Test questions range from questions measuring foundation skills to questions measuring critical thinking processes and strategies.
Reading
- Includes original reading selections
- Measures emergent literacy
- Reports Lexile measures and provides Student Reading Pathfinder Report
- Assesses phonics at kindergarten through grade three
- Aligns with NAEP and the new NCTE and IRA Language Arts Standards
- Provides multiple-choice and open-ended assessment
The Reading tests are consistent with the goals of the new Language Arts Standards of the International Reading Association (IRA) and the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE), as well as the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). They support the idea that the most meaningful instructional reading experiences come through engaging students in useful and appropriate skills and strategies within rich and varied real-life materials.
METROPOLITAN8 measures the spectrum of important reading components, from recognizing sounds to word identification, from vocabulary skills to comprehension. The Reading Vocabulary test at all levels measures student knowledge of grade-appropriate general and content-area vocabulary, as well as vocabulary strategies. It helps make certain that students understand the concept behind the words, not merely the definitions.
Emergent Literacy
Emergent literacy is a cornerstone of the Reading test. Unlike most formal assessments, the early literacy tests measure the foundations of literacy for the youngest students. METROPOLITAN8 offers a tool to gather information about your youngest students’ progress in reading. To support early literacy, the test documents students’ progress in phonemic awareness, concepts of print, letter recognition, word recognition, and sentence reading.
Reading Comprehension
The Reading Comprehension test is designed to actively encourage students to become involved in and stimulated by the reading process. It includes a diverse, rich sample of the kinds of texts that students use in school and beyond—from realistic fiction to science fiction, from folk tales to historical fiction. Besides fiction, the test measures and reports reading achievement with informational selections and functional texts.
The authentic selections used in METROPOLITAN8 ensure that no students will be advantaged or disadvantaged because of prior experience with a selection. Throughout the selections, the test measures and reports separate scores for students’ initial understanding, interpretation, and reflective thinking.
Lexile Measures
The METROPOLITAN8 Reading Comprehension test has been put on The Lexile Framework® so that teachers and parents can better help their students make progress in reading. This valuable tool provides an answer to the crucial questions “Where do we go from here?” and “How can I help?” Each child who takes the Reading Comprehension test can receive a Lexile measure, a number that identifies his or her specific level of reading. The Student Reading Pathfinder Report provides a book list customized to each student’s reading level.
Open-Ended Reading
The open-ended reading assessment will help you address instructional objectives that are best measured with performance-based tasks and student-constructed responses. The test consists of a narrative reading selection followed by nine open-ended questions.
In the open-ended reading assessment, questions measuring the same objective are grouped together.
- “Get the Big Picture” questions ask the student to provide an initial understanding of what was read.
- “Take a Closer Look” questions require the student to explore relationships in the text and make connections.
- “Be a Critic” questions require the student to consider critically the writer’s craft and the value of the material.
The test can be administered in one class period and provides a full range of norm-referenced scores.
Mathematics
- Aligns with the NCTM Standards 2000
- Reflects the connections within mathematics
- Recognizes the importance of estimation strategies
- Connects the use of manipulatives with assessment
- Provides both multiple-choice and open-ended assessment
The Mathematics tests assess appropriate mathematics content and process skills at every level, grounding questions in realistic situations that are relevant to students’ everyday lives. The questions assess students on their knowledge of mathematics as well as their ability to solve problems and communicate and reason mathematically.
To ensure that the tests are current with changes in the curriculum, they align with the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) Standards 2000. NCTM identifies five process strands: Problem Solving, Reasoning and Proof, Communication, Connections, and Representation. In METROPOLITAN8, these processes are reflected in the processes of Problem Solving, Mathematical Procedures, Language and Symbols, Mathematical Connections, and Tools and Models.
Many of the questions reflect the importance of hands-on materials in instruction. Through the use of photographs, METROPOLITAN8 connects assessment with the manipulatives familiar to students.
