This report is a summary of the Basic Skills Task Force activities covering the period from August 1982 to June 30, 1983. The Task Force was created by the West Virginia Board of Education in 1982. The report provides information on the historical background of the Task Force, a summary of how it functioned, and recommendations of the Task Force…

The holistic procedure used to score 2,800 student papers in the New Jersey Writing Project is described in this booklet. Characteristics are given of papers that received high, middle, and low scores. It is noted that (1) papers receiving high scores were characterized by a clear understanding of and a direct approach to the assignment, a…

Georgia Institute of Technology has created a preparatory workshop that avoids focusing composition courses on the state competency exam while helping its students pass the exam. In checking the exams of students who had failed, three problems appeared: lack of motivation, lack of awareness of the standards for grading the exam, and an inability…

Reports on an experiment designed to identify positive variables in the essay writing of Black college students and to use the variables in a new writing course. Suggests that instruction in concepts, skills, and relationships, when combined with consideration of students' diagnosed needs, can result in writing improvement. (AOS)

Once a year every student in Hazelwood (Missouri) high schools is required to write a composition. This Total School Writing Assessment is a major step in an effort to emphasize writing skills and to make writing competence a requirement for graduation. (SK)

The President of Miami University of Ohio explains why he has proposed a test of basic reading and writing skills as a graduation requirement at his institution. (SJL)

This paper specifies the assessment of those spelling skills that are needed for effective writing by students in grades one through six. An introductory section provides background materials, including explanations of how the skill specifications were selected and how they are presented in this report. In the sections that follow the…

A study was designed to identify highly teachable composing skills that have a strong statistical relationship with composition quality across various grade levels. Sample compositions were randomly selected from the National Assessment of Educational Progress (1972). A total of 750 compositions written by 9-, 13-, and 17-year-old-students (250…

This study compared performance of 300 mildly handicapped and 300 nonhandicapped adolescents on the Florida State Student Assessment Test, Part II, a test measuring functional literacy in math and communication skills. Substantial differences indicate severe consequences for handicapped students forced to pass minimum competency tests to graduate…

Intended to help secondary school students prepare for the New York Board of Regents competency tests in writing, this manual will enable students to use writing for effective communication of their needs and enjoyment of the pleasure of permanent self-expression. The first portion of the manual provides several introductory lessons and writing…

Developed as part of the Arkansas Minimum Performance Testing Program (MPT), these item specifications relate to the third grade language arts minimum performance test. There is one item specification for each instructional objective included in the MPT. Item specifications are intended to provide an overview of the general content and format of…

Standardized tests represent one way of obtaining assessment information. Yet in recent years educators and the public have voiced concerns about an overriding emphasis on tests and test scores. Pressure to "teach to the test" means that not enough time is spent on higher order thinking and literacy skills because minimal competencies…

Because of consistent faculty involvement from its earliest stages, the writing assessment program at the University of Missouri at Kansas City (UMKC) represents a competent, fair, and useful procedure for the large-scale testing and evaluation of student writing. UMKC's assessment curriculum builds on the existing sequence of three composition…

This report describes the procedures followed in scoring the October 1978 Florida Minimal Writing Production Skills Assessment and reports the results of that assessment. The assessment was conducted on a sample of Florida public school students in grades 3, 5, 8, and 11. Sections include descriptions of the rating scale and scorer's guide as well…

The South Carolina Basic Skills Assessment Program (BSAP), a testing program, presents information to determine how successfully children in individual school districts are achieving the minimum basic skills required by South Carolina law. Each year BSAP tests are given to children entering the first grade and to children in grades 1, 2, 3, 6, 8,…