News
School Readiness Office Hours Announced
The School Readiness team will be holding virtual office hours over the next several weeks to support kindergarten programs utilizing Teaching Strategies® GOLD®. For more information please visit the School Readiness Trainings and Meetings page.
State Board Approved MOU with Teaching Strategies® Regarding The Use of GOLD® for Kindergarten School Readiness
The Colorado State Board of Education approved a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with Teaching Strategies® regarding the use of GOLD® for kindergarten school readiness assessment in 2015. In order to implement the MOU, all kindergarten programs planning to use GOLD® in SY 2016-17 will move onto the expanded Birth-3rd grade platform (2.0) in SY 2016-17. While the platform allows for teachers to utilize the tool up through 3rd grade, there is no state requirement to use the tool beyond kindergarten. The MOU does not apply to preschool programs using GOLD®. The MOU accomplishes the following objectives:
- It streamlines the assessment process for kindergarten teachers by reducing the number of assessment items in the Kindergarten Entry Assessment (KEA) used to measure children's knowledge and skills at kindergarten entry (reduced items highlighted yellow),
- It creates even greater levels of data privacy for kindergarten students through additional privacy safeguards when using the assessment.
Reminder:Parent Guardian Permissions for Videos and Pictures in Teaching Strategies GOLD
Districts are reminded to obtain explicit, individual written parental/guardian consent for the use of photos and videos in Teaching Strategies GOLD™ in kindergarten. In December 2015, the Colorado State Board of Education approved a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with Teaching Strategies® regarding the use of the GOLD assessment for kindergarten school readiness. As part of the MOU, additional privacy safeguards when implementing the assessment tool are in place to ensure even greater levels of student data privacy.
Implementation of the documentation opt-in provision for this school year will not be managed by CDE or Teaching Strategies, but at the district level to allow for maximum local flexibility. Districts may manually opt-in, or turn on the Documentation functionality, at the classroom-level, but must limit the use of the feature to children whose parents have opted in to its use. Larger districts may submit a written request to Teaching Strategies to activate this feature for their entire system. However, these districts will still be responsible for limiting use to permissioned children. Please contact Kelly Cochrane at kelly.c@teachingstrategies.com for assistance.
If you have questions about the MOU or its implementation, please contact Emily Kielmeyer at Kielmeyer_e@cde.state.co.us or 720-822-0640
New Teaching Strategies GOLD Town Hall Webinar
Watch the webinar, recorded on April 27th, that discusses the changes and updates made to the Birth-3rd grade platform for SY 2016-17.
Early Childhood Assessment
We recently migrated information related to Early Childhood Assessment to a new location. Please visit the P-3 Education section or click the link above to access Early Childhood Assessment information.
SY 2016-2017 School Readiness Portfolio Reimbursement and Teaching Strategies® GOLD® Credit Information
Districts will receive information regarding their specific kindergarten student portfolio credit directly from Teaching Strategies® in May for budget planning purposes. Districts who wish to request reimbursement for kindergarten school readiness assessment portfolios or apply for first-time funds, please contact Emily Kielmeyer, Kindergarten and School Readiness Manager via email at kielmeyer_e@cde.state.co.us.
Preparing Colorado's Children
CDE and School Readiness promote a start early approach to school. With a strong, early start Colorado children will be more likely to continually succeed in school. School Readiness supports teachers’ ability to create responsive learning environments that ensure academic and developmental growth for students. This includes promoting awareness of developmentally appropriate practices (DAP) that supports hands-on learning experiences and challenges students’ thinking.
To do this, school readiness assessments are used on an ongoing basis to measure children’s growth. Information collected through the assessments provides teachers with targeted instruction opportunities for individual students and small groups of students, thereby strengthening the learning environment for students.
