Getting Acquainted with the Lite and Teacher Deluxe Versions of easyCBM

EasyCBM® was designed by researchers at the University of Oregon as an integral part of an RTI (Response to Intervention) model. From the start, developers have emphasized the goal of the system: to help facilitate good instructional decision-making. This project began with a grant from the federal Office of Special Education Programs in 2006, but it has continued to expand with the help of our school district partners across the state of Oregon and – more recently – across the United States. In the fall of 2009, there were over 20,000 registered users on the site, spread out across the 50 states.By September of 2010, this number had grown to over 68,000, representing over half a million students.

The assessments on the system are what is known as curriculum-based measures (CBMs). CBMs are standardized measures that sample from a year’s worth of curriculum to assess the degree to which students have mastered the skills and knowledge deemed critical at each grade level. The CBMs on the easyCBM® system are often referred to as ‘next-generation CBMs’ because we used an advanced form of statistics, Item Response Theory (IRT) during measurement development to increase the consistency of the alternate forms of each measure type and increase the sensitivity of the measures to monitor growth. At each grade level, alternate forms of each measure type are designed to be of equivalent difficulty, so as teachers monitor student progress over time, changes in score reflect changes in student skill rather than changes in the test for

Here is the progression for learning about, setting up, and using the easyCBM system for testing.

1. Resource Tab-To get started, it is best to become familiarized with the program and how to use it. There are tutorials that demonstrate how to administer and record timed student tests. We recommend logging into your account and clicking on the Resources tab. This tab is located in the upper right side of your account dashboard. There are manuals, videos, documents, and tutorials that will help get you acquainted with the program and assist you with getting your account up and running. Teacher’s manuals for both easyCBM Lite and Deluxe give a general overview of the program workings. There is also a “Help” section, found in the upper right-hand corner of your main dashboard, that you can refer to for specific problems and questions.

2.) Setting-Up Your Account-To prepare an account for testing, students need to be added, groups created, students activated within those groups, and tests assigned to those groups. There is a document called Getting-Started-with-your-easyCBM-Accnt_Fini.pdf that walks through the steps needed to complete the set-up.

3.) Testing Students-Students go to a designated portal found under your Measures tab listed in blue (https://app.easycbm.com/+ your username) then select their group name, their name, and then a test to complete. Once tests are completed the program will score and graph the results in the Reports section (student responses entered manually will also be scored and graphed). There is a document called Administering easyCBM Measures During Remote Instruction that discusses the remote application of the program.