Running head: ASSESSMENT INQUIRY PROJECT FINAL 1

Assessment Inquiry Project Final

Suzann Keith

EDU 471
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Assessment Inquiry Project: Reading MAP Test Results

My survey focused on finding out how and to what extent teachers in my school

district use the results of the reading portion of the Measures of Academic Progress

(MAP) test to inform their instruction. The survey can be seen here: Reading MAP Test

Results Utilization Survey. I sent the survey out to all teachers grades K-12 (even

though the lowest primary grades do not use the MAP test) and received a total of 22

responses from teachers at all grade levels.

Question 1: To what extent do you read and review the Reading MAP test results
associated with your students?
Number of Responses

Eighty-six percent of teachers

responded at level 3 or above,
indicating that they read and
review the Reading MAP test
results associated with their
students a moderate to high
amount.

Not at all…..…..A great deal

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Question 3: To what extent do the Reading MAP test results inform or alter your
instruction?

Seventy-two percent of teachers

Number of Responses

responded at level 3 or 4,
indicating the results of the
Reading MAP test inform or alter
their instruction a moderate to
moderately high amount.

Not at all……....A great deal

Question 5: How useful do you find the Reading MAP test results to be?

Almost equal numbers of teachers

responded at levels 2, 3, and 4, indicating
Number of Responses

that the perception of the usefulness of

the Reading MAP test results varies
greatly from teacher to teacher.
Additionally, almost equal numbers of
teachers responded at the extreme ends
of the scale, showing that they felt the
results of the test were either “not useful
at all” or “very useful.”

Not useful at all……....Very useful

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Percentage of
Responses

Responses
Number of
Question 7:  What would make Reading MAP test results more useful to
you as a classroom teacher? (Respondents could select more than one
response.)

More time to analyze the test results 9 19%

More training to understand the test results. 10 21%
More time and/or training to understand how to apply the results to 11 23%
classroom instruction.
More time and/or training to work with students regarding their individual 14 29%
test results.
Nothing else is needed. 0 0%
Other 4 8%

Although a significant number of teachers requested more time and/or training to

understand and analyze the Reading MAP test results in general, the majority of

teachers responded that they would like additional time and/or training to work with

students regarding their individual MAP test results. This response was closely followed

by teachers who indicated a need for more time and/or training to understand how to

apply the test results to classroom instruction. Taken together, these two results seem

to suggest that teachers are interested in applying the test results more specifically to

their work with students and classroom instruction, but they are in need of more

professional development in order to do this effectively.

One striking finding from this question was that not one respondent marked

“Nothing else is needed,” showing that no one who responded to this survey felt that the

currently amount of time and/or training regarding Reading MAP test results is sufficient.
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Question 9: To what extent do you use the DesCartes instructional resources

associated with the Reading MAP test results?

The vast majority of teachers responded

that they do not use the DesCartes
Number of Responses

instructional resources associated with the

Reading MAP test results at all. In fact,
many teachers added in the comments that
they had never heard of the DesCartes
resources at all. This indicates that this
resource is highly underutilized and that
significant staff development would need to
be devoted to this area if the district wishes
teachers to use this resource.

Not at all…..…..A great deal

As a whole, the responses to my survey tell me that teachers in my district read

and review the Reading MAP test data on their students, and that the results inform

their classroom instruction in a general sense. However, the majority of teachers are

not using MAP data to work with students on an individual basis (with the possible

exception of the special education teachers). Teachers expressed a significant need for

more time and/or training in order to use the MAP test data in this manner. Teachers

had mixed opinions as to how useful the MAP test data is with most falling between

somewhere between “not very useful” and “moderately useful.” Finally, the

overwhelming majority of teachers do not use the DesCartes instructional resources

and most were unaware of their existence. These resources can show teachers,

students and parents the relative areas of strength and areas of growth for students in a
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particular RIT range, but the implementation of the DesCartes resources requires time

and training for teachers that is not currently available.

Through this project I learned that literacy assessment is a complex process that

involves many factors. Testing can be expensive and time consuming and often

teachers have mixed feelings about the usefulness of the results obtained from the test.

Teacher are interested in the data that results from testing, but they are often given

inadequate time and training to interpret, analyze and implement the results. Therefore,

assessment often becomes just a means to an end and does not always have the

desired effect of informing instruction and improving student learning.

If I could impact how assessment is conducted in my local school district, I would

set aside significantly more professional development time to helping teachers become

more knowledgeable consumers of test data. Once we have the results, what do we do

with them? How can we use this data to improve our overall classroom instruction?

How can we use this data to work with individual students to increase their academic

achievement? How can we communicate this data in meaningful ways to students and

parents? The answers to these questions are likely to be found in strategic professional

development and focused collegial collaboration.

Literacy assessments can provide valuable information on student achievement,

but assessments are also drains on time and resources. In order to be an effective use

of time and an informative measure of student learning, teachers must be provided with

adequate time and training to maximize the effectiveness of literary assessments.