FAST ELA Grade 4 case studies
FAST ELA Grade 4 · Put your knowledge to work in context.
The Florida Assessment of Student Thinking (FAST) ELA Reading assessment for Grade 4 is part of Florida's statewide, standardized testing program in English Language Arts Reading, aligned with the Benchmarks for Excellent Student Thinking (B.E.S.T.) Standards. Per the Florida Department of Education, FAST includes VPK through grade 10 ELA Reading and is administered as a progress monitoring assessment three times per year, giving families and teachers periodic information about a student's growth rather than a single end-of-year snapshot. The FAST ELA Grade 4 case studies are 5 cases and about 3,073 words.
1Scoring Theme Responses: When Is a Trait a Theme?
Okafor's Grade 4 team is scoring the first cold read of the quarter. The text is an original 430-word story, 'Mira's Garden.' A hurricane flattens Mira's bean plants, but her seed jar survives.
656 words, about 3 min2Personification or Illness: What Does 'Coughed' Really Tell the Reader?
Bautista's Grade 4 class is working through an original poem, 'Night Bus,' which describes a city bus at 11 p.m. Two lines matter here: 'the headlights swept the road / like two slow brooms,' and, three stanzas later, 'the engine coughed and would not wake.' Item 7 asks: 'The poet says the engine "coughed and would not wake." What does this personification tell you about the bus?' The options are A The bus is sick and needs a doctor.
608 words, about 3 min3Comparing How Two Texts Present Reef Information
Lindqvist pairs two short texts for a Grade 4 informational unit. Text 1, 'How a Reef Is Built,' is 310 words and follows a sequence: free-swimming coral larvae settle on rock, secrete a limestone skeleton, and over decades pile into a reef.
655 words, about 3 min4Who Is Telling 'The Last Seat'?
Iyer's class reads an original 500-word story, 'The Last Seat.' The narrator follows only Jalen: 'Jalen counted the buses pulling out. He wondered whether Maya would wave.
572 words, about 3 min5Which Evidence Actually Supports the Recess Claim?
Herrera's Grade 4 class is analyzing a student-written editorial, 'Why We Need a Longer Recess.' The claim is that a longer recess would help students concentrate in the afternoon. The editorial gives three supports: (1) 'Recess is my favorite part of the day.' (2) 'After 20 minutes of running, our class came back and finished the math quiz faster than usual.' (3) 'My older brother says middle school recess is too short.' Item 5 asks, 'Which sentence best supports the claim that longer recess helps students concentrate?' The options are A sentence 1, B sentence 2, C 'Many schools have different recess rules,' and D 'Our principal used to be a teacher.' During discussion, a student argues for A because 'it shows kids really like recess, so they'd focus better.' Ms.
582 words, about 3 min