Grade 9 VLT Volusia Literacy Test 2: Informative Writing

[Pages:7]Grade 9 VLT Volusia Literacy Test 2:

Informative Writing

Volusia County Schools

Grade 9 Volusia Literacy Test 2 Read the "Teenage Transition" passage set.

Teenage Transition

Source 1: It's the Transition That's Troublesome:

Schools need to focus on transitions in order to help

students succeed.

by Cornelia Grumman

U.S. News & World Report, April 16, 2015

1

Transitions are hard. The first day at a new job. When the baby goes

from two naps to one. That moment between the "House of Cards" credits

and the theme music for the next episode.

2 Joking aside, transitions are especially hard for students and teachers. In Chicago, where most elementary schools span from kindergarten all the way through eighth grade, and students make one huge leap into high school (often one that isn't their neighborhood school), freshman year poses a particular challenge.

3 It's easier to withdraw or even skip class. It's harder to form relationships with teachers and to figure out how to get help with coursework. The adults in the building often don't know if you're an honors kid, a foster kid, a kid whose job supports the family or a kid about to fall in with the wrong crowd. There's a lot more freedom. There's a lot more responsibility. And you have all the impulse control, risk aversion and future foresight of a 14-year-old.

4 You will read an essay about the transition of students from middle school to high school. You will then write an informative essay about some of the challenges that students face when transitioning to high school and some steps that schools can take to solve those issues.

5 Even kids who look like they're doing great in the middle grades slip during freshman year. The Consortium on Chicago School Research found that grades declined between 8th and 9th grade for high- and lowachieving students, in high performing and low-performing schools, and for every demographic group ? boys and girls of all races and ethnicities. The average freshman unweighted GPA is below a C.

6 In response, schools now understand they need to wrap better supports around freshmen; the freshman on-track indicator can flag students whose grades and attendance are in the danger zone. Some examples of responses are: freshman homerooms and lockers are condensed into a

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Grade 9 Volusia Literacy Test 2

single corridor; teachers take responsibility for ensuring someone on the team knows each and every ninth grader; and the parent of a ninth grader with an unexcused absence gets a phone call from every single instructor.

7 Every school approaches it differently, but the widespread focus on freshman year has yielded impressive results; each year, fewer freshmen are off track and at risk for dropping out.

8 These insights may be easily applied as important principles to other significant school transition points, in particular, between preschool and K-12 and between K-12 and higher ed. With a little bit of useful data and a deliberate focus from school leaders on relationships and collaboration, those transitions can go much better too.

9 Preschool and kindergarten are more often than not worlds apart. Even when preschool classrooms share space with elementary schools, it's all too common for them to share little else ? not curricula, not professional development, not special education services or other wrap-around programs. Kindergarten teachers often don't know much, if anything, about the experiences their students have had for their prior five years. Montessori preschool? Head Start? Lots of Nick Jr. at Aunt Janice's? Where they've been and how ready they are for kindergarten has to be discerned once they're in the classroom, with instruction adapted on the fly.

10 There's a move afoot to be more thoughtful about this transition point between early childhood and early grades, even while early childhood and K-12 usually operate in two separate galaxies. A recent gathering in Chicago of district teams from across the country to share strategies and practices to better align the two worlds suggests awareness of the problem has grown, as has the appetite to uncover solutions.

11 At the higher ed level, high schools have been working diligently to ensure more students are college-ready. But few have been diligently tracking how those students fare if and when they matriculate. If they did, they'd likely be disappointed ? nationwide, only about 18 percent of high school freshmen earn a bachelor's degree by the time they're 25 years old. But some colleges are doing a better job than others. In Illinois, the colleges that fall into the "somewhat selective" band ? colleges that presumably attract students with comparable levels of achievement and preparation ? vary in their graduation rates from a low of 21 percent to a high of 54 percent. What's going on? Why are some schools

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Grade 9 Volusia Literacy Test 2

able to help students make the transition, while others have far more students falling through the cracks? And what role can both high schools and institutions of higher ed play in getting more students through college? 12 There's exciting momentum building that's focused on figuring it out. Here in Chicago, local colleges are collaborating to share promising approaches. Nationwide, schools like the University of Texas are using data dashboards and targeted supports for freshmen they identify as at risk of not graduating, and universities are employing tactics from text reminders to complete financial aid forms and peer mentoring to extra financial help for common barriers like an inability to pay student fees. Transitions are opportunities to give students and parents a clear line of sight from early childhood to college success. We just have to look beyond our foxholes, reach out across systems and make it happen.

Source 2: Ninth Grade: The Most Important Year in

High School

Freshman year is essential in deciding whether a

student drops out or stays in school.

By Michele Willens

The Atlantic, Nov 1, 2013

13

Educators are increasingly focusing on the ninth grade as the year

that determines whether a young person will move on or drop out of

school. According to research published in the journal Education, ninth

graders have the lowest grade point average, the most missed classes,

the majority of failing grades, and more misbehavior referrals than any

other high-school grade level. Ninth grade has increasingly become a

"bottleneck" for students: A joint report from Princeton University and the

Brookings Institution found "in 1970, there were 3 percent fewer tenth

graders than ninth graders; by 2000, that share had risen to 11 percent."

