Educators Gather in Portland, OR to Build Instructional Resources
State Network of Educators Winter Workshop Provides Professional Development, Networking Over 120 educators from across 11 Smarter Balanced member states and territories recently met in Portland, OR to develop and review instructional classroom resources at the State Network of Educators Winter Workshop. Educators from as far as the US Virgin Islands and Hawaii collaborated to…
5 Ways to Make Interims a Natural Part of Instruction
Elizabeth Johnston, Guest BloggerEnglish Language Arts Teacher (7th Grade) Have you used interim assessment blocks (IABs) with your students? Do you use them as a common assessment with your team to identify student needs? Or maybe your district uses them as a tool to review student progress? Weaving interims into classroom activities is a natural way to…
4 Ways to Supercharge Learning with IABs
Tips and Tricks for Using Interim Assessment Blocks in the Classroom Interim Assessment Blocks are quick, flexible tools teachers can use with students as learning opportunities and to collect information about learning. Based on collaboration with, and feedback from, member state educators, here are the top four ways you can use IABs to give learning…
Five Built-in Test Tools Students Should Know (and Use!)
Familiarizing Students with Universal Test Tools Can Yield Confidence Boost Smarter Balanced digitally-delivered assessments (interims, the summative test, and practice tests) include a wide array of embedded universal test tools. These are available to students as part of the technology platform. Students gain confidence with the testing software when they understand how to use these…
Educators Meet for Math Rangefinding
NOTE: The Smarter Balanced Digital Library was decommissioned. Please visit Tools for Teachers, the new home for instructional resources and professional learning. Team of teachers review and confirm score ranges during summer Rangefinding Workshop Educators are involved in nearly every aspect of building Smarter Balanced assessment tools, from writing test items to setting score rubrics, to developing and vetting instructional resources….
Educators Meet to Review and Write Smarter Balanced Test Items
Over the course of a week in Chicago, Mathematics and ELA test items were reviewed for content alignment, bias and sensitivity, and new items were developed for field-testing Classroom teachers from eight states convened July 30-August 3 to provide a “boots on the ground” perspective of student skill levels. Core to the Smarter Balanced mission,…
Three Tips for Getting Started with IABs
Bite-size advice on using Interim Assessment Blocks from a district that made it happen Michelle Dean, Director of Curriculum and Professional Development at Lyme Consolidated School District in Connecticut, worked with educators in her district to implement the Smarter Balanced system of assessments over the past two years. She offers these words of wisdom for…
Smarter Balanced Meets Federal Peer Review for Grades 3-8 and High School
In September, South Dakota became the first Smarter Balanced member state to meet all federal peer review requirements for the math and ELA/literacy high school assessment. That federal peer review letter also served as notification that Smarter Balanced meets all of the statutory and regulatory United States Department of Education peer review requirements for the general assessments…