Arithmetic Operations
The Mathematics tests include a comprehensive test of arithmetic operations specifically for grades 1 through 8—Mathematics Computation. Results from this test may be reported by the operation (addition, subtraction, multiplication, division) or by the kind of number used in the operation (whole numbers, decimals, fractions, and percents). Many of these items are presented in context so that the student must select an appropriate operation as well as perform the computation.
Concepts and Problem Solving
The Concepts and Problem Solving tests measure a student’s facility for applying mathematics to many different kinds of problems and evaluating their results. The Mathematics Concepts and Problem Solving test comprises five clusters:
- Number and Operations
- Patterns, Relationships, and Algebra
- Geometry and Measurement
- Data, Statistics, and Probability
- Problem Solving
Estimation is one of the important skills assessed in the Concepts and Problem Solving test. Students may apply these strategies in any of the clusters.
Open-Ended Mathematics
The open-ended Mathematics test consists of nine questions or tasks developed around a single theme. The questions assess mathematical communication, reasoning, and problem solving.
Each question is scored on a four-point scale according to one of three process rubrics: Communication, Reasoning, and Problem Solving. The test can be administered in one class period and provides a full range of norm-referenced scores.
Language
- Models the writing process with unique format
- Aligns with the new NCTE and IRA Language Arts Standards
- Includes a full-length Spelling test
The innovative Language test gets as close as any test can, in a multiple-choice format, to measuring students’ communication skills. Realizing that children learn to listen, speak, read, and write for a purpose, we developed METROPOLITAN8 so that language is evaluated in the context of a realistic application of knowledge, strategies, and skills.
In the early grades, language skills are assessed through listening vocabulary and listening comprehension, since listening is a basic building block in language acquisition and development. For these young children, METROPOLITAN8 includes developmentally appropriate words, concepts, and messages like those heard at home, at school, and in everyday life.
Writing Process
The METROPOLITAN8 Language test, unlike any other, replicates the writing process through the three essential stages: prewriting, composing, and editing. METROPOLITAN8 also reports student achievement in Prewriting, composing, and editing.
Prewriting measures students’ understanding of a variety of tasks at the early stages of writing. Questions test students’ planning, generating, and organizing skills, as well as their abilities to use resource material.
Composing measures students’ abilities to craft a clear, concise, purposeful composition. Questions test both sentence-level objectives and more challenging content and organization objectives within the context of various modes and purposes for writing.
Editing questions mirror what students encounter in their daily work. Students must detect realistic errors in language usage and mechanics.
Spelling
Spelling is a separate test at grades 1 through 12 to provide in-depth information about students’ achievement in this important basic skill.
Like language, spelling is assessed in context. Students are asked to identify a misspelled word in a sentence. Older students are presented with the added option of answering “no mistake,” in order to challenge their ability to spot misspelled words as well as recognize correctly spelled words, just as they must do when editing their own compositions. In the early grades, the spelling of sight words is measured, while at the higher grades, the test includes more spelling objectives, such as homophones.
Writing
- Measures written expression through picture prompts
- Aligns with the new NCTE and IRA Language Arts Standards
With the METROPOLITAN8 writing assessment, students compose written responses to picture prompts. The test provides a reliable, norm-referenced measure of student writing achievement with a free-response assessment. Together, the METROPOLITAN8 Writing Test and the Language test provide a thorough measure of students’ language and writing skills.
During testing, students are encouraged to allocate their time for each process stage from prewriting through editing. The test can be administered in one class period and provides a full range of norm referenced scores.
A six-point Holistic Score Scale allows for clear, meaningful distinctions. A four-point Analytic Scale measures six widely recognized features of good writing: content and development, organizational strategies, word choices, sentence information, usage, and writing mechanics.
Science
- Provides a context-relevant assessment of science
- Assesses developmentally appropriate concepts and science process skills
- Follows the National Science Education Standards and the Benchmarks for Science Literacy
Students succeed in science most when they understand how the nature and processes of science help them function more effectively in a complex society. The METROPOLITAN8 Science test uses this concept as a springboard for a highly relevant assessment of science. We’ve followed closely the example of the National Science Education Standards and the Benchmarks for Science Literacy to create a developmentally appropriate assessment.
