• Financial Literacy Unit: 
    This week of readings and writing utilize a sample argumentative Smarter Balanced assessment released for student use.  
    It shows the type of test that measures student proficiency for Common Core State Standards. South Bend's English classes has used this assessment as a 9-12 district writing prompt in the past in order to determine individual, classroom, and district-wide learning targets for the upcoming year.  
     
    Learning Targets: 
    As students engage in this assessment, they are developing and demonstrating skills.  
    *The student will evaluate the relevance of information from multiple sources.
    *The students will integrate information by paraphrasing while avoiding plagiarism.
    *The student will cite evidence to support arguments, analyses, or conjectures.
    *The student will write full arguments about topics or sources, attending to purpose and audience: establish and support a claim, organize and cite supporting evidence from credible sources, provide appropriate transitions for coherence, and develop a conclusion that is appropriate to the purpose and audience and follows from and supports the argument(s) presented. 
     
    About the test: 
     *The reading portion consists of four sources written by authors who have taken different positions on the issue.  There are three questions students will answer related to the four sources.  Students are encouraged to take notes as they read and may use their notes later when they write their arguments.
    *Using a format such as the ones shown by these graphic organizers may assist with note taking: Claim, Evidence, and Interpretation. 
    *Time is given in class on Tuesday and Wednesday to complete the readings.
     
    *The writing part, including brainstorming, drafting, revising, editing, and publishing, will occur in class Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday.
    *The writing portion has a set of rubrics that will be used to score student responses Argument Rubrics.  
    *This sample outline with explanations can help individuals unfamiliar with argumentative writing Argument Writing Tips.
    * All student responses will be written in Google Docs using student accounts.  
     
     
    To begin reading sources in the format that will be used on Smarter Balanced Assessments click here. 
     
    The original source links are below. 
     
     
    Spanish Versions of the texts to support ELL students are below.  These were generated using the Google translate function. Similar translations are NOT provided on the actual Smarter Balanced Assessments.  They are provided here only in the interest of assisting ELL students whose focus is to develop writing skills to have the needed reading context in their native language. Translations of the directions are also NOT provided on the actual Smarter Balanced Assessment, but they are provided here to help familiarize test takers with the format and language commonly accompanying writing prompts.