ALP Training Outline

Total Time: 45–90 minutes

Quick Intro (5 minutes)

DLC Site

• Point out the Search box (appears on every page) and the About section.
• Explain differences between Students, Educators, and Parents sections.
• Point out the Bookmarks tab and provide a brief overview.

ALP WASL Prep Resources

ALP (Accelerated Learning Program) is designed to be used by math and reading teachers to help students practice and review skills covered in the WASL. ALP Math is for middle– and high school students, and ALP Reading is for middle school students (but can also be used in high school for review and special education). Refer to the ALP User's Guide on the DLC site to learn more about this resource.

Intro Activities (30–45 minutes)

Navigating Math and Reading

Learn more: To learn more about each resource, click on Getting Started in Math and click on Home in Reading.

Lesson content: Click on Getting Started/Introduction for a series of six introductory math lessons, and then navigate by math strand, numbered 2.0–10.0. For Reading, click on Index or mouse over Lessons; ALP Reading has two sections: Reading Literature (Narrative) and Reading for Information (Informational).

Rubrics: In Math, click on 1.0 Rubrics. In reading, mouse over the Rubrics tab (without clicking) to reveal a drop-down menu of choices. See A Closer Look at the Rubrics to learn more.

Assessments: Math assessments are included in Strands 2.0–8.0. To access Reading assessments, mouse over the Assessments tab. See A Closer Look at the Assessments to learn more.

Tools: Click on Tools in Math or Reading to access vocabulary. Math also links to helpful math websites. The vocabulary for each is essential terminology that students should recognize in order to complete the lessons. (Students might want to print out the vocabulary terms to refer to the definitions).

Digging Deeper (15–30 minutes)

A Closer Look at Rubrics

Rubrics are a useful "test prep" resource, offering valuable tips and practice on the types of questions that appear on the WASL: multiple choice, short answer, and extended response. Although the content of the Rubrics section is specific to either Math or Reading, many of the tips and strategies are generic to any test-taking situation.

In the Short Answer and Extended Response subsections, actual rubrics used by WASL scorers are provided, and students are given the opportunity to score sample responses.

Introduction: "Kid-friendly" explanation of rubrics, using terms middle school students understand.

Multiple choice: Since multiple choice questions do not require a rubric for scoring purposes, "rubric" is not really an appropriate context for considering response strategies. Nevertheless, many valuable tips and practice opportunities are provided in this Rubrics subsection.

Short answer: This subsection begins with an explanation of the two necessary components for full credit in a short-answer response: the correct answer and a brief explanation of how that answer was derived.

The tutorial then moves on to a Tips section that repeats/reviews some of the same tips included under Multiple Choice, but adds a new section (with an example) discussing the importance of identifying the "key elements" of a question in order to write a complete response.

A Scoring section then provides an actual rubric used by WASL scorers for scoring short-answer questions, based largely on the rule: "Write two things, earn two points."

Next, students are provided with a Checklist to check their answers and explanations. (Students can print this checklist to use when practicing short-answer responses.)

Finally, students are provided with a short-answer "guided practice" question. Students are prompted to describe the key elements of the question, and then two, one, and zero point sample responses are provided for each question.

Extended response: This subsection basically repeats most of the same points provided in the Short Answer section, emphasizing the need for "more thinking, more organizing, more explaining, and more writing." The Tips section is expanded somewhat to more fully cover the key elements of extended responses, two examples of which are given and discussed. A somewhat expanded version of the Checklist used earlier for short-answer questions is provided, including a final self-scoring item.

A Closer Look at Lessons

ALP lessons are clustered within strands (Math) or sections (Reading). Each lesson includes the following standard set of lesson components:

Objectives: Describes what students will be able to do after completing the lesson.

Vocabulary: Lists the essential terms that students must understand in order to successfully accomplish the lesson objectives.

Tips: Summarizes the conceptual understanding and the algorithmic skills (for Math) necessary to successfully complete the lesson.

Examples: Summarizes the conceptual understanding and the algorithmic skills (for Math) necessary to successfully complete the lesson.

Presents 5-15 problems (Math) or 3-5 passages/questions (Reading), along with clear, complete explanations of how the problems are solved or the questions answered.

Practice: Presents additional sets of problems (Math) or passages/questions (Reading) for students to complete on their own. Students have access to the correct answers, however, and can immediately check the accuracy of their responses.

Self Check (ALP Reading only): Provides students an opportunity to reflect back on their experiences of completing a lesson. The Self Check can be assigned by teachers to be completed and handed in for review.

A Closer Look at Assessments

ALP assessments address entire strands (Math) or sections (Reading) and include a review. Individual ALP lessons do not include assessments.

Review: Recaps the learning objectives for each lesson and offers tips for how to best review the concepts and skills covered in that strand or section.

Assessment: The assessment itself is intended to be completed online by students. After they've completed it, they click on a button at the bottom of the page to score their answers. ALP automatically scores all multiple-choice questions and the results are immediately available to students. They must then print out the Assessment page and submit it to a teacher, mentor, tutor, or parent to score the short answer and extended response questions. (Whoever does the scoring should review the contents of the Rubrics section to understand how to score short answer and extended response questions.)

Neither Math nor Reading provides answer sheets or specific scoring rubrics for Short Answer or Extended Response questions. If assessment scoring is an important consideration in your use of the ALP resources, the scorer should be familiar with the Math and/or Reading content and qualified to score the nonobjective questions.

Training Evaluation (2–5 minutes)

Return to the Digital Learning Commons website. Click on the Training Evaluation link, which appears at the bottom of every page on the site.