Writing to Reading in 2023 STAAR

Writing to Reading

Caution: This year, 2022, is NOT the time to be teaching this for test prep. It's time to wait and see what the data says and final decisions by TEA. Now is the time to think, reflect, and develop our own knowledge about reader response. 

In 2023, students will be writing extended constructed responses (multiple paragraphs) based on what they read, "writing to reading." In other words, students will be writing in response to what they are reading: "writing in response to reading." 

This means that students will not be receiving a prompt that asks them to write an informational or argumentative essay. It means that they will be writing using informational or argumentative techniques to respond to a prompt about a text they have read. (Decisions have not yet been made on what genres will be assessed for each grade. Decisions have yet been made if the genres will be different each year. Decisions have not been made if the genres will be announced before the test.) As you know, all genres listed in the TEKS are available for assessment purposes. I can't see how they'd ever ask kids to write poetry or drama, but I do think we could see them writing in response to those genres. My opinion only. 

Caution: Just because students will not be asked to write from an informational or argumentative prompt, it does not mean that students should not be asked to write them in class. Just because it isn't assessed doesn't mean that we shouldn't be doing it. 

Hypothetical Examples

For example, in third grade, students learn about argumentative texts (9E). They also learn to distinguish facts from opinions in (9Ei). Students may (remember - the jury and field test data are still out) be asked to read a passage and answer a prompt explaining their opinion about something in the text. Their opinion becomes their claim (9Ei). Then students must use facts and details (9Eii) to support their claim. Students take a point of view and attitude (9Eiii) and pull support from the reading to justify their claim. 

4th grade students may read a personal narrative or story and be asked to write an informational essay comparing and contrasting the characteristics or actions of two characters. 

Students may read a paired passage about a topic and be asked to write a problem-solution response to the information presented in the article. 

The prompts are carefully designed with the information in the passage to ensure that students know the expectations to pull from the prompt and structure their writing response appropriately. We will know more about this after field testing.