Our FAQs are a work in progress. See if your question is answered below. If it isn't, go to our Interactive FAQ Sheet to ask your question and get it answered.
TASK 1: LITERACY PLANNING TASK
How detailed should lesson plans be?
As is always the norm with a formal lesson plan, your plan should be detailed and clear enough that you could hand it to a colleague and they would be able to try it out in their classroom. edTPA lesson plans should also attend to specific demands. See our formative lesson planning template (housed under our “Program Resources” tab) for a guide.
In lesson plans, should I write in the first person (“I will…”)?
It is totally fine to write in the first person, though not required.
Are we supposed to teach reading and writing, or just one?
Your lessons should focus on one essential literacy strategy for comprehending OR composing text. However, students are likely to read and write throughout the segment, and that’s perfectly okay. In fact, you will be asked to talk about ways in which your plans built an authentic connection between reading and writing (so don’t teach five lessons on process of elimination, memorizing vocabulary words, or spelling words in isolation, for example).
What exactly is a “language function”?
Click here for helpful blurbs on language functions from our edTPA resources.
_In my own words, a language function: 1) is a verb 2) tells what students are going to practice during the learning segment AND 3) will prompt you to teach some specific vocabulary, sentence starters, or genre features (discourse structures) in order for students to be successful with it.
What can our assessments look like? Is there one particular format they want over another?
The only thing to keep in mind is that you’ll want the assessment you analyze to be something that you can: 1) scan and upload and 2) provide feedback on for each student. So while small-group posters, turn-and-talks, and oral presentations are perfectly fine assessments to weave throughout your learning segment, you’ll want to plan at least one assessment for the end of your segment that is on paper and individual. This is also the assessment that you’ll want to align quite tightly with your learning segment objectives and language demands.
Why do we have to respond to the first commentary prompts before teaching the lesson, and how is that enforced?
I recommend that you draft your commentary prompts before teaching the learning segment, but feel free to go back to them during and after your teaching to polish them or to account for any major changes that you made while teaching. There is no way for the scorers to know when you wrote your planning commentary, but it is of course good practice (and our program’s expectation) that you always plan before you teach!
Are we choosing one language function to assess and analyze throughout all three lessons or different language functions for each lesson?
One language function.
Can it be small group or does it need to be whole class?
It can be small group. The minimum is 4, but I strongly recommend that you teach at least 6 students so that you have rich data to analyze.
Must we be specific about language such as IEP or 504, or ought we to assume that our scorers know the definitions of these terms?
Your scorers will know the definitions of those terms.
What is the difference between a strategy and a skill? And what is the relationship between the two?
Click here for a snapshot of the glossary definitions and a very helpful chart from "Making Good Choices."
In my own words, I would say that for the edTPA a skill refers to the technical procedures used to encode and decode text while a strategy refers to the conceptual approaches readers and writers take to make meaning as they read and write. Here is a helpful chart from “Making Good Choices”:
What are “common misconception or common developmental approximations”?
A common misconception is simply a misunderstanding that you can anticipate your students having. For example, when teaching the difference between fact and opinion, you might want to be ready to address the possible misconception that opinions are untrue statements or even lies- this is not accurate, but many children initially think that opinions must be the opposite of facts, which leads them to this misconception.
The handbook glossary offers this definition for developmental approximations.
“Invented spelling” is a great example of a developmental approximation that most teachers of emergent writers happily encourage. A first grade teacher might state that she accepts and encourages students to spell words just how they sound, with the exception of the “sight words” posted on the word wall. For “sight words,” she may plan to prompt students to consult the word wall and edit their work.
What are discourse-based language demands?
Here is a snip from “Making Good Choices.”
In English Language Arts, I have found that edTPA “discourse structures” are basically the same as genre features. For example, if you are teaching students how to write a persuasive essay, you might teach them to start with a compelling introductory paragraph that hooks the reader and then follow with development paragraphs that share facts and figures. These can be described as discourse-based language demands in your commentary.
TASK 2: LITERACY INSTRUCTION TASK
Should the entire class be videotaped or should it be focused on teaching?
