Study Guide

Field 140: Business Education 
Sample Constructed-Response Assignment

Recommendation for individuals using a screenreader: please set your punctuation settings to "most."

The following materials contain:

Test Directions for the Constructed-Response Assignment

This section of the test consists of one constructed-response assignment. You are to prepare a written response of approximately 300to600 words on the assigned topic. You should use your time to plan, write, review, and edit your response to the assignment.

Read the assignment carefully before you begin to write. Think about how you will organize your response.

As a whole, your response must demonstrate an understanding of the knowledge and skills of the field. In your response to the assignment, you are expected to demonstrate the depth of your understanding of the content area through your ability to apply your knowledge and skills rather than merely to recite factual information.

Your response to the assignment will be evaluated on the basis of the following criteria:

 start bold PURPOSE: end bold  the extent to which the response achieves the purpose of the assignment
 start bold SUBJECT MATTER KNOWLEDGE: end bold  accuracy and appropriateness in the application of subject matter knowledge
 start bold SUPPORT: end bold  quality and relevance of supporting details
 start bold RATIONALE: end bold  soundness of argument and degree of understanding of the subject matter

The constructed-response assignment is intended to assess subject matter knowledge and skills, not writing ability. However, your response must be communicated clearly enough to permit valid judgment of the scoring criteria. Your response should be written for an audience of educators in this field. The final version of your response should conform to the conventions of edited American English. Your written response must be your original work, written in your own words, and not copied or paraphrased from some other work.

Be sure to write about the assigned topic. You may not use any reference materials during the test. Remember to review what you have written and make any changes you think will improve your response.

Sample Constructed-Response Assignment

Competency 0011 
Analyze a lesson plan and student work sample for a learning standard in the state standards for business education and describe differentiated instructional strategies that address the student's needs.

 start bold Use the information provided in the exhibits to complete the assignment that follows. end bold 

Using your knowledge of content and sound pedagogical practices in business education and citing evidence from the exhibits provided, write a response of approximately 300to600 words in which you:

Be sure to utilize all of the exhibits in your response.

Exhibit 1: Learning Activity

Class Context:

High school business students have begun a unit of study on business management. In previous lessons, they have studied topics related to starting a business, the forms of business ownership, and other elements of the legal environment in which businesses operate. Currently, students are learning about the skills of successful managers, as broken down into the primary management functions of planning, organizing, leading, and controlling. In this activity, students are asked to apply their understanding of two of those concepts to a real-world scenario.

Excerpt from Lesson Plan:

Standard:

Oklahoma Full (Subject Matter) Competencies for Licensure and Certification – Vocational Business:

(B) Business Management.
Understands principles of business management and their applications in the decision-making process.

Lesson Objectives:

Students will be able to compare and contrast the leading and controlling functions to each other and to other management functions.

Students will be able to apply management functions to solve problems related to project and business management.

Exhibit 2: Assignment Sheet

You have developed the following student assignment:

  • Read the prompt below.
  • Discuss the prompt for five minutes with your in-class study group.
  • Then write a brief essay responding to the prompt.
  • Use information from the prompt to support your analysis.

Management of a company has analyzed its operations and made the following general observations:

  • the company has become excessively bureaucratic and inflexible
  • there is poor communication within and among departments
  • employees have few incentives to perform efficiently and are seldom held accountable when they perform poorly
  • the company's culture is characterized by fear of change
  • managers and workers approach their duties without enthusiasm and innovation

Clearly, this company is in need of more effective management. Of the four primary management functions, please describe how the two functions that are usually hardest for students in this course to understand and distinguish—leading and controlling—might be applied by management to improve the operation of this company.

Exhibit 3: Student Writing Sample

Leading might sound to some like just another word for "managing," but I have learned that leading means something more specific. It means setting up teams to increase motivation and cooperation among workers. And then making sure each team is staffed by individuals of diverse backgrounds, interests, and areas of expertise. The manager then has to lead each team by establishing very clear vision and mission statements and making sure those goals get fulfilled one way or the other.

