Florida Standards Assessment

4th Grade

2014-2015

English Language Arts and Mathematics

What is FSA?

• “As many Floridians are aware, our state has been in a period of transition as we have made important decisions to improve our education system and raise the bar for our schools, educators and students.”

• The FSA will be replacing FCAT assessments in the school system. The Florida Standards in mathematics and English Language Arts were approved by the Florida State Board of Education in February 2014 and will be fully implemented in grades K-12 in the 2014-2015 school year.

What Assessments will my Child be Taking?

• 4th grade tests will be paper based

• Reading

• Math

• Writing

Assessment Dates

• The following dates are tentative, they can change.

• Writing: March 2nd- 13th

• Reading: March 23rd- April 10th

• Math: March 23rd- April 10th

Test Specifications Writing, Reading, and Math

Subject

Grade level

Number of Days Testing

Minutes per Session*

Approximate Number of items per Assessment.

Math 4 2 80 60-64

Reading

4 2 80 56-60

Writing

4 1 90 N/A

*Students may be allowed to continue working an additional 30 minutes, if needed for writing.

Writing

• Students will be assessed based on a 5 point rubric

• 90 minutes allotted time

• Students will have to read a variety of texts/articles (Average 3 articles)

• Students will have to form an opinion or explain

• Answer prompt with citing

• Students will have to write about 5 paragraphs

Writing: Opinion Vs. Explanatory

• Write an essay in which you give your opinion about . . . . Use information from the passages in your essay.

• Write an informative essay about . . . . Use information from the passages in your essay.

• Each point of view should be equally represented so that a student can take either side of a position.

• Thorough and convincing support for the controlling ideas must be evident. Students must support their opinions or explanations by citing evidence.

Reading

• Types of questions• Multiple choice

• Open response (citing evidence to support their response)

• Hot text- Students will have to go into the text and find the exact place an answer is located.

• Example: Select the sentence that shows that the main character has told the story many times.

Math

• Students will not have calculators

• Types of questions: • Equation Response

• Natural Language Response- Students explain how they got to their answer

• Multiple Choice

• Multi-Select Response- more than 1 possible answer

• Matching Item Response

Will my Child Receive any Accommodations?

• ESOL- Extended time, access to a dictionary if necessary

• ESE

• 504 Plan

How will the Test Affect my Childs Promotion?

• Your child will not be retained if he/she does not pass the 4th grade FSA test.

Test Taking Tips

• Computer based training tests for each assessment are available for teachers, students, and parents/guardians. Training tests allow students to become familiar with the system, functionality, and item types that will be encountered on the FSA. (http://www.fsassessments.org/training-tests.)

• Students will be required to participate in a training test session at their school prior to testing.

• On the website you will find questions for multiple grade levels as well as the answer keys for each test.

The Night Before

• Make sure your children go to sleep early, so that they can be well rested for the FSA the following day.

• A healthy breakfast is key, this will make sure they are concentrated during the FSA.

• Positive reinforcement is another key quality that needs to be presented to your child so they feel optimistic during the test.• Example: You are going to do great!