Assessment - School and District Leaders
Smarter Balanced Resources
- Connecticut State Department of Education—Student Assessment News
- Connecticut State Department of Education Comprehensive Assessment Program Portal – This site provides access to resources for the Smarter Balanced Assessments in Mathematics and English Language Arts/Literacy, CMT/CAPT Science Assessments, and the Alternate Assessment
- Smarter Balanced Interim Assessments -This site provides important background information on the Smarter Balanced Interim Assessments as well as links to resources to support classroom instruction. Smarter Balanced Interim Assessments/ Classroom Activities – ELA/Literacy and Mathematics
- Smarter Balanced Digital Library- is a searchable, interactive online collection of instructional and professional learning resources developed by educators for educators. These resources are aligned with the intent of the Common Core State Standards and help educators implement the formative assessment process to improve student learning. The Digital Library will also include resources to interpret data and reports from the Smarter Balanced summative and interim assessments.
- CT State Assessment Guide— provides Connecticut-specific information about assessment consortium, testing timelines, sample test questions, impacts on students, new accountability systems and ways for parents to get involved and support their child’s learning at home. (National PTA)
SAT Resources
Communication Tools for Smarter Balanced
Parent Resources
Below are resources that can be used when communicating with parents and guardians about the Smarter Balanced assessments.
- Parent template letter that reminds parents of the new tests and explains that the results will be different;
- Template PowerPoint presentation to use at parent and community meetings or at local board of education meetings;
- Handout for parents about the new tests that helps explain how the results will be different this year; and
- Web-friendly version of the parent handout about the new test and the expected new results.
Rubrics
- Smarter Balanced Assessment Rubrics: English Language Arts/Literacy
- An Introduction to the EQuIP Rubric- Learn more about the EQuIP (Educators Evaluating the Quality of Instructional Product) Rubric for mathematics and ELA/literacy grades k-2 and 3-12 (webinar from Learn Zillion and Achieve)
- EQuIP: Educators Evaluating Quality Instructional Products (Achieve)
Evaluation
- Achieve OER Evaluation Tool Handbook (Achieve)
- Toolkit for Evaluating the Alignment of Instructional and Assessment Materials to the Common Core State Standards (Achieve)
- Tchrs’ Voice, a Teaching Channel blog - Back-to-School Backpack: Think About Assessment -This blog offers many ways to think about assessment with live links to resources.
Math
- Materials Analysis Tools (NCSM, webinar and materials) (mathedleadership.org)
- Tchrs’ Voice, a Teaching Channel blog – Tests Without Grades: Learning Moments – This blog showcases the value of students learning by mistakes. It also links directly to a 7 minute companion video, for Grades 6-12 Math, “Highlighting Mistakes: A Grading Policy” (teaching channel.org)
ELA/Literacy