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Cloze books

Posted: Sat Jan 05, 2013 3:03 pm
by Araucana girl
Can anyone point me in correct direction for Moore Cloze - I can see only Contemporary Cloze for 8-10 and age 11 + on Amazon. Cloze in on Language Upper and Extension is currently out of stock.
Which ones are appropriate? We are doing CEM for first time this year for CCHS Essex.
Thank you.

Re: Cloze books

Posted: Sun Jan 06, 2013 10:57 pm
by um
Age 11 + is fiendishly difficult for most Yr 5 children...you may wish to ease them into it by making up some of your own first.

While there is certainly no harm in practising cloze regularly, remember that it is designed to test whether a child reads a lot. If they read rich, varied material regularly - they will be able to complete cloze far more easily.

Re: Cloze books

Posted: Mon Jan 07, 2013 7:38 am
by mystery
KenR refers to missing letter Cloze. How does this work in multichoice format?

Re: Cloze books

Posted: Mon Jan 07, 2013 10:47 am
by UmSusu
mystery, the multiple choice format of cloze is when you are given a choice of usually four words to select from but with missing letters cloze the child has to fill in the missing letters: the sun radiates i _ t _ _ se heat.

The third type is a mixture of the cloze with the synonyms/antonyms. For example, fill in the missing gaps with a word similar in meaning:
quarrel : _ _ _ _ ment.

This third type came up in the sample paper this year but in the end did not turn up in the Birmingham exam. However, it has turned up in a CEM exam in another region. Cloze practice is all well and good and scores can improve if you encourage them to look at the wider sentence and take clues such as whether they are looking for a noun, adjective, adverb etc but ultimately it as about having a good vocabulary, comprehension skills and accurate spelling and it is much better practice those more generic skills in the long term and leave cloze itself until nearer the time (for practice with technique and timings) - especially as you can never really be sure which type will turn up.

UmSusu

Re: Cloze books

Posted: Mon Jan 07, 2013 5:52 pm
by mystery
Thank you Umsusu. I'm probably being very thick, but how can the other types of Cloze be computer-marked?

Re: Cloze books

Posted: Mon Jan 07, 2013 6:42 pm
by KenR
how can the other types of Cloze be computer-marked?
Optical Character Recognition (OCR) - all exam papers (not just 11+) have for many years now been scanned in digitally/electronically and then OCRed.

This means they can be computer marked - the originals are not used (but are stored in a backup location).

The same techniques are used for the National Census and other data capture forms.

This also means that individual papers can be reviewed online over the internet by the examining body without having to request the original.

should add that the contract for printing the papers, the data entry and processing is outsourced to specialised secure printing organisation - the details of the tender can be found here -
http://england.unitedkingdom-tenders.co ... 012_Durham

Re: Cloze books

Posted: Mon Jan 07, 2013 10:10 pm
by mystery
Is OCR good enough for the dodgy handwriting of 10 year olds?

Re: Cloze books

Posted: Tue Jan 08, 2013 10:43 am
by um
When I enquired about 3 years ago, the KE Foundation assured me that papers were hand marked.

Re: Cloze books

Posted: Tue Jan 08, 2013 1:01 pm
by mystery
That would make sense for a handful of schools like that. Some of the testing type questions which are written about in connection with Durham CEM seem to me to be better suited towards handmarking than OCR for this young age group unless OCR has moved on massively in recent years.

If CEM wins a large county like Kent though, handmarking will surely be out of the question cost-wise. This might therefore limit questions to conventional multi-choice? It does affect what you can test.

Re: Cloze books

Posted: Tue Jan 08, 2013 1:34 pm
by Araucana girl
Thank you. I have sourced the Cloze - Extension by Moore online now - thank you DIY mum. I could see it online and view the content and level and, although I agree it is hard for Year 5, I think it will be great for dd's vocab and to stretch her - given that she will also have to do the Essex grammar exam English as well, which is very hard and the CEM exam.

I will leave it a few months anyway, but actually exams are only 8 months away so not really that long :shock: