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Smarter Balanced Math Practice

Washington Smarter Balanced Assessment. Smarter Balanced is aligned to the Common Core State Standards for math, which Briveli covers comprehensively.

Test window

Spring (mid-March through early June, district-selected window)

Format

Computer-adaptive

Calculator

No calculator in grades 3-5. Grades 6-8 have the embedded SBAC calculator on the calculator-allowed CAT segment and the performance task (four-function in grade 6, scientific in grades 7-8).

Score scale

Four achievement levels: Level 1 (Below Standard), Level 2 (Approaching Standard), Level 3 (Meets Standard), Level 4 (Exceeds Standard)

About the Smarter Balanced

Washington has administered the Smarter Balanced math summative — branded simply as the Washington Smarter Balanced Assessment, or SBA — to grades 3 through 8 plus grade 10 since 2014-15. OSPI uses the consortium's default CAT-plus-performance-task design and the 2000-3000 scale, with the Cambium TIDE platform delivering items in the same testing console used by Idaho, Hawaii, Nevada, and Oregon. Washington's high-school SBA is given in grade 10 (it serves as a graduation-pathway option), so the K-8 SBA is the load-bearing block for federal math accountability in elementary and middle school.

Washington keeps the SBAC default level labels (Below Standard, Approaching, Meets, Exceeds) and uses Level 3 (Meets) as the federal accountability bar. Aggregate results are published every fall on the OSPI Washington State Report Card (reportcard.ospi.k12.wa.us), broken out by district, school, grade, and subgroup. Math testing typically runs 2.5 to 3 hours total. Note that WCAS — the Washington Comprehensive Assessment of Science — is a separate test for science only; SBA covers math and ELA, while WCAS handles grades 5, 8, and 11 science.

Official source: https://ospi.k12.wa.us/student-success/testing/state-testing/smarter-balanced-assessments

Practice by Grade

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