View the tools for each Reading Standard:
State Curriculum Standard 1.0General Reading Processes
State Curriculum Standard 2.0Comprehension of Informational Text
State Curriculum Standard 3.0Comprehension of Literary Text
We welcome your comments and suggestions regarding how we can make these tools more useful to you on the feedback form.
Toolkits are resources created by Maryland teachers. Aligned with math and reading Voluntary State Curricula, they offer instructional support in math and reading. Detailed explanations of skills that emphasize their interrelatedness aid a teacher's understanding of the complexity of math and reading instruction. Ideas for lessons and student work samples complete a substantial body of information to assist a teacher with both short term and long range planning.
Explanation of Specific Resources
A reading clarification is found at the indicator level and is a detailed explanation of an indicator that addresses each objective embedded within the indicator. The clarification focuses on the building of reading skills and their dependency upon each other.
Public Release items have appeared on MSA forms and then are released for public viewing and use. Releasing items is one step to ensuring that schools, districts, and other stakeholders understand how the content standards are assessed on the MSA.
A lesson seed is found at the objective level and is an idea for a lesson. The seed is directly aligned with an objective and ranges in cognitive demand. The sequential development of the lesson idea may begin at a lower level of cognitive demand and then evolve into a higher level of cognitive demand. Teachers may use the entire seed or only a portion of a seed based upon the capability of their classes.
A sample assessment is found at the objective level and contains three components. There is a passage, a BCR written to that specific objective, and annotated student responses. Each BCR has been field tested by a group of students from whom a select number of responses has been annotated. While the format used for these BCRs is the same as MSA, these sample assessments have not appeared on an actual MSA.
Advanced/Gifted and Talented: An advanced/gifted and talented tool is an idea for a complex, multi-step instructional task that requires students to apply knowledge and skills of multiple objectives that support one indicator. Tasks require students to interpret, analyze, and evaluate text at an appropriate level of complexity and embed a variety of differentiation strategies to challenge advanced readers. Many of these strategies and activities can be adapted for use with all students.