on track for achieving end-of-year learning goals, differentiated for ELs using the CA ELD Standards,
so that within-year instructional adjustments and refinements can be made. For example, a fifth-
grade teacher examines a quarterly narrative writing task the whole class completes and uses the CA
ELD Standards to analyze how EL students expand and
enrich ideas in noun phrases (ELD.PII.5.4). Using this
approach, she monitors how an individual EL student
progresses throughout the year. A student who began
the school year at an early Expanding level of proficiency,
for example, might progress through the Expanding level
(across the narrative writing samples) and, potentially,
into the early Bridging level by the end of the year.
Similarly, high school teachers design a two-month
unit of study with a culminating, curriculum-embedded
argument writing task. This writing task provides useful
medium-cycle ELD assessment evidence if the writing is
analyzed for degree of attainment of the learning goals
tied to particular CA ELD Standards (e.g., how students
are using verb types and tenses, organizing their writing,
expanding noun phrases). This analysis helps teachers
identify patterns in student learning outcomes (e.g., many students may need support in linking ideas
throughout a text to create cohesion) as well as individual needs. Using the results of this analysis
teachers plan further instruction, this within-year adjustment supports students’ progress toward end-
of-year goals in ELD.
Interim/benchmark assessments should be used judiciously and intentionally. Authentic classroom
learning tasks, rather than multiple-choice tests or decontextualized performance tasks that focus
on discrete grammatical skills and vocabulary knowledge, best inform ongoing teaching and learning
in ELD. Teachers of ELs approach all assessments with a critical eye to ensure that tests match
teaching and learning goals and that valuable instructional time is not sacrificed to administer and
analyze tests—or any other type of medium-cycle assessment—that are not critical for monitoring ELD
progress.
Long-Cycle Assessment
Yearly assessments, such as the Smarter Balanced
Summative Assessments, are long-cycle assessments. They
typically assess students’ mastery of standards at the end
of the grade and provide student achievement results at
several levels, including individual, school, district, and state.
They sum up achievement after a year of learning and are
therefore most appropriately used by schools and districts to
monitor their own annual and longitudinal progress and to
determine that individual students and groups of students
are on track academically. The CELDT serves similar purposes
with respect to measuring ELs’ progress toward learning
English. Schools and districts ensure that students in dual
language programs are making steady progress toward
biliteracy by including assessments in the relevant non-
English language.
Long-cycle assessments also help teachers answer the
following questions:
Interim/benchmark assessments
should be used judiciously and
intentionally.... Teachers...
ensure that tests match teaching
and learning goals and that
valuable instructional time is
not sacrificed to administer and
analyze tests—or any other type
of medium-cycle assessment—that
are not critical for monitoring ELD
progress.They [long-cycle assessments]
sum up achievement after
a year of learning and are
therefore most appropriately
used by schools and districts
to monitor their own annual
and longitudinal progress
and to determine that
individual students and groups
of students are on track
academically.Assessment Chapter 8 | 839