ABSTRACT

This chapter explores Joanne Addison's, Shelby McIntosh's, and Patricia Sarles's critiques of the digital writing practices fostered in the tests developed by the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium and the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Career. It describes the ways in which the assessments are reductive and decrease possibilities for situated, interactive, and dialogic forms of writing assessment. The future of digital writing and rhetoric within American schools is being marked by the Common Core State Standards (CCSS)—even in states where the CCSS or its assessments have been officially rejected by state governments. The chapter also explores how rhetorically based and contextually sensitive forms of assessment such as those described by Angela Clark-Oates and by Elyse Eidman-Aadahl National Writing Project's MAP group see digital writing technologies being used. The writing assessment landscape for secondary students in the United States is complex, but there is a tendency to undervalue extended digital writing tasks.