Bibliography/ Teacher Resources
“Test practice is not test preparation. During test preparation, we need to teach children about this new and rather bizarre genre. We need to teach them to read for new purposes, in a new context, with new strategies. We need to draw on all that we know and believe about teaching in general and teaching reading, so that our children will learn the skills they need to do their best on standardized reading tests.” -Kathleen Tolan
MCAS Resources:
⭐ Links to Resources for Teaching with Kids (What we sorted & discussed during our PD on 3/6! 😁):
3-5 Open Response Prompts from 2017-2023 (for sorting/discussion)
6-8 Open Response Prompts from 2017-2023 (for sorting/discussion)
Student Work Samples/Scoring Guides from 2016-2023 (Also linked on each grade level page)
⭐ LPS Mini Test Prep Unit PROPOSED Pacing for Teachers (and FUN GAMES!)
2020 MCAS Test Prep Unit from Teachers for Teachers
2022 MCAS Test Prep Unit (LPS Slightly Revised from Teachers for Teachers Unit)
2022 TCRWP Test Taking 101 Mini-Unit
💡Language Stems to Support Writing About Reading (How can we use these ALL YEAR LONG to support writing in the content areas?):
Looking for more ways to weave test-taking vocabulary into this work in a fun way... check out these WORD LOVE UNITS:
Links to Sample NewsELA articles (for purposes of adjusting Lexile):
Need more? or have a particular topic in mind that your students are interested in? Reach out to Gwen and she'll help!
Short Text Resources to Help Teachers Curate Text Sets (some of these sites have ads so they are not acceptable for direct student use):