I recommend setting up the camera in a way that allows the viewer to see the teacher and a good portion of the class (with permission). This way, you will be able to capture plenty of examples of students making meaning in addition to the teacher teaching. For independent work and group work, consider setting up the camera in a way that allows you to capture student discussions and teacher support.
When you select clips from your videos, does it have to be from one lesson?
Definitely not. It is perfectly fine for your clips to be pulled from two different lessons, and in your instruction commentaries you will have opportunities to provide the context a scorer might need to situate these clips.
Do the individual clips have to be consecutive or can we edit out a transition to save time?
Editing your film is NOT permitted. If your clip happens to include a brief transition, it’s not a problem. That’s part of teaching, and it may even give you opportunities to discuss some of your instructional moves.
What sorts of theory and research should we be drawing on in our commentary?
I recommend drawing from the theory and research that really has informed your your thinking, and use it to justify why you are doing what you are doing. Here is a live chart with some of the texts you may have encountered in your time at TC. Please feel free to add to it, draw from it, or suggest new categories we need to consider together. Also note that at the bottom of the chart I have pasted a blurb from “Making Good Choices” that provides some insight into what the edTPA scorers are looking for.
TASK 3: LITERACY ASSESSMENT TASK
What is “submit feedback” for work samples? What should our feedback be oriented towards (e.g. future skill development, particulars/revision of the assignment, etc)?
After analyzing whole class learning, you will select 3 student work samples that represent patterns of learning you identified in your analysis. You will then provide feedback to these 3 focus learners, and the edTPA asks that you document this feedback (it can be writing on the work itself, an audio clip, or a video clip). The feedback artifacts are uploaded to your edTPA.com portfolio along with all of your other required documentation for the assessment task. Please also read this unbelievably helpful guide to feedback from “Making Good Choices.”
What is language use? What are scorers looking for with regard to the sections and clips on academic language use?
“Language use” is your evidence that students used the academic language you hoped for during the learning segment. Read this helpful blurb from “Making Good Choices” for guidance.
What do quantitative and qualitative patterns look like in an assessment?
This really depends on the objective and the assessment. Look back at the essential literacy strategy you named as your primary goal. How many students achieved it? How many students showed partial understandings of the strategy? How many did not seem to use the strategy at all? (These three questions might help guide a very simple quantitative analysis of your student work). How do you know students achieved your goal? For students who are not demonstrating an understanding or use of this strategy, what do you notice in their work? (These questions might help you begin to describe some qualitative patterns).
Can we provide differentiated assessments (maybe 2-3 different versions of the same assessment) based on student learning needs?
Unfortunately, the edTPA assessment task really does anticipate the use of uniform assessments. However, this is a great opportunity for you to think about Universal Design for Learning. If you know you have three students in the class who would benefit from having directions read aloud, for example, why not read directions aloud to the whole class? If you know that some students would benefit from having a photograph of a key event at the top of their sheet, why not provide that for everyone? Etc.
TASK 4: MATH ASSESSMENT TASK
What information should be submitted about the lesson itself?
In your math assessment commentary, you will be prompted to describe your re-engagement lesson. There are specific sub-prompts that remind you to cover: your learning objective, the related common core state standard, strategies and learning tasks you used, representations and other materials used, and assessments used.
Do I need to teach the 3-5 lesson learning segment?
No. This is certainly permitted, but I recommend that you simply observe your CT teaching and jot down a few notes on what happened each day.
Do I need to design an assessment from scratch?
No. I strongly recommend that you simply adapt an assessment that your CT was already planning to use. To adapt it for edTPA use, you might simply add a few questions that will help you get a fuller sense of students’ procedural, conceptual, or mathematical reasoning proficiencies.
Does the math task require me to film anything?
No. You might notice in the handbook that a film assessment artifact is allowed for student teachers who are assessing very young children. Feel free to ignore this; there is no need to do any filming for the math edTPA.
It's September. I’m already teaching math every day and I have lots of data I could analyze! Can I get started early?
Please make an appointment with Katie to discuss this.
Should my write-ups be typed or written by hand?