14

"More and more of us are realizing that it's the make or break year

for many 14- and 15-year-olds," says Jon Zaff, director of the Center for

Promise at Tufts University. "It's a time when the cognitive, emotional,

and physical are all coming together. The schools are likely new

environments, and the students have more autonomy and more

homework."

15

Not only are youths entering the intimidating institution that is high

school, they are experiencing the usual adolescent angst and depending

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Grade 9 Volusia Literacy Test 2

on poor decision making skills. "Students entering high school--just at the time brains are in flux--still have the propensity to be impulsive and are prone to making mistakes," says Washington D.C. psychoanalyst, Dr. Linda Stern. "They are therefore experimental and trying to separate and might try substances that interfere with the normal developmental process. Put all that together with raging hormones, the normal academic pressures, and meeting a whole new group to be judged by."

16

When kids fall behind and have to repeat a grade, they can wind up

in a vicious cycle of peer judgment and low self-esteem. "We are ending

up with something now called the ninth-grade bulge," explains Zaff,

"which means a glut of students who have to repeat the grade. So they

are stigmatized socially as well as academically, which can also lead to

their finding it easier to just give up."

17

While she doesn't deny that the ninth grade is a pivotal moment in a

student's education, Diane Ravitch, author of Reign of Error, has her

suspicions about the motivations behind schools' growing interest in

ninth-grade performance. "Many schools allow students to advance ready

or not, and when they reach the ninth the stakes are higher. The high-

stakes testing starts in the tenth grade, so kids are being held back not

for their own sake but to protect their school's statistics. If the focus were

really on the students, people would be thinking creatively about how to

help them instead of thinking of them as data points."

18

Educators are honing in on three indicators--attendance, behavior,

and course performance--that are believed to be the most accurate

measurements of a student's likelihood to either quit school or move on.

A lengthy, detailed guide from the National High School Center states that

"more students fail ninth grade than any other grade in high school, and

a disproportionate number of students who are held back in ninth grade

subsequently drop out." The guide describes telltale signs that can be

detected as early as the first semester of the first year in high school: The

biggest risk factor for failing ninth, for example, is the number of

absences during the first 30 days. Missing more than 10 percent is cause

for concern. In addition, first-year high-school students are classified as

`on track' if they earn at least five full year course credits, and have

received no more than one F per semester. So to be `off track'? You do

the math.

19

High schools are working to use this information to keep students in

school past the ninth grade. The Everyone Graduates Center at the Johns

Hopkins School of Education recommends something called the Freshman

Seminar for students in their first year of high school. The program offers

learning materials and training specialists to aid students in study and

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social skills. Some students use it during homeroom or advisory periods, some during special enhancement periods.

20

"We try to build some relevance into their experience to go along

with the regular curriculum," says Mary Maushard, communications

director for the Everyone Graduates Center. "So many of these ninth

graders--particularly in high-poverty areas--just don't see any reason to

stay in school."

21

There are signs that programs and administrators are getting

through to high school freshmen. In Portland, Oregon, Self-Enhancement

Inc.?which employs coordinators to oversee 30 high-risk students each,

in 12 public schools--takes pride in a 98 percent high-school graduation

rate for the students it works with. Goals are set for every student, and

the aides are available 24/7 and serve as links between child and school,

parent and school, and child and parent.

22

"A lot of what we do is to prepare the students for the ninth grade,"

says Self Enhancement project manager, Lisa Manning. "We make sure

they have cultural activities that engage them and that they attend a six-

week summer program for the academics before even starting."

23

New York City's Flushing High School, one of the city's so-called

"dropout factories," now hosts a program designed to keep at-risk

students in school. Initiated by the Sports and Arts In Schools

Foundation, a non-profit that works to improve low-performing schools in

the city, and sponsored by AT&T, the program brings in a support staff to

encourage students to participate in afterschool activities in athletics and

the arts and to work closely with low-performing students throughout the

school day.

24

"Just by staying on top of the students who were considered to be in

trouble academically, we've had tremendous success," says Amir Sultan,

a program manager for the Sports and Arts in Schools Foundation. "Now,

some 85 percent have moved on to the tenth grade. That's not only

double-digit improvement over previous numbers, but over the other

students not in the program."

25

The answers seem to be coming, however gradually, and at least the

right questions are being asked. "The main one is what does each of

these potential dropouts in the ninth grade need as they make this big

transition?" says Zaff. "It's a time of great upheaval and great

opportunity."

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Grade 9 Volusia Literacy Test 2

Writing Prompt

Moving from middle school to high school can be a challenging time for a teenager. Write an informative essay in which you address some of the challenges that students often face when transitioning to high school and some steps that schools can take to solve those issues. Be sure to use evidence from the texts. Manage your time carefully so that you can

? read the passages; ? plan your response; ? write your response; and ? revise and edit your response. Be sure to ? use evidence from multiple sources; and ? avoid overly relying on one source. Your response should be in the form of a multiparagraph essay. Write your response in the space provided.

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