessment Task the appropriate organizational format is related to complete answers. The teacher could develop a scoring rubric that took into account spelling and punctuation which would provide for a more expanded process to determine the performance calculations.

Facts & Opinions - Template ?

Hey, Kelly

We are at a collegial review and an issue came up on several datafolios, and we woiuld like to clarify.
6th gr ELA # 11305- Dinstinguish facts from opinions.
Worksheet has statements which student must identify as fact or opinion.
In the directions it says "A fact is something that can be proven true.
An opinion is someone's feelings about a particular topic."
Would this be considered a prompt and therefore reduce the Ind. to 0%?
Thanks
Ginny

Hi Ginny,

Thank you for the question. It is not great that the directions include the information; however, as long as there is a mix of statements of fact and opinion then this information would not be considered a template. An example of what we mean when we say "mix of statements" is that all the opinion statements do not start with "I like" or "I feel." The information at the top is really meant more for the teacher to use during the instructional aspect of the assessment and it would be better (but not absolutely required) if the teacher removed the information prior to giving the student the worksheet to assess him/her on distinguishing facts from opinions.
Thank you,

Kelly Ickes

Assistant Director
Client Services - Special Education

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