Controlling comes close to that last part about making sure goals get fulfilled, but it mostly has to do with financial numbers like profits and sales. Maybe if this company tries the cooperative teamwork method and finds that it is not working as well as hoped, it can become necessary to take a more controlling approach. At those times, for those reasons, a manager can change to a more hierarchical structure to establish better control over the company and keep costs under control to increase profits. Probably the leading method is a better idea than the controlling method in this case, but the information is unclear.

Sample Strong Response to the Constructed-Response Assignment

 start bold Please note: The sample response provided below is for review purposes only and should not be used in a response on an operational exam. Use of the exact words and phrases presented in this sample response will result in a score of "U" (Unscorable) due to lack of original work. end bold 

The students in this class will work together in small groups to discuss the prompt, make connections with their peers, and prepare for writing. After this, students can use those connections and new ideas to create their own essays. Students are often able to deepen understanding when learning from and working with their peers. Additionally, misconceptions can also be cleared up during the group discussions. Informed and guided peer discussion will provide a foundation of ideas for the independently written essay portion of the assignment. It does seem important to note that there are drawbacks to using group work like this to ensure understanding of content. Students may not participate fully enough to benefit from the group discussion, or they may accidentally spread incorrect ideas. Some students may not use the time properly and may need more guidance and structure than others to benefit from group work. In this situation, when we go on to read and analyze the student work sample, we see this student required more direct instruction and other learning strategies to meet the standard and objectives.

The student work sample in Exhibit 4 shows some recognition of the primary management functions of leading and controlling: leading does include the aspect of motivating employees, and controlling does include the aspect of making sure goals get fulfilled. The sample also comes to the defensible conclusion that the company in the scenario would benefit from a move toward a more "cooperative teamwork method."

However, the student response lacks a deeper understanding of the leading and controlling functions. For example, the drafting of mission and vision statements is usually regarded as part of the planning management function, not leading, and deciding whether or how to form workplace teams is part of the organizing function, not controlling. The sample also makes a major error in confusing leading and controlling with democratic and hierarchical management "methods," respectively. The learning goal of applying management principles to solve business problems is under-treated in the sample's second paragraph's "Maybe if this company tries..." It does seem that the student is not meeting the standard as listed in Exhibit 1, which states that students will understand "...principles of business management and their applications in the decision-making process."

For an instructional strategy to support student learning goals, we might begin with a class discussion that would review the concepts and then brainstorm ways to implement each of the management functions. The group will be guided to find case-specific ways to show these two management functions in the workplace in multiple scenarios. One example would be assigning the class to read case studies from business journalism describing business decisions illustrating various aspects of leading, controlling, and the other management functions. These real-life examples would help the students gain insight into these concepts and help them see what was missing from the sample of student work. Practicing with various scenarios applied to the assignment described in Exhibit 2 will help them better understand how to apply these concepts to achieve more effective management. Students might also be able to find ways to use controlling and leading management functions in scenarios of their own. The teacher could also have the student edit this essay into a more satisfactory work. These strategies will help support a more thorough mastery of these concepts.

Rationale for the Sample Strong Response

Please note that the response is evaluated based upon the four performance characteristics of Purpose, Subject Matter Knowledge, Support, and Rationale. Please also note how the score point descriptions are based upon how the examinee attends to the performance characteristics. You should be very familiar with the CEOE performance characteristics and score scale and refer to them when reviewing this rationale.

This response largely fulfills the purpose of the assignment: it discusses the learning activity's effectiveness; it analyzes the student work sample by identifying strengths and weaknesses; it gives possibilities for improvement of the student's weaknesses while using their strengths; and it explains why the strategies might support student learning goals.

The writer shows subject matter knowledge in this area by giving multiple approaches to addressing student needs. The response shows a comprehensive understanding of the managerial factors present and the pedagogical solutions needed to address student learning goals.

The response addresses support by giving reasoned examples and by citing the exhibits provided in the prompt. The examples given by this writer generally support the assertions they have made.

Throughout the response, rationales are given for choices made and ideas presented by the writer. This adds to the understanding of potential effectiveness of the strategies given. However, a stronger response would have provided additional specific examples and more reasoning throughout the response. Overall, this response demonstrates a general understanding of the subject matter.

