Spring Testing Information

Understanding The Smarter Balanced Assessment (SBA)

Test results are one piece of information about how your student is doing in school. Together with report cards and other information, test results tell us if your student is on track to succeed in higher grades as well as for college and career.

The Smarter Balanced Assessments are computer adaptive. Computer-adaptive tests adjust the difficulty of the questions based on the answers that students give. As students answer questions correctly, they receive more challenging questions. Incorrect answers trigger easier questions. This helps keep the test short for many students and makes sure the scores are very accurate.

How can I help my student prepare for the test?

You are an important part of your student’s education. Some things you can do to help your student are:

• Discuss the purpose of the state tests with your student.

• Help them be relaxed and comfortable.

• Tell your student that you and their teacher want them to do well and try their best and that you are both there to support them.

• Make sure your student is prepared for school on test days as they would be before every school day.

• Review test results with your student and discuss with their teacher where your student might need additional help.

Sample Questions

If you want to quickly try out test questions (also called test items) and explore features without going through a complete test, check out the Sample Items Website. On this site, you can:

• Read about the types of items used on Smarter Balanced assessments;

• Search for test items based on grade, subject, or item type;

• Find additional details about the content that items measure; and

• Use the full breadth of accessibility features used on Smarter Balanced assessments.

GO TO THE SAMPLE ITEMS WEBSITE