Colorado Assessments

This collection of assessments was written through a project developed by the National Core Knowledge Coordinator of Colorado and funded with monies from the Colorado Department of Education Dissemination Grant. This project has gathered and developed a collection of Core Knowledge assessments that evaluate the specific content in the units and lessons being taught in Core Knowledge classrooms throughout the year. The assessments are for specific units, like the American Revolution or Astronomy; these are not intended to be a year-end assessment. These assessments constitute an invaluable collection, all directly assessing the Core Knowledge content for Science and History and individual units so that teachers have a bank of assessments to draw from and use in the classroom for each unit taught. All the assessments have a similar format and are directly correlated to the Colorado Model Content Standards as well as the CSAP.

The assessments are formatted so that they give teachers options to use for differentiating instruction. Each bullet in the Core Knowledge Sequence is covered with at least one question. Each question is then broken down into three different questions that represent a different level (“a,” “b,” and “c”). Each level represents a variety of higher order thinking skills, with level “a” representing levels on the lower end of Bloom’s Taxonomy and progressing in difficulty with levels “b” and “c.” Level “a” is written on a more basic or remedial level, possibly for a Special Education student or if the content was only taught briefly, level “b” is written for a student who is average or on grade level, and level “c” is written for a gifted student or if the content was taught and expanded. Educators have the option to use all the level “a” questions, level “b” questions, or level “c” questions together to create one test, or the levels can be mixed and matched. Before using the questions, teachers need to decide what kind of test they want to give to students; the assessments are not intended to use with all questions from all levels. The multitude of choices are intended to give teachers many different options of how to assess and to cover a wide range of ability levels.
 

Kindergarten Science:

• Plants and Plant Growth
• Animals and Their Needs
• Human Body (Five Senses)
• Introduction to Magnetism
• Seasons and Weather
• Taking Care of the Earth
• Wilbur and Orville Wright

First Grade Science:

• Living Things and Their Environments
• Human Body (Body Systems)
• Matter
• Properties of Matter: Measurement
• Introduction to Electricity
• Astronomy: Introduction to the Solar System
• The Earth

First Grade History and Geography - World:

• Geography
• Mesopotamia: The "Cradle of Civilization"
• Ancient Egypt
• History of World Religions
• Modern Civilizations and Culture: Mexico

First Grade History and Geography - American:

• Early People and Civilizations
• Early Exploration and Settlement
• From Colonies to Independence: The American Revolution
• Early Exploration of the American West

Second Grade Science:

• Cycles in Nature-The Water Cycle
• Cycles in Nature- Seasonal Cycles
• Cycles in Nature-Life Cycles
• Insects
• The Human Body-Taking Care of Your Body: A Healthy Diet
• The Human Body-Cells
• The Human Body-The Digestive and Excretory Systems
• Magnetism
• Simple Machines

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