Benchmark Education Announces New Common Core Aligned Series of Reading Assessment Practice Books for Grades 3 to 6

NEW ROCHELLE, NY, Apr. 21, 2014— Literacy publisher Benchmark Education Company announced a new reading practice book series in print format for students in grades 3–6 and aligned to Common Core State Standards. Available now, Short Reads for Finding Text Evidence provides students with specific practice reading short genre text passages and then answering comprehension questions using text evidence, preparing them to succeed on the new Common Core reading assessments. Each grade-level set consists of an 88-page teacher’s guide and 10 consumable or reproducible 128-page student practice books that prepare students to read short genre texts and answer evidence-based questions correlated to Common Core reading informational (RI) and literary (RL) standards. All questions reflect the item formats students will encounter on Common Core assessments currently being developed by the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC) and Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium (SBAC).

Short Reads for Finding Text Evidence starts with mini-lessons that model the kind of thinking needed for success on the tests, and moves on to practice test questions based on the PARCC and SBAC tests. Each Short Reads for Finding Text Evidence teacher’s guide provides mentor reads and model mini-lessons to build evidence-based reading strategies, as well as answer keys and rubrics. Each student practice book includes Lexile-leveled reading passages representing the required genres for the grade level. Each passage is accompanied by evidence-based questions reflecting the formats of the coming assessments:

• Two-part items in which students provide both an answer and the evidence to support the answer;
• Constructed response questions that require students to write short answers based on the texts;
• Questions that replicate the tech-enhanced items students will encounter in the online assessments.

As students read complex grade-level passages and answer 120 evidence-based questions in each book, they rehearse the thinking strategies they need to achieve skillful, text-dependent comprehension. They also become familiar with the variety of questions and the formats of the new Common Core assessments they will take.

“We are excited that this program gives students valuable experience and success working with the genres and types of questions they will encounter in the new assessments,” said Benchmark Education President Tom Reycraft. “We’ve made classroom sets very affordable for schools at only $99.”

For information about the Short Reads for Finding Text Evidence Series or to purchase these and other Benchmark Education products, visit www.benchmarkeducation.com or call 877-236-2465.

ABOUT BENCHMARK EDUCATION COMPANY

Headquartered in New Rochelle, NY, Benchmark Education Company is a leading publisher of K–12 core, supplemental, and intervention literacy resources in English and Spanish. These resources are supported by instructional technology solutions as well as on-site and online customized professional development training for teachers and administrators. Benchmark Education’s print and online resources are differentiated to support all learners in all settings and are research-based and proven. In addition to extensive educational use in the USA, they are also used in schools and training centers in the Middle East, Canada, South America, and Asia.