All edTPA forms and commentaries should be typed. Type right into the edTPA Word documents I emailed to you in September. See the handbook for specifications on font and size.
When we are describing the Common Core Standards that apply to the lesson, is it enough to write “1.0A.6” or should we also say that that Standard is?
Definitely say what the standard is. It is NOT your scorer’s job to look this up, and frankly, they probably won’t, which means you could get an automatic 1 for misalignment on this component.
For a spiraling curriculum like Everyday Math, there are aspects in the three lesson learning segment that aren't really related to the objectives of the learning segment. In defining my evaluation criteria, my central focus, and in my notes on the lesson, should I ignore those parts of the lesson that are not my focus for the assessment? Or, if not ignore them, how should I handle them?
Spiraling curriculums can be tricky to deal with for the edTPA. I do recommend zooming in on one central focus and naming the objectives, teaching strategies, etc, that move students toward that central focus. If you find that ignoring the rest is impossible or leaves you with almost nothing to talk about, make an appointment with Katie. We can talk through how to be clear in your context for learning form and your learning segment document that this is a spiraling curriculum and some activities were not directly linked to the central focus.
What is the minimum number of students needed for the "whole class assessment" portion? What is our classes are very individualized and our math class is quite small?
I believe the minimum is 6 but that is very low. It’s nearly impossible to identify “patterns” among six students. I highly recommend gathering whole class assessment data for as many students as you can.
If a few students are absent the day of the assessment, do we need those students to make up the assessment or can we submit fewer assessments than the number of students in our class?
You can submit fewer assessments than the number of students in your class. Scorers recognize that absences are part of the everyday life of a classroom and are not combing through your submissions for tiny discrepancies like this.
REGISTRATION AND SUBMISSION LOGISTICS
There are three systems we can choose when we register. Do we register using “Integrated edTPA Platform Provider System” or “Pearson ePortfolio System”?
Choose the “Pearson ePortfolio System.”
Can we submit for Elementary Mathematics or do we submit for Elementary Education?
Elementary Education!!!!!!!!!! If you are reading this and you realize that you made a mistake, call the help number listed on edTPA.com. They can make the change for you.
TASK 1: LITERACY PLANNING TASK
How detailed should lesson plans be?
As is always the norm with a formal lesson plan, your plan should be detailed and clear enough that you could hand it to a colleague and they would be able to try it out in their classroom. edTPA lesson plans should also attend to specific demands. See our formative lesson planning template (housed under our “Program Resources” tab) for a guide.
In lesson plans, should I write in the first person (“I will…”)?
It is totally fine to write in the first person, though not required.
Are we supposed to teach reading and writing, or just one?
Your lessons should focus on one essential literacy strategy for comprehending OR composing text. However, students are likely to read and write throughout the segment, and that’s perfectly okay. In fact, you will be asked to talk about ways in which your plans built an authentic connection between reading and writing (so don’t teach five lessons on process of elimination, memorizing vocabulary words, or spelling words in isolation, for example).
What exactly is a “language function”?
Click here for helpful blurbs on language functions from our edTPA resources.
_In my own words, a language function: 1) is a verb 2) tells what students are going to practice during the learning segment AND 3) will prompt you to teach some specific vocabulary, sentence starters, or genre features (discourse structures) in order for students to be successful with it.
What can our assessments look like? Is there one particular format they want over another?
The only thing to keep in mind is that you’ll want the assessment you analyze to be something that you can: 1) scan and upload and 2) provide feedback on for each student. So while small-group posters, turn-and-talks, and oral presentations are perfectly fine assessments to weave throughout your learning segment, you’ll want to plan at least one assessment for the end of your segment that is on paper and individual. This is also the assessment that you’ll want to align quite tightly with your learning segment objectives and language demands.
Why do we have to respond to the first commentary prompts before teaching the lesson, and how is that enforced?
I recommend that you draft your commentary prompts before teaching the learning segment, but feel free to go back to them during and after your teaching to polish them or to account for any major changes that you made while teaching. There is no way for the scorers to know when you wrote your planning commentary, but it is of course good practice (and our program’s expectation) that you always plan before you teach!
