I Read to Write ©2021 is designed to help students master the skills needed for close reading and responding to multiple sources on writing assessments.
Among other things, students learn to cite text evidence as they respond to multiple sources; to write across Science, Social Studies, and Math content areas; and to write within three text types: narrative, informative/explanatory, and opinion.
Rainbow was responsible for developing, writing, editing, and/or reviewing all content for both the Student Editions and Teacher Editions, Grades 2–5.
Rainbow developed assessment passages and items to be used in conjunction with The College Board’s SpringBoard English Language Arts ©2020-2021, Grades 9–12 (Texas Edition) and Grades 6–8, English I, English II, English III, English IV (National Edition).
The assessment program is designed to assist students to develop and refine skills in critical thinking, close reading, and writing in various genres.
At each grade level, Rainbow developed content for two separate types of assessments—Activity Quizzes and Unit Assessments. Activity Quizzes are designed to assess students’ understanding of the Learning Targets and Focus Standards taught in each activity. Unit Assessments are longer cumulative assessments that test students’ understanding of the reading, writing, and language standards taught throughout an entire unit.
Rainbow’s team of assessment experts handled start-to-finish passage and item development including analysis of existing items and creation of Blueprint planning documents. Rainbow handled the literature search for permissioned text stimuli as well as developed new content for commissioned text stimuli. Item types, developed in Learnosity’s authoring tool, included multiple-choice, multi-select, two-part, drag and drop, highlighting, and matching.
All items are aligned to the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS) for the Texas edition or the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) for the National edition.
Rainbow handled development of approximately 25 passages 600+ multiple-choice and technology-enhanced items focused on reading and writing skills to be used in connection with HMH’s Into Reading ©2020, Grades 2–5.
Our team of assessment experts developed short reading passages and crafted multiple-choice and constructed response items. Each constructed response item contained an item-specific rubric. For the writing portion of the assessment, our team created embedded error passages and multiple-choice questions designed to assess students’ knowledge of grammar, usage, revising, and editing.
Rainbow also handled art and photo searches for any passages that required graphic stimuli or support.
All passages and items were designed to reflect those found on the State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness (STAAR) tests and were aligned to the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS).
Rainbow’s team of assessment experts handled the development of approximately 300 passages and 1,500 multiple-choice and technology-enhanced items to be used in connection with HMH’s Into Reading ©2020, Grades K–5.
Passages at grades 2–5 were written to meet grade-specific Lexile ranges, and the items at all grade levels were aligned to the Common Core State Standards (CCSS), the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS), and the Virginia Standards of Learning (SOL). All passages and items were created using the online authoring tool Learnosity.
For kindergarten, Rainbow’s team created fiction and nonfiction listening comprehension passages with corresponding multiple-choice items. Our team also developed stand-alone, multiple-choice items to assess phonics and high-frequency words.
For first grade, Rainbow developed decodable fiction and nonfiction reading passages with corresponding multiple-choice items. In addition to these passage-specific items, our team also created stand-alone items to assess phonics, high-frequency words, and grammar.
At grades 2–5, Rainbow created fiction and nonfiction reading passages and multiple-choice, constructed response, multi-select, ordering, and matching items associated with each passage. Our team also created embedded error passages with corresponding multiple-choice items.
Rainbow developed the Leveled Library Take and Teach Lessons & Assessment Quizzes to be used in connection with HMH’s Into Reading ©2020, National Edition.
These four- to eight-page guided reading instructional lessons were designed to accompany each leveled reader in the Rigby Leveled Library for Grades K–6. Each lesson includes a Key Ideas & Details instructional session as well as two target skill instructional sessions.
Rainbow developed content for all Take and Teach Lessons for Grades K–2 and provided full-service content review — a total of 1,800 pages. In addition, Rainbow developed content for all 30 of the Take and Teach Lessons for Grade 6 and provided full-service content review of all 120 pages, from manuscript to soft proof.
Each Take and Teach Lesson is accompanied by a Comprehension Quiz. Rainbow developed content for all 90 quizzes — a total of 425 assessment items.
Rainbow’s team of assessment experts handled NGSS-aligned item development for the print and digital Assessment Guides, Grades 1–5, used in conjunction with the national edition of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt’s instructional program, Science Dimensions ©2018.
Rainbow’s team of early childhood specialists planned and developed, within the client’s assessment builder tool, an inventory of Online Playlist Activities to be used in conjunction with Age of Learning’s ABCmouse Early Learning Academy.
All Digital Activities were developed and organized based on specific English Language Arts and Math state standards, Grades K–2.
Rainbow handled “start-to-finish” passage and item development in Riverside’s proprietary content management system (CMS). Our team of assessment experts wrote passages and crafted multiple-choice items with rationales for Grades K, 1, 2, 5, and 6. The assessment suite was built to the Common Core State Standards for ELA in the Reading Literature (RL), Reading for Information (RI) in Grades 2–8, as well as the Reading for History (RH) and Reading for Science and Technical Subjects (RST) in Grades 6–8. Additionally, all grades required some items written to Language standards 4 and 5. Rainbow’s design team provided full-color art and illustrations for K–1 passages and items.
To help prepare students for Next-Generation Writing Assessments, Rainbow developed content for new Test Writing Chapters for Strategies for Writers ©2015, Grades 2–8. Working in InCopy templates, all content was developed using a K4 workflow. Rainbow handled the literature search for permissioned Text Stimuli as well as developed new content for commissioned Text Stimuli. Our team also handled the editorial development of the Student Edition, Teacher Edition, and Optional Revising Lessons (ORL). Finally, all content was aligned and correlated to the Common Core State Standards.
In addition to developing the core components of Voices Literature & Writing ©2013, Rainbow also handled “start-to-finish” development of the Assessment Handbook and CD-ROM, featuring ExamView®, Grades K–6. During the ideation phase, Rainbow handled all research, including a competitive analysis; conceptualization; prototypes; and met regularly with the program authors to incorporate their input into the planning. Rainbow then managed the editorial, design, and production workflows for all print and digital components: Question Banks and Test Development, Reteaching Masters, Leveled Reading Benchmark Assessment Handbooks, Literature and Writing Assessment Handbooks and CDs, Leveled Readers (K–3), and Leveled Passages (4–6).