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Sample Materials for the Mississippi Writing Assessment Program

 

Sample Materials for the Mississippi Writing Program February 2, 2009
Grade 4, Grade 7, and English II

The new Mississippi Writing Assessment Program brings some changes for students in grades 4 and 7. To help teachers ensure that students in grades 4 and 7 are comfortable with this new presentation, we are providing sample booklets that teachers may download and use for classroom practice.

Students will receive both a test booklet and a response booklet. The test booklet will contain TWO prompts; students will select ONLY ONE to which to respond. The test booklet allows students room to plan and to write their draft.

Students must write the response to be scored in the response booklet. ONLY the pages in the response booklet will be scored. Students will have to darken the bubble that corresponds to the ONE prompt they selected.

This format is the same format that English II students have followed for the past several years, but we have also posted a sample test booklet and response booklet for English II students. We are hopeful that English I teachers working with their students will use these sample booklets as they support instruction that will lead students to a successful performance on the English II Writing Assessment. As a reminder, English II students who are first-time test takers and will participate in the March Writing Assessment administration will respond to only ONE of two prompts; these two prompts may be two expository prompts or two position paper prompts or one expository prompt and one position paper prompt. ***During school year 2009 - 2010, first-time test takers will also be responsible for response to literature prompts.***

The prompts in the test booklet at each grade are ones found in the Mississippi Writing Assessment Program Teacher's Guide, which arrived in districts in December. (The Guide offers actual student responses to the prompts along with annotations for each score point.)