Assessment Spotlight Issue #72 - December 4, 2019

Focusing on the California Assessment of Student Performance and Progress (CAASPP) System and English Language Proficiency Assessments of California (ELPAC)—and including, when timely, updates on California's other statewide assessments.

Summative ELPAC Assessment Results in the California Educator Reporting System

The California Educator Reporting System (CERS) now includes Summative ELPAC results from the 2017–18 and 2018–19 school years. Local educational agency (LEA) staff who have Test Operations Management System (TOMS) logon credentials can enter CERS through the CAASPP Portal or ELPAC Portal to access student assessment results. Over the next two years, CERS will become the single source of interim and summative assessment results for all CAASPP and ELPAC assessments except Initial ELPAC results, which will be recorded in a different manner. Interim assessment results already are in CERS and are available within minutes after scoring has been completed.

December's Featured Digital Library Resource for Professional Learning—"Understanding the Formative Assessment Process"

This month's featured resource, Understanding the Formative Assessment Process (Digital Library account required), introduces teachers of all grades and subjects to the formative assessment process as part of an activity for a professional learning community, for ongoing professional development, or as a staff meeting discussion topic. It includes an eight-minute introductory video and the materials needed for guiding educators in a collaborative and reflective learning activity about the formative assessment process.

In this professional learning activity, participants complete a "Know-Want to Know-Learned" organizer to activate their background knowledge, complete the video study guide, and discuss their responses. The teachers then finish the activity by filling out an "Exit Ticket," writing three things they learned, two questions they still have, and one thing they already knew that was reinforced.

To access this resource, users can visit the Smarter Balanced Digital Library (Digital Library account required). The Digital Library provides many subject- and grade-specific resources to help K–12 educators apply the formative assessment process during daily instruction.

Check Them Out! New ELPAC Accessibility Resources

LEA preparations for the 2020 Summative ELPAC administration are under way. The California Department of Education now offers the following new resources to support educators and individualized education program (IEP)/Section 504 plan teams in determining the appropriate supports for their English learner students:

• ELPAC Administration Student Accessibility Checklist. This guide is for determining the appropriate supports for allowing students to access the ELPAC through the use of universal tools, designated supports, and accommodations. It can be used to help plan and organize the variety of available accessibility resources.
• ELPAC Administration Guidance and Governing Definitions. This resource explains the use of domain exemptions and alternate assessments and defines important terms to support discussions in IEP and Section 504 plan team meetings.

Alternate ELPAC: Looking Ahead

The Alternate ELPAC operational field test (census) will be administered in January and February 2021. The field test will include all eligible students; that is, English learner students with significant cognitive disabilities, as indicated in their IEP. LEAs can prepare for this field test administration by having planning discussions with IEP teams to determine eligibility. The ELPAC Administration Student Accessibility Checklist and ELPAC Administration Guidance and Governing Definitions are available to guide those discussions.

Also available are the Alternate Assessment IEP Team Guidance web page and the Alternate Assessment Decision Confirmation Work Sheet, which provide more information about alternate assessment participation guidelines. Begin your planning now to ensure a successful Alternate ELPAC field test administration!

New CAA for Science Performance Task Video!

A new video for the California Alternate Assessment (CAA) for Science is available on the CAASPP Portal! Located on the Training Videos web page, "CAA for Science: How to Administer an Embedded Performance Task"provides basic information about how to administer an embedded performance task for the CAA for Science. Topics include the preparation needed, an overview of a performance task, and security protocols. Note that the CAA for Science is intended to be embedded in instruction, with the four performance tasks being administered shortly after related instruction.