This collection of student essays provides illustrations of the criteria used to grade the composition portion of the sixth-grade achievement test used in Alberta (Canada). An introductory section describes the procedures for selecting the essays used, establishing scoring norms, and scoring the tests, and offers general comments on the writing processes used by students and the teaching techniques they reflect. The text of the composition segment of the achievement test is also included. Writing samples are presented exactly as they appeared to the scorers, in the students' handwriting. Some samples are accompanied by the student's notes. The scorer's general comments precede the text of each essay, and specific comments on content, theme development, sentence structure, vocabulary, usage, and other aspects are presented in the margin of the text. A concluding section summarizes the comments. Specific scoring criteria for each category of comment (content, theme, etc.) are appended. (MSE)