METROPOLITAN8 Science moves from general content in the early years to more course-specific content for high school students—from concepts that are concrete to concepts that are more abstract.
Test content in early grades includes concepts that are familiar—animals, weather, health, and the human body. The Science test for students in the middle years of schooling is more complex, with content that assesses biological sciences, physical sciences, and earth/space sciences. High school students are tested on the more specialized science disciplines— physiology, physics, chemistry, biology, and earth and space sciences.
For students in all grades, METROPOLITAN8 tests a student’s ability to use reasoning to reach an answer rather than simply recalling information.
Social Studies
- Based on the fundamental goals of social studies
- Encompasses national social studies standards
- Assesses foundation concepts and skills as well as higher-order skills of evaluation and analysis
The METROPOLITAN8 Social Studies test measures the concepts important for the development of citizenship.
The test covers five major academic disciplines—history, geography, political science, economics, and culture—integrating academic content with processing skills and techniques and encompassing the most recent national standards. Reflecting a developmental approach to social studies instruction, the test asks young students to answer questions related to their immediate environment, while older students address broader aspects of social studies.
History questions focus on broad themes and trends in U.S. history and world history. Depending on the grade level, students are questioned about leaders, major events, symbols, and at higher levels, origins of democratic ideals.
Geography helps put the student’s place in the world in perspective, covering both human and physical aspects of geography.
Political science deals with the basic principles of the U.S. system of government, including the rights and responsibilities of citizenship. At the upper levels, the test addresses different forms of government.
Economics looks at the monetary forces at work in our society with issues such as supply and demand.
Culture questions examine customs, norms, and social institutions in a multicultural perspective.
Achievement/Ability Information
When you administer METROPOLITAN8 with the Otis-Lennon School Ability Test®, Seventh Edition (OLSAT7), you can report Achievement/Ability Comparisons (AACs). AACs describe how students are performing in relation to the achievement of other students with the same measured ability. METROPOLITAN8 was standardized with OLSAT7.
Pathways to Progress
The new Pathways to Progress reports and materials give principals and teachers specific information to make test results meaningful to classroom instruction.
Based on results of METROPOLITAN8, Pathways to Progress reports place groups of students in stanine levels, showing how they performed in relation to other students across the nation. Reports for METROPOLITAN8 provide detailed information about the specific tasks students are capable of performing, based on stanine levels. These reports provide educators with helpful information that blends norm-referenced and criterion-referenced results into easy-to-understand, actionable statements that can be used to enhance curriculum development. METROPOLITAN8 reports describe tasks that 80 percent of the students whose scores fall into a stanine level can perform. The reports are available for the major content areas for each grade level. For METROPOLITAN8, the content areas are Reading Comprehension, Mathematics, Language, Science, and Social Studies.
Pathways to Progress materials include:
- Booklet for each grade, describing what students can and should be able to do at each stanine level for all content areas
- Booklet for each content area, describing what students can and should be able to do at each stanine level for all grades
- Classroom Poster for each grade, pointing students to things they can do to learn to achieve excellence
Pathways to Progress helps teachers guide students to higher achievement.
Score Reports and Information
METROPOLITAN8 reports are designed to meet the specific needs of teachers, principals, district-level personnel, and parents. Administrators, teachers, and parents across the country told us about the information they find most useful on score reports and how it could be conveyed and delivered most effectively.
The resulting reporting system provides information and interpretation that is meaningful, understandable, and action-oriented. Scores are presented clearly, with interpretations delivered in both narrative and graphic formats. The information clearly shows how students perform with respect to other students at the same grade level. Reports provide specific recommendations and strategies for parents and teachers to use in helping students achieve.
METROPOLITAN8 also offers special scores and reports such as the following:
- Lexile Measures—identify students’ specific reading levels and books that correspond to those reading levels
- Performance Categories—give specific diagnostic information within each subject area
- Learner Competency Reports—allow the test to be used as a criterion-referenced measure of local content
- Process Scores and Content Scores— show how well students did in terms of the skills, strategies and processes, and knowledge each subject area requires
- Pathways to Progress Reports— provide in-depth information about tasks students are capable of performing at each stanine level
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