Are we choosing one language function to assess and analyze throughout all three lessons or different language functions for each lesson?
One language function.
Can it be small group or does it need to be whole class?
It can be small group. The minimum is 4, but I strongly recommend that you teach at least 6 students so that you have rich data to analyze.
Must we be specific about language such as IEP or 504, or ought we to assume that our scorers know the definitions of these terms?
Your scorers will know the definitions of those terms.
What is the difference between a strategy and a skill? And what is the relationship between the two?
Click here for a snapshot of the glossary definitions and a very helpful chart from "Making Good Choices."
In my own words, I would say that for the edTPA a skill refers to the technical procedures used to encode and decode text while a strategy refers to the conceptual approaches readers and writers take to make meaning as they read and write. Here is a helpful chart from “Making Good Choices”:
What are “common misconception or common developmental approximations”?
A common misconception is simply a misunderstanding that you can anticipate your students having. For example, when teaching the difference between fact and opinion, you might want to be ready to address the possible misconception that opinions are untrue statements or even lies- this is not accurate, but many children initially think that opinions must be the opposite of facts, which leads them to this misconception.
The handbook glossary offers this definition for developmental approximations.
“Invented spelling” is a great example of a developmental approximation that most teachers of emergent writers happily encourage. A first grade teacher might state that she accepts and encourages students to spell words just how they sound, with the exception of the “sight words” posted on the word wall. For “sight words,” she may plan to prompt students to consult the word wall and edit their work.
What are discourse-based language demands?
Here is a snip from “Making Good Choices.”
In English Language Arts, I have found that edTPA “discourse structures” are basically the same as genre features. For example, if you are teaching students how to write a persuasive essay, you might teach them to start with a compelling introductory paragraph that hooks the reader and then follow with development paragraphs that share facts and figures. These can be described as discourse-based language demands in your commentary.
TASK 2: LITERACY INSTRUCTION TASK
Should the entire class be videotaped or should it be focused on teaching?
I recommend setting up the camera in a way that allows the viewer to see the teacher and a good portion of the class (with permission). This way, you will be able to capture plenty of examples of students making meaning in addition to the teacher teaching. For independent work and group work, consider setting up the camera in a way that allows you to capture student discussions and teacher support.
When you select clips from your videos, does it have to be from one lesson?
Definitely not. It is perfectly fine for your clips to be pulled from two different lessons, and in your instruction commentaries you will have opportunities to provide the context a scorer might need to situate these clips.
Do the individual clips have to be consecutive or can we edit out a transition to save time?
Editing your film is NOT permitted. If your clip happens to include a brief transition, it’s not a problem. That’s part of teaching, and it may even give you opportunities to discuss some of your instructional moves.
What sorts of theory and research should we be drawing on in our commentary?
I recommend drawing from the theory and research that really has informed your your thinking, and use it to justify why you are doing what you are doing. Here is a live chart with some of the texts you may have encountered in your time at TC. Please feel free to add to it, draw from it, or suggest new categories we need to consider together. Also note that at the bottom of the chart I have pasted a blurb from “Making Good Choices” that provides some insight into what the edTPA scorers are looking for.
TASK 3: LITERACY ASSESSMENT TASK
What is “submit feedback” for work samples? What should our feedback be oriented towards (e.g. future skill development, particulars/revision of the assignment, etc)?
After analyzing whole class learning, you will select 3 student work samples that represent patterns of learning you identified in your analysis. You will then provide feedback to these 3 focus learners, and the edTPA asks that you document this feedback (it can be writing on the work itself, an audio clip, or a video clip). The feedback artifacts are uploaded to your edTPA.com portfolio along with all of your other required documentation for the assessment task. Please also read this unbelievably helpful guide to feedback from “Making Good Choices.”
What is language use? What are scorers looking for with regard to the sections and clips on academic language use?
“Language use” is your evidence that students used the academic language you hoped for during the learning segment. Read this helpful blurb from “Making Good Choices” for guidance.
What do quantitative and qualitative patterns look like in an assessment?
