GKIDS Assessment

1. GKIDS Assessment Presented by Avery’sKindergartenTeachers

2. Georgia Kindergarten Inventory of Developing Skills

3. Why are KindergartenersAssessed? • Georgia Law 20-2-151 and 20-2-281 • Requires an instrument, procedures, and policies necessary to assess the first grade readiness of children enrolled in Georgia public school kindergarten programs. • Requires development of guidelines for the utilization of the instrument in grade placement decisions. • Requires an annual summary report.

4. Purpose of GKIDS • Provides teachers with ongoing diagnostic information about kindergarten students’ developing skills in language arts, math, science, social studies, personal/social development, & approaches to learning. • Provides a summary of individual student performance at the end of the kindergarten school year as an indicator of first grade readiness.

5. Range of Performance vs. True Performance • A child’s performance on any one assessment should be seen as an indicator of that child’s range of functioning rather than as an indicator of true performance. • Thinking in terms of range makes sense in view of the difficulty in assessing young children and the variable nature of their development and learning. • Children vary tremendously in their responses from one day to the next or in different contexts. • Young children’s capabilities cannot be discerned through a single test. Securing valid and reliable information about young children’s development and learning requires multiple measures applied at multiple points over time.

6. Why assess Approaches to Learning? • Teachers need to be aware that children differ in how they approach new and novel tasks, difficult problems or challenges, and teacher directed tasks. • Students who do not value reading are not going to read outside of school even if they have reading skills. • Students with positive dispositions toward reading will choose to read often. -Early Childhood Research and Practices • An individual child’s approach to learning may have little association with his or her level of knowledge or skill. • An individual child may have considerable knowledge and skills, however, his inclination to use his skills may be influenced by temperament, the way he was raised, or cultural values. • All children need to acquire positive approaches to learning, including children with significant disabilities or from diverse cultural backgrounds. -Indiana University Early Childhood Center

7. Final Thoughts • Even the most carefully designed assessment instrument cannot, by itself, capture the complexity of a child’s understanding. -Edward Chittenden