KINDERGARTEN assessments assessments

Vision and Hearing

This screening should have been done by your physician as part of the School Health Examination Record you were given at registration and submitted before the first day of school.

Acadience

All students in kindergarten through sixth grade will be assessed using Acadience. This quick assessment is research-based and provides teachers with a reliable means of evaluating letter-naming fluency, phonemic awareness/fluency (the ability to identify sounds, or phonemes, in words), oral-reading fluency and measures of early numeracy and computation. Teachers will use the results of these assessments, along with classroom information, to help monitor your child’s progress with these important “building block” skills to reading and math. They also will use this information to help identify student strengths/needs, make instructional decisions and plan for reading intervention. The Acadience assessment will be administered by the kindergarten teachers during the phase-in days, then twice more throughout the year to measure the student’s progress.

Gross Motor

Gross motor involves the development and coordination of the body’s larger muscles (legs, arms and trunk) to produce effective and controlled movements. Gross motor development can be encouraged through skills like running, climbing, bicycling, kicking and throwing a ball. Please note that there is a large variance in an incoming kindergartener’s gross motor abilities, developmental rate and age range. Gross motor skills will be assessed during gym class during the second quarter.

MCSD Kindergarten Gross Motor Screening

• Stairs (alternates feet up and down with or without railing)

• Gallop or skip (can demonstrate smooth rhythm with either skill for 10 feet)

• Run (demonstrates functional running patterns either straight or zig zag)

• Hop on one foot five times (demonstrates skill with either right or left foot)

• Jump forward (jumps forward at least 24 inches with two-foot takeoff/landing)

• Catch 8” ball tossed directly to them from four feet (can either use hands only or trap the ball against their body)

• Kick 8” ball (kicks ball at least 10 feet forward without loss of balance)