Alabama Direct Assessment of Writing
Alabama students in Grades five, seven, and ten take the Alabama Direct Assessment of Writing each year to measure their writing skills. It is a criterion-referenced assessment that measures levels of writing achievement as follows:
Level I - does not meet standard
Level II - partially meets standard
Level III - meets standard
Level IV - exceeds standard
Fifth Grade students will read one of the following writing prompts and respond to the prompt during a fifty minute testing period: descriptive, narrative, or expository.
Seventh Grade students will read one of the following writing prompts and respond to the prompt during a sixty minute testing period: descriptive, narrative, expository, or persuasive.
Tenth Grade students will read a narrative, expository, or persuasive prompt and respond to it in essay form during a sixty minute testing period.
Use the Alabama State Department of Education links below to better understand the Writing Assessment and its purpose. The links provide good examples of student writing and the reasons for the scores assigned to them.
A link to a U.S. Department of Education site for parents: Help Your Child Learn to Write Well