Connecticut - Smarter Balanced Informative-Explanatory Performance Task Writing Rubric Grades 3-5

The response has a clear and effective organizational structure, creating a sense of unity and completeness. The response is fully sustained, and consistently and purposefully focused: controlling or main idea of a topic is clearly communicated, and the focus is strongly maintained for the purpose, audience, and task; consistent use of a variety of transitional strategies to clarify the relationships between and among ideas; effective introduction and conclusion; logical progression of ideas from beginning to end; strong connections between and among ideas with some syntactic variety.

The response has an evident organizational structure and a sense of completeness, though there may be minor flaws and some ideas may be loosely connected. The response is adequately sustained and generally focused: controlling or main idea of a topic is clear, and the focus is mostly maintained for the purpose, audience, and task; adequate use of transitional strategies with some variety to clarify the relationships between and among ideas; adequate introduction and conclusion; adequate progression of ideas from beginning to end; adequate connections between and among ideas.

The response has an inconsistent organizational structure, and flaws are evident. The response is somewhat sustained and may have a minor drift in focus: controlling or main idea of a topic may be somewhat unclear, or the focus may be insufficiently sustained for the purpose, audience, and task; inconsistent use of transitional strategies and/or little variety; introduction or conclusion, if present, may be weak; uneven progression of ideas from beginning to end; and/or formulaic; inconsistent or unclear connections between and among ideas.

The response has little or no discernible organizational structure. The response may be related to the topic but may provide little or no focus: controlling or main idea may be confusing or ambiguous; response may be too brief or the focus may drift from the purpose, audience, or task; few or no transitional strategies are evident; introduction and/or conclusion may be missing.

Unintelligible • In a language other than English • Off-topic • Copied text • Off-purpose

The response provides thorough and convincing support/evidence for the controlling idea and supporting idea(s) that includes the effective use of sources, facts, and details. The response clearly and effectively elaborates ideas, using precise language: comprehensive evidence from sources is integrated; references are relevant and specific; effective use of a variety of elaborative techniques; vocabulary is clearly appropriate for the audience and purpose; effective, appropriate style enhances content.

The response provides adequate support/evidence for the controlling idea and supporting idea(s) that includes the use of sources, facts, and details. The response adequately elaborates ideas, employing a mix of precise and more general language: adequate evidence from sources is integrated; some references may be general; adequate use of some elaborative techniques; vocabulary is generally appropriate for the audience and purpose; generally appropriate style is evident.

The response provides uneven, cursory support/evidence for the controlling idea and supporting idea(s) that includes uneven or limited use of sources, facts, and details. The response elaborates ideas unevenly, using simplistic language: some evidence from sources may be weakly integrated, imprecise, or repetitive; references may be vague; weak or uneven use of elaborative techniques; development may consist primarily of source summary; vocabulary use is uneven or somewhat ineffective for the audience and purpose; inconsistent or weak attempt to create appropriate style.

The response provides minimal support/evidence for the controlling idea and supporting idea(s) that includes little or no use of sources, facts, and details. The response is vague, lacks clarity, or is confusing: evidence from the source material is minimal or irrelevant; references may be absent or incorrectly used; minimal, if any, use of elaborative techniques; vocabulary is limited or ineffective for the audience and purpose; little or no evidence of appropriate style.

Unintelligible • In a language other than English • Off-topic • Copied text • Off-purpose

The response demonstrates an adequate command of conventions: • adequate use of correct sentence formation, punctuation, capitalization, grammar usage, and spelling

The response demonstrates a partial command of conventions: • limited use of correct sentence formation, punctuation, capitalization, grammar usage, and spelling

The response demonstrates little or no command of conventions: • infrequent use of correct sentence formation, punctuation, capitalization, grammar usage, and spelling

Unintelligible • In a language other than English • Off-topic • Copied text • Off-purpose (Off-purpose responses will still receive a score in Conventions.)