WRITING
Essential Skill Assessment

Write clearly and accurately

Writing Essential Skill Description

Write clearly and accurately, means that students:

• Adapt writing to different audiences, purposes, and contexts in a variety of formats and media, using appropriate technology.
• Develop organized, well-reasoned, supported, and focused communications.
• Write to explain, summarize, inform, and persuade, including business, professional, technical, and personal communications.
• Use appropriate conventions to write clearly and coherently, including correct use of grammar, punctuation, capitalization, spelling, sentence construction, and formatting.

Writing Essential Skill Graduation Requirement

Students first enrolled in Grade 9 in the 2009-2010 school year and beyond are required to demonstrate that they are proficient in the Writing Essential Skill in order to graduate. Student fulfill this graduation requirement by earning at, or above, a specific score (the achievement standard) on one of the approved assessment options.

• Overview of the Essential Skill of Writing
  Description of the Writing Essential Skill graduation requirement
• Overview of the Essential Skill of Writing (Spanish)
  Spanish translation of description of the Writing Essential Skill graduation requirement

Assessment Planning Resources

To support Essential Skills across K-12 curricula, links to instructional planning resources, including Common Core links, and data resources are available at the bottom of this page.

Approved Assessment Options

Assessment Category	Specific Assessment Option	Achievement Standard
OAKS	Writing Performance Assessment	40 Composite score
OTHER ASSESSMENTS	Other Assessment List List of all assessment options and achievement standards
WORK SAMPLES	Two Work Samples:  •   One must be expository or persuasive;  •   One in any of the approved modes        (expository, persuasive, narrative)	For each Work Sample, minimum score of 4 in the required Traits Required Traits:  •   Ideas/Content  •   Organization  •   Sentence Fluency  •   Conventions (Word Choice and Voice are not required.)

Work Sample Resources

Professional Development Materials

• Workshop Materials for Writing Scoring Guide and Work Sample Development
  Materials for facilitators to use in leading local trainings or for individual use
• On-Demand Writing Scoring Training
  Webpage with scoring tool for use in calibrating to the Writing scoring guide

Guidelines and Resources

• Work Samples Case Study
  Description of district planning, developing, administering, and scoring Work Sample prompts
• Work Sample Frequently Asked Questions
  Answers to frequently asked questions about Work Sample administration and policy

Scoring for Writing Work Samples

• Guidelines for Scoring and Raters
  Description of requirements for scoring Work Samples, including eligibility for raters



• Work Sample Scoring Guides
  • Writing
    High School State Scoring Guide for Writing
  • Writing (Spanish)
    Spanish translation of high school state Scoring Guide for Writing
• Scored Writing Student Work
  Scored student work illustrating varying levels of performance

Development of Writing Work Samples

• Guidelines for Developing Writing Work Samples
  Description of requirements for developing Work Samples
• Work Sample Resource Sharing
  Webpage with table showing Work Sample resources available from districts or ESDs and contact information

Administration of Writing Work Samples

PURPOSE	To Practice	To Fulfill Graduation Requirement
RESOURCES	Practice Work Samples Writing Work Sample Prompts for use in class assignments or practice tests	Guidelines for Administering Writing Work Samples Description of requirements for administering Work Samples Writing Feedback Form Feedback form for use as the only acceptable means to communicate feedback

Assessment Planning Resources

• Assessment Chapter of the Oregon K-12 Literacy Framework
  Webpage with resources to plan assessment as a part of effective Reading instruction
• Using Essential Skills Data within Instructional Planning
  Webpage with Essential Skills Report and resources for data-based decision making



• Standards-Based Instructional Planning:
  • Implementing English Language Arts and Literacy Common Core
    • Resources Specific for Claim 2: Writing
      Webpage with resources to help in understanding and implementing Claim 2: Writing
  • Assessing Common Core
    Webpage with information about Oregon's statewide assessment for the Common Core
    • Literacy Task Shells
      Fill-in-the-blank shells that teachers use to create powerful Common Core tasks developed by the Literacy Design Collaborative
  • Communicating about Common Core
    Webpage with resources to help in communicating about the Common Core