Teachers utilize checks for understanding throughout a lesson to gauge students understanding of the topic/skill. These checks for understanding can take on many forms. A common example is a thumbs up, sideways, or down. Teachers will ask students how they are feeling about the lesson and the students raise their thumb with their comfortability at the moment. Another common check for understanding is the "exit ticket". An exit ticket is a quick set of questions covering the lesson that students complete before ending the lesson. This provides teachers with quick information about the students understanding of the content and how well the students apply the information independently. 

Quizzes are assigned to students throughout the course of a unit. This provides teachers a snapshot of how well the students are applying the information they have learned, if re-teaching is necessary, or if the students are ready for their summative assessment. Teachers assign quizzes as part of their core curriculums or through technology programs such as E-Spark. The purpose of quizzes are to inform instruction and provide feedback to support student achievement and growth. 

At the end of a unit of study, especially in mathematics, students will take unit tests. These tests will cover all content taught throughout the unit and determine students mastery of the content. Unit tests also inform teachers if students are proficient with the content and prepared for the following unit of study. 

In place of a unit test, students may also complete a project as a summative assessment. This project will determine student mastery of the content taught in a unit, just like a unit test. A summative assessment project may look like a writing sample, a presentation, or an original creation, such as an art project or 3D printed design. 

All students (K-5) complete STAR benchmark assessments at the end of each academic quarter (4 times per school year). Kindergarten students complete the STAR Early Literacy assessment. Students in 1st-5th grade complete both the STAR Reading and STAR Mathematics assessments. Each test is comprised of 35 multiple choice questions. After completing the assessments, teachers have multiple scores to interpret for each student including grade equivalent (GE), percentile ranking (PR), and scaled score (SS). The scaled score presents students with an overall score. This is helpful when analyzing student growth to determine how many points the score rose between each test. The percentile ranking score ranks students compared to their peers. For example, if a student scores a 70 percentile ranking, the student scored higher than 70% of students in the same age or grade level. The grade equivalent score gives students the grade level and month in which they are demonstrating proficient skills. For example, if a student scores a GE of 3.4, they are demonstrating proficient skills at the 3rd grade, 4th month level. Along with benchmark assessments, teachers use STAR for progress monitoring. Students who are demonstrating below grade level proficiency take STAR assessments once a month to monitor their progress and determine if additional support is needed.

Along with STAR, K-2 students complete NWEA Maps benchmark assessments twice a year, once in the fall and once in the spring. Each student completes both the Maps Reading and Maps Mathematics assessments. These assessments are similar to STAR in how they score, measure, and compare students. The main difference is in the type of questions offered to students. Instead of only multiple choice questions, Maps offers students drag-and-drop, fill-in-the-blank, and short answer questions. GCES' students complete both STAR and Maps to give teachers two data points from norm-referenced assessments to evaluate achievement and growth. 

3rd-5th students complete the CMAS state assessments. 3rd-5th students each complete 3 sections of Mathematics and Reading. 5th grade students also each complete 3 sections of Science. These assessments are required by the state of Colorado and determine the school's accreditation status.