Focusing on the Core Just Got a Whole Lot Easier...
See what else just got a whole lot easier for teachers:
Monitoring Student Performance of the Core
Through MasteryConnect’s patent-pending MasteryTracker™, teachers can quickly and effectively assess core standards, monitor student performance, and report student mastery to parents and administrators. MasteryConnect is a formative assessment system designed with the TEACHER in mind. Whether you’re using your state’s core or the new Common Core, MasteryConnect has you covered.
Viewing and Using the Core
Viewing the core daily helps teachers stay focused on teaching the core standards. MasteryConnect synthesizes both the Math and Language Arts standards from the Common Core State Standards Initiative as well as state standards. With shared common assessment examples, teachers can quickly understand what the core is asking them to teach. Convenient “view standards” links are visible throughout MasteryConnect, and hovering over standard headings reveals short descriptions of core standards to help you create teaching sequences and curriculum maps.
Sharing common assessments
Teachers sharing common assessments saves everyone time in a professional learning community. Assessments can be uploaded in any digital format including Microsoft Word, Adobe PDF, or OpenOffice. MasteryConnect makes it simple to add common assessments to the MasteryTracker™ and powerful collaboration tools help teachers decide which common assessments are right for their classroom. MasteryConnect makes it simple to view common assessments developed by every teacher in the MasteryConnect private teacher network, and common assessments can be rated and discussed by all teachers.
Online Professional Learning Community
Finding the time to collaborate with other teachers can be challenging. MasteryConnect takes the work out of practicing a Professional Learning Community and saves teachers and administrators time. Through powerful social and collaboration tools, teachers can connect and share best practices as well as stay informed of effective common assessments that are being utilized in the classroom. When teachers you are following add an assessment to their classroom or upload a new assessment, you can be notified through the collaboration feed on your dashboard. The collaboration feed allows you to post and comment on status (similar to Twitter, but in a only teachers in your network see your posts) and share important information and comments with teachers that are following you. A private messaging system allows you to send personal messages to each other, and commenting tools allow you to view what others are saying about your assessments. Participation in the social and community tools is completely optional; become as involved as you want to be!
Assessing, Grading, and Scoring
Frequent assessment and immediate feedback is key to helping students master core concepts. MasteryConnect’s assessment tools provide multiple ways to administer assessments, and makes grading automatic and fast. Students can be assessed on paper or through advanced digital tools including: paper-based bubble sheets (scanned via your own document camera), iPad, iPod, and any computer web browser.
Time-Saving Assessment Tools
Printed Bubble Sheet Scoring*
Scan plain paper bubble sheets from your own web or document camera! Whether open answer or multiple-choice, MasteryConnect’s built-in web/document camera grading saves you time. No need for taking expensive, proprietary answer sheets down to the office or work room to get scored, do it right from your computer on plain paper! Bubble answer sheets can be printed right from MasteryConnect and instantly scored. After students have filled out the answer sheets, simply hold them in front of your web or document camera, and scores are immediately populated into the MasteryTracker™. Immediate feedback is provided to students and shows them what they got wrong. Teachers can see class-wide item analysis of assessments, and track progress of mastery of standards with ease.
*(Powered by GradeCam™ Technology)
iPod/iPad Scoring
No more dragging students to the computer labs or buying expensive printed answer sheets from other vendors...formative assessment can now be done right in the classroom with mobile devices! Scan in an answer key using a bubble sheet or manually select the right answers in the answer key builder, and you are ready to assess. Download the BubbleSheet app from the iTunes™ app store and have students launch the app. Simply put in the MasteryConnect provided Test ID and assessment begins for students. With iPad/iPod assessment, scoring happens automatically. You can watch as scores automatically pop into your MasteryTracker™ as students finish the assessment. Students get immediate feedback with automatic scoring.
Computer Online Scoring
Online assessment of students is as simple as putting a URL into any web browser (all popular browsers supported). Students enter the MasteryConnect provided Test ID and their student ID and can take any assessment that you’ve uploaded or added to your MasteryTracker™ from the teacher created common assessments. As with the other methods of assessment in MasteryConnect, scores are automatically populated in the MasteryTracker™, students receive immediate feedback, and parents can be notified and view assessments results from anywhere they have Internet access.
Exporting to ANY Gradebook or Student Information System
Assessing and scoring is made even easier when you are able to export your scores to any gradebook or student information system. No matter which method teachers use for scoring assessments (Bubble Sheet Camera Scoring, iPod/iPad Scoring, or Computer Online Scoring), scores can be exported to ANY gradebook system using our one-touch exporting feature.
Remediation / Re-teaching
MasteryConnect takes the time and strain out of remediation and re-teaching. With focus on individual standards, teachers can easily identify which students are struggling to understand a concept. The traffic light colors of green, yellow, and red indicate the mastery status of each student for every standard. Quick access to community-shared assessments saves teachers time and provides opportunity to re-teach core standards.
Creating Scope and Sequence and Curriculum Maps
Viewing the core in context on a daily basis makes it easy to stay focused on teaching the core. MasteryConnect always lets the teacher decide how and when things will be taught. By dragging column headings, teachers can arrange the teaching sequence in any order and build curriculum maps.
Communicating with Parents
Student Reports
Through student reports, teachers can report on what matters most: what the student knows relative to the core being taught. Student reports give parents the information they want most, and show the core standards in detail along with student progress. Parents see in one integrated report what standards were taught, and the student mastery of each standard. Most importantly, parents can see where their student is excelling or if targeted intervention is needed in a specific area.
Parent Notifications
Parent notifications can be turned on or off and provide parents with instant access to how their child performed on an assessment. After scores are populated in the MasteryTracker™ an email notification gets sent to the parent giving them access to:
- View the assessment that was given
- View the core standard that was taught
- View how the student performed and what they got wrong
- View the item analysis of how the student performed relative to the class
- A convenient way to contact the teacher about the assessment
End-of-level Preparation and Benchmark Tests
As a complete formative assessment system, MasteryConnect is designed to help teachers focus on the core standards and teach and assess students for mastery. MasteryConnect is designed to teach and assess students at the “atomic” standard level and help teachers focus on re-teaching concepts that are not understood. MasteryConnect is an endorsing partner of the Common Core State Standards Initiative and is a proponent of projects such as commoncore.org. After units have been mapped to the core and taught to students, assessment of each standard is critical to monitoring student understanding. MasteryConnect helps teachers and administrators prepare for benchmark and end-of-level tests by keeping track of each student's understanding of core standards.
Response to Intervention (RtI)
MasteryConnect was designed with RtI in mind. Identifying students for tiered interventions has never been easier. At MasteryConnect, we know how important it is to provide students with targeted interventions, so we’ve made monitoring student performance fast, easy, and effective. Visual reports of student progress are instantly recognizable and user friendly.
