From March 22-25, English 11 students will take their writing SOL (Standards of Learning). On the first day of the test, students will take the multiple choice section. On the second day, students will take the essay section.
The multiple choice section is untimed and will contain a variety of questions.
“[Students will] get a web or an outline and get multiple choice questions regarding planning. [Students will] also receive questions around revision, so they might have a sentence and have to put where the comma or semicolon goes. They might give you a group of sentences and ask which is the best way to write this sentence,” English teacher Rachel Sadauskas said.
Unlike other SOLs, this test is taken in March instead of May to give the state enough time to grade the essay portion of the test. Similar to the multiple choice section, the essay is untimed; however, it tends to take longer because students must produce a final draft.
“Students go through the entire writing process, reading the prompt, prepping for the questions like ‘How am I going to answer this?’ and brainstorming. They write the essay, and then they’re expected to also revise that essay and have a strong product at the end,” Sadauskas said.
The English 11 Writing SOL is the end-of-course assessment for English, so the SOL shows what students have learned throughout the years.
“Every student who wants to graduate in Virginia must earn one verified writing credit, and this March Writing SOL gives you that credit,” testing coordinator Wendy Boone said.
English 11 students will be split in half for test taking. One half will take their SOL on Tuesday and Wednesday, and the other half will take their SOL on Thursday and Friday.
The schedule has been changed on SOL testing days. There will be no Patriot Period, and instead, students will remain in their third period class until 11:14. Due to teacher requests, on March 24 and 25, seventh and sixth periods will be at the beginning of the day and first and second periods will be at the end. Because of the schedule flip, teachers will not miss a full week of teaching to those 1st and 2nd period classes. It also allows different SOL test proctors to be selected.
“I can only pull teachers [for proctoring] who are free at the beginning of the day, and if we don’t flip the schedule, then only first and second period teachers can proctor all week,” Boone said.
Test times and locations the test will be taken is specific to each student. Teachers have received emails with specific test times and locations the test will be taken for each student. Talk to your English teacher if you haven’t received this information yet. Good luck to all English 11 students!