This really depends on the objective and the assessment. Look back at the essential literacy strategy you named as your primary goal. How many students achieved it? How many students showed partial understandings of the strategy? How many did not seem to use the strategy at all? (These three questions might help guide a very simple quantitative analysis of your student work). How do you know students achieved your goal? For students who are not demonstrating an understanding or use of this strategy, what do you notice in their work? (These questions might help you begin to describe some qualitative patterns).
Can we provide differentiated assessments (maybe 2-3 different versions of the same assessment) based on student learning needs?
Unfortunately, the edTPA assessment task really does anticipate the use of uniform assessments. However, this is a great opportunity for you to think about Universal Design for Learning. If you know you have three students in the class who would benefit from having directions read aloud, for example, why not read directions aloud to the whole class? If you know that some students would benefit from having a photograph of a key event at the top of their sheet, why not provide that for everyone? Etc.
TASK 4: MATH ASSESSMENT TASK
What information should be submitted about the lesson itself?
In your math assessment commentary, you will be prompted to describe your re-engagement lesson. There are specific sub-prompts that remind you to cover: your learning objective, the related common core state standard, strategies and learning tasks you used, representations and other materials used, and assessments used.
Do I need to teach the 3-5 lesson learning segment?
No. This is certainly permitted, but I recommend that you simply observe your CT teaching and jot down a few notes on what happened each day.
Do I need to design an assessment from scratch?
No. I strongly recommend that you simply adapt an assessment that your CT was already planning to use. To adapt it for edTPA use, you might simply add a few questions that will help you get a fuller sense of students’ procedural, conceptual, or mathematical reasoning proficiencies.
Does the math task require me to film anything?
No. You might notice in the handbook that a film assessment artifact is allowed for student teachers who are assessing very young children. Feel free to ignore this; there is no need to do any filming for the math edTPA.
It's September. I’m already teaching math every day and I have lots of data I could analyze! Can I get started early?
Please make an appointment with Katie to discuss this.
Should my write-ups be typed or written by hand?
All edTPA forms and commentaries should be typed. Type right into the edTPA Word documents I emailed to you in September. See the handbook for specifications on font and size.
When we are describing the Common Core Standards that apply to the lesson, is it enough to write “1.0A.6” or should we also say that that Standard is?
Definitely say what the standard is. It is NOT your scorer’s job to look this up, and frankly, they probably won’t, which means you could get an automatic 1 for misalignment on this component.
For a spiraling curriculum like Everyday Math, there are aspects in the three lesson learning segment that aren't really related to the objectives of the learning segment. In defining my evaluation criteria, my central focus, and in my notes on the lesson, should I ignore those parts of the lesson that are not my focus for the assessment? Or, if not ignore them, how should I handle them?
Spiraling curriculums can be tricky to deal with for the edTPA. I do recommend zooming in on one central focus and naming the objectives, teaching strategies, etc, that move students toward that central focus. If you find that ignoring the rest is impossible or leaves you with almost nothing to talk about, make an appointment with Katie. We can talk through how to be clear in your context for learning form and your learning segment document that this is a spiraling curriculum and some activities were not directly linked to the central focus.
What is the minimum number of students needed for the "whole class assessment" portion? What is our classes are very individualized and our math class is quite small?
I believe the minimum is 6 but that is very low. It’s nearly impossible to identify “patterns” among six students. I highly recommend gathering whole class assessment data for as many students as you can.
If a few students are absent the day of the assessment, do we need those students to make up the assessment or can we submit fewer assessments than the number of students in our class?
You can submit fewer assessments than the number of students in your class. Scorers recognize that absences are part of the everyday life of a classroom and are not combing through your submissions for tiny discrepancies like this.
REGISTRATION AND SUBMISSION LOGISTICS
There are three systems we can choose when we register. Do we register using “Integrated edTPA Platform Provider System” or “Pearson ePortfolio System”?
Choose the “Pearson ePortfolio System.”
Can we submit for Elementary Mathematics or do we submit for Elementary Education?
Elementary Education!!!!!!!!!! If you are reading this and you realize that you made a mistake, call the help number listed on edTPA.com. They can make the change for you.