This technical report documents the processes and procedures employed by NWEA® to build and support the English MAP® Reading Fluency™ assessments administered during the 2020-2021 school year. It is written for measurement professionals and administrators to help evaluate the quality of MAP Reading Fluency. The seven sections of this report: (1)…

Reading scores exist for a continuum of purposes, from informal assessment to formal standardized tests. This brief aims to answer the question: What matters most for elementary-grade teachers when thinking about reading scores, and what could policymakers do to help teachers? Three positions worth pursuing in this regard are shared: (1) every…

Although there are many methods available for assessing text comprehension, the cloze test is not widely acknowledged as one of them. Critiques on cloze testing center on its supposedly limited ability to measure comprehension beyond the sentence. However, these critiques do not hold for all types of cloze tests; the particular configuration of a…

ACT reporting categories and ACT Readiness Ranges are new features added to the ACT score reports starting in fall 2016. For each reporting category, the number correct score, the maximum points possible, the percent correct, and the ACT Readiness Range, along with an indicator of whether the reporting category score falls within the Readiness…

For decades, standardized reading comprehension tests have consisted of a series of passages and associated multiple-choice questions. Although widely used in and out of the classroom, there continues to be considerable disagreement regarding how or whether such tests have net value in the service of advancing educational progress in reading. This…

This technical report is one in a series of five describing the reliability (test/retest/and alternate form) and G-Theory/D-Study research on the easy CBM reading measures, grades 1-5. Data were gathered in the spring 2011 from a convenience sample of students nested within classrooms at a medium-sized school district in the Pacific Northwest. Due…

Recent findings of passageless comprehension by college readers have added to the fallout with standardized reading comprehension tests and have called for theoretically and psychometrically stronger options. Reviewing the research literature, this paper suggests the maze test as an option for college reading assessment. The existing evidence,…

Noting that the amount of reading students do is related to their reading achievement, this booklet presents an instrument designed to measure the amount and breadth of students' reading in and out of school. The first part of the booklet discusses the Reading Activity Inventory (RAI) and how it differs from other reading activity measures, uses…

The School Mastery of Reading Test (SMRT) program was designed to give administrators and teachers information about reading performance and recommendations for improving the instructional program. The project includes development of a valid and reliable reading test based on the New York City curriculum in order to assess the potential linkage…

The Woodcock Reading Mastery Tests assess reading ability in individuals from kindergarten to adulthood. The test battery is designed for use in clinical assessment and diagnosis, program planning, student selection and placement, appraisal of student progress, and other uses. This paper describes the test battery's administration, scoring,…

The Multilevel Academic Survey Test is intended for students in grades 3-8 and older students who perform inadequately on K-8 reading and math content. It determines which students need special services and determines appropriate instruction according to specific curriculum objectives. This paper describes administration, data summation,…

Assessment of student performance is critical for developing effective instructional policy and designing programs responsive to individual students' needs. To gauge the adequacy of available assessment tools for achieving these ends, the Reading First Assessment Committee (RFAC) developed criteria for evaluating the adequacy of reading measures…

The secondary level English proficiency (SLEP) test is a group administered 150 item multiple-test of English language proficiency that includes two subscores and eight different item types. It is designed to assess a foreign student's readiness for English medium instruction at the secondary level. This paper reports on two studies which were…

The Woodcock-Johnson Psycho-Educational Battery-Revised is a set of tests designed to measure cognitive abilities, scholastic aptitude, and achievement in the areas of reading, mathematics, and written language, in individuals aged 2-95 years. This paper describes the test battery's administration, scoring, standardization, reliability, and…

The North Carolina End-of-Grade Testing Program is based on the assessment of higher level skills in the context of specific subject-area content. These tests inform students, parents, the community, and educators about the achievement of North Carolina students in grades three through eight in given areas. This report describes the development…