In the reading component of the test, students use strategies to interact with a variety of selections to construct an understanding of the texts by responding to multiple-choice questions and one open-response question.
These selections focus on three reading skills:
understanding explicitly stated information and ideas
understanding implicitly stated information and ideas (making inferences)
making connections between information and ideas in a reading selection and personal knowledge and experience (interpreting reading selections by integrating information and ideas in a reading selection and personal knowledge and experience)
In the writing component, students respond to multiple-choice questions and demonstrate their ability to communicate ideas and information clearly and coherently through one long-writing response.
The combination of these written and multiple-choice questions focuses on three writing skills:
developing a main idea with sufficient supporting details
organizing information and ideas in a coherent manner
using conventions (spelling, grammar, punctuation) in a manner that does not distract from clear communication
Since a large-scale assessment does not allow for a complete revision and refinement process, written work on the OSSLT is scored as first-draft (unpolished) writing.