8.1.19 Monica Rodríguez How to be assessment literate, no matter your role A confident understanding of assessment helps teachers meet their students’ needs early, when it’s easier to close achievement gaps and pave the way to a long and successful academic career. Our... Read more
7.23.19 Derrick Vargason 7 Steps to Creating a Growth Assessment that Works Thanks to high-quality assessments, teachers, students and families are able to see and celebrate heroic growth. Consider a fifth-grade student who starts the year reading at a second-grade level. In... Read more
7.18.19 Erin Ryan Why It’s Important to Consider the Assessment Data Needs of All Stakeholders When we think about educational assessments, “timely” means that assessment data is delivered at a time when it will be most useful to the people who need it the most. When building a coherent... Read more
7.11.19 Erin Ryan Three Ways to Better Engage Students to Get the Most from Educational Assessments It’s not uncommon to find a classroom where a few highly motivated students monopolize the discussion. To ensure that all students are learning, teachers need to find opportunities to actively... Read more
6.25.19 Kathy Dyer Making Sense of Growth Mindset and Growth Measures For the past few years, “growth mindset” has generated a lot of conversation in the education world. Both adults and students have opportunities to develop a growth mindset, to shift their... Read more
6.20.19 Kristie Werner What Can These 5 Types of Assessment Data Tell You? Educational assessments can be used to support learning, as well as validate it. The type of assessment you choose should match the purpose behind the questions you’re trying to answer about... Read more
6.18.19 Derrick Vargason 4 Simple Steps For Streamlining Your Assessment System Every assessment has strengths and limitations, which means no single measure will serve every specific need. If your system has been built piecemeal over time, it’s likely to be chaotic, as... Read more
4.25.19 Kristie Werner Three Ways to Right-Size Educational Assessments for Early Learners When we think about educational assessments, we most often think of elementary, middle, or high school students, but more and more K-3 students are being introduced to assessments. Assessing early... Read more
4.4.19 Derrick Vargason Leveraging Growth Data for Teachers and Principals In an earlier post, we shared some insights into how teachers can use MAP® Growth™ assessment data to work with students. Students can leverage growth data to improve their learning and... Read more
3.19.19 Keri Nettles Do Your Assessments Measure Up When It Comes To Equity? At NWEA, our mission is simple, but vast: Partnering to help all kids learn. As a not-for-profit organization, we have the ability not only to believe in the mission, but to invest in it and act on... Read more
2.21.19 Derrick Vargason How to Leverage Growth Data to Improve Student Learning Growth data is powerful and can have an enormous impact for students, teachers, and administrators. For students, the more they understand their own assessment results, the better they’ll be able... Read more
2.5.19 Kristie Werner Filling the Gaps in Understanding for Spanish-Speaking Students One of the foundational purposes of assessment is providing good data—and useful data—to teachers and administrators to help them understand their students’ learning. But sometimes, it can be... Read more
