New!  ELA added to the State Assessments Database

Problem-Attic’s database just got a whole lot bigger!  We added nearly 22,000 questions for ELA.  These come from 23 states’ curriculum samplers and released tests—more than 1000 source documents—and are totally free for anyone who signs up for Problem-Attic.

About 80% of the ELA questions are passage-based.  However, for copyright reasons, not all of the passages are in the Problem-Attic database.  If you wish to use the questions, please see the discussion below about copyrights and what options you may have for accessing the passages.

The other 20% of ELA questions (which are not passage-based) cover writing, grammar, sentence correction, vocabulary, dictionary entries, etc.  The level of difficulty and style vary by state.  If you are an ELA teacher, you should skim through the database and see all the different question types that are available.  Please do not assume they are for testing only; there are many excellent writing prompts and tasks.

The new ELA questions are in the State Assessments database.  Notably, they are organized by test or source document.  (We are still working on a suitable organization by topic.)  To access the questions, sign up for a free account and log in.  Go to the main Select page and click State Assessments.  Then click the “Tests” tab and “ELA”.

You’ll notice the tests (or source documents) are organized by state, year, grade and title.  If you click a title, you’ll see the questions in their original order.  Of course they are individually selectable and re-formattable in Problem-Attic.  Choose what you like, set page layout options, and make a PDF in the usual manner.  If you’re a subscriber, then the questions are editable, as well.

Passage copyrights

The states’ ELA database (which is separate from the NY Regents database) has about 17,000 questions that are associated with 4000 reading passages.  About 40%, or 1400, of the passages are in Problem-Attic.  They can be easily included in a PDF document and reprinted for your students.  In fact, you get the passages automatically just by selecting the questions.

Due to copyright restrictions, the other questions have only references to passages.  You can tell the difference when you are looking at thumbnails on a Select or Arrange page.  The passage icons are color coded.  A white icon means the passage is available.  A yellow icon means it is not available.  Here are examples:

Note:  some questions are associated with a group of passages, often called a “pair” or “triplet”.  In such cases, if at least one of the passages is unavailable, then the icon is yellow.  This means you might get part of a group if you select a question and make a PDF document.  Please watch out for missing passages so there are no unpleasant surprises when you hand out a document to your students.

On a thumbnail, you can click the passage icon to get details.  If the passage is available, you’ll see a PDF version of it.  If unavailable, you’ll see a one-page message, like the following.

As much as possible, when a passage is not in the Problem-Attic database, we’ve tried to offer up an alternative source.  If we could locate another website with the passage (normally a state website which has the released test), we provide a live link to it.  Depending on your situation, you may be able to use the alternative source.  Please check the terms or copyright restrictions before you do any reprinting or redistribution.

Important:  The one-page message (“passage not available”) does not get inserted into a PDF document.  Your students won't see it.

Technical details

There are few limitations in Problem-Attic that you should be aware of when selecting questions with reading passages.

• Passages, when available, are included in PDF documents only.  They are not included in an online test, slideshow or quiz that is exported to an LMS.  In such situations, you can click the passage icon on a thumbnail and download/print the passage, or copy/post the link for your students.
• Passages are not currently editable.  In most cases, this is not an issue, because you’ll want to print them in their entirety.  However, some have introductory notes or refer to questions that follow.  The extra text is there because we tried to be faithful to the original source document.  (We expect to make them editable soon.)
• Passage PDFs, like all PDFs made by Problem-Attic, are password-protected.  Much of the material on Problem-Attic is there by permission.  Thus, the passwords help us safeguard the copyrights of many third parties.  Please be respectful of them and Problem-Attic’s Terms, which together make the free service possible.

What’s ahead

We know that a test-based organization is not adequate for 22,000 questions, but we didn’t want to hold off on their release.  We are working on a topical organization and will update Problem-Attic with it as soon as possible.  Here is a list of improvements to the ELA database that you can look forward to:

• Sorting of questions by type (grammar, vocabulary, etc.).
• Sorting of passages by theme, possibly with words counts and readability scores.
• Hierarchical documents in Problem-Attic, so passages can be assigned to groups of questions and can have customized directions.
• Passage viewer, so the collection of passages can be browsed separately from the questions.
• Passage editor and various formatting options, like paragraph and line numbering and reserved space on the right for notes.

If you have other suggestions for improving the ELA database, please let us know.  We hope you like the material and find many great uses for it.  Thanks for signing up!

The Problem-Attic Team at EducAide Software
support@problem-attic.com