Sample Weak Response to the Constructed-Response Assignment

Our class is learning about business management principles. When we are ready to write about business management, the class will meet and talk in our established discussion peer groups. This plan is in the lesson plan and exhibits provided for the prompt. This way, we can talk about the ideas and the expectations together as peers before they write. Students would like to work with their peers to prepare for the essay. They might learn a lot from each other while enjoying the discussion period of the work.

The student does a nice job when they explain the two kinds of functions of management. They tell us a lot about controlling the people we manage and about leading the people we manage in our position. This is good information and helpful for assessing their understanding of business management and decision making. The student is meeting most of the expectations we have for them. They are maybe doing average, but I would like to see some more from the student work. They need to know more about how to do the things mentioned in the leading and controlling explanations.

We should try to learn more about these principles as a class. We can learn even more about how to manage people with the leading and controlling functions. The students should be instructed to try writing again. They will edit the work they have turned in as the exhibit and add to it more about the functions and how to manage workers with these skills.

Rationale for the Sample Weak Response

Please note that the response is evaluated based upon the four performance characteristics of Purpose, Subject Matter Knowledge, Support, and Rationale. Please also note how the score point descriptions are based upon how the examinee attends to the performance characteristics. You should be very familiar with the CEOE performance characteristics and score scale and refer to them when reviewing this rationale.

The purpose of the assignment is partially achieved by this writer. The writer attempts to address all parts of the prompt, but the response to each bullet point is not completely explained or achieved. In this response, the purpose is only partially achieved. The subject matter knowledge shown in the response is less than appropriate, and some of it is inaccurate. The response may have been improved by further support for ideas presented. Few, if any, relevant examples are given to support the assertions made by the writer. Unfortunately, this also contributes to the insufficient subject matter knowledge displayed. When it comes to the learning strategy, the writer does not specify how exactly they will build skills in the area necessary. The explanations given are vague and insufficient for this task. Overall, the response reflects a limited, poorly reasoned understanding of the subject matter.

Performance Characteristics

The following characteristics guide the scoring of responses to the constructed-response assignment.

Characteristics that guide the scoring of responses
Purpose The extent to which the response achieves the purpose of the assignment
Subject Matter Knowledge The accuracy and appropriateness in the application of subject matter knowledge
Support The quality and relevance of supporting details
Rationale The soundness of argument and degree of understanding of the subject matter

Scoring Scale

Scores will be assigned to each response to the constructed-response assignment according to the following scoring scale.

Score Scale with description for each score point.
Score Point Score Point Description
4  start bold The "4" response reflects a thorough knowledge and understanding of the subject matter. end bold 
  • The purpose of the assignment is fully achieved.
  • There is a substantial, accurate, and appropriate application of subject matter knowledge.
  • The supporting evidence is sound; there are high-quality, relevant examples.
  • The response reflects an ably reasoned, comprehensive understanding of the topic.
3  start bold The "3" response reflects a general knowledge and understanding of the subject matter. end bold 
  • The purpose of the assignment is largely achieved.
  • There is a generally accurate and appropriate application of subject matter knowledge.
  • The supporting evidence generally supports the discussion; there are some relevant examples.
  • The response reflects a general understanding of the topic.
2  start bold The "2" response reflects a partial knowledge and understanding of the subject matter. end bold 
  • The purpose of the assignment is partially achieved.
  • There is a limited, possibly inaccurate or inappropriate application of subject matter knowledge.
  • The supporting evidence is limited; there are few relevant examples.
  • The response reflects a limited, poorly reasoned understanding of the topic.
1  start bold The "1" response reflects little or no knowledge and understanding of the subject matter. end bold 
  • The purpose of the assignment is not achieved.
  • There is little or no appropriate or accurate application of subject matter knowledge.
  • The supporting evidence, if present, is weak; there are few or no relevant examples.
  • The response reflects little or no reasoning about or understanding of the topic.
U The response is unscorable because it is illegible, not written to the assigned topic, written in a language other than English, or lacking a sufficient amount of original work to score.
B There is no response to the assignment.