Testing Mods for Special Ed

Sent: Wed 4/4/2007 12:37 PM To: Gillmeister, Janet A. Subject: Testing Mods Janet,We are struggling with the issue of how special ed teachers are going to read the ELA test to a group of students who have that as part of their test mods...Is it possible for the students with disabilities, who as apart of their tests mods, have the ability to have the ELA and Math Exams read to them through the program? I don't remember from training feature how to turn on access to have the test read through the program itself. I have seen this feature automatically appear for the customized math practice tests that we created. Is it possible to have this feature available for the upcoming testing???I look forward to hearing from you. Maureen Kendrick, LMS LeMoyne Elementary School

ESL Students

Will we administer the diagnostic test to esl students who are exempted from the test and to the students who take the test in their own language even though the diagnostic test is only in english? Jean M. Van Doren Grant Middle School Library

Acuity and Laptops

4/5/07 I have had the similiar experience with even less wireless laptops being utilized at the same time in various buildings. At times, you actually are at a standstill and then may be totally dropped. Once dropped either from the website or wireless network, there are times you are not able to relogin. It does get very frustrating during professional development with adults and even more so when working with students. I think as Joy suggested a trial run would be a necessary step and providing for all variables that may be evident on testing days would help to ensure success. Again we all know with technology nothing is a given. Marie Pampinella 4/4/07 My experience has been that once you get more than 20 computers logged on to the wireless, the network is very slow. A trial run would tell you more about your building capacity. Try having a class of 25 or so students log on to the internet and see what happens. That may give you a fairly good idea of what you can expect. Of course, there will be many more people on the network during Acuity testing and that may slow down the system as well. Maybe this is a question we can address to the technicians. Joy Carlson Title IID IST Mathematics and Technology 4/4/07 Lois brought up a point that many of us are facing - using our laptops to allow us to get all students tested within three weeks. I had planned to use the laptops with our 6-8 students at Huntington and the labs for 3-5. I was recently told if all of our laptops (30) are in use at the same time (accessing the internet) it might cause the wireless network to become too slow to process through the test. Since our MS classrooms have 28-32 in class sections, this will be the most efficient way for us to test our students at this level. Does anyone have any immediate experience, comments or suggestions to the capacity of the wireless connection(s) within buildings? Perhaps this is not something I should worry about, but I want to be proactive now in finalizing our schedule rather than reactive during the three weeks of testing. Also, is there any room for allowing students to complete make-ups during the week of May 7-11? We have worked on our schedule for several weeks - to make it an optimal as possible while working around other commitments such as: NYS 4th & 8th grade Science, Scott Foresman Staff Development, Elementary Annual Reviews, and MS classes that are assigned to the computer lab as a special on a daily basis. While scheduling around these constraints, we still have a few groups testing right up until May 3rd & 4th. If students are absent in any of the classes that are testing during those last few days, will they be able to access their tests after 5/4? Francine Grannell, Reading Specialist Huntington K-8

To prevent copying

When I observed at Ed Smith yesterday for a sample test I saw that students were comparing answers on the final page. Obviously this would not blatently happen when the actual test was occuring - but Levy is doing a great idea to avoid copying. If students 1,2 and 3 are lined up next to each other in a lab, then student 1 takes the ELA test, student 2 takes the math test and student 3 takes the ELA, etc. This way a student is not taking the same test as the student next to him/her. Also, they are both about the same amount of time. Just an idea. Laurie Holtsbery IST for Technology in ELA I'd like to clarify Laurie's comments about kids taking the Acuity test at Ed Smith. What she observed were students taking the practice tests. Most of the students taking the test had never used laptop computers before. Our computer lab doesn't have enough computers to accomodate a class in grades 4, 5, or 6, so all those classes will need to learn how to use a laptop and will take their Acuity tests using the laptops. We used the practice tests to help get student used to the laptops and encouraged students to support each other as they learned how the laptops worked and how Acuity was set up. Don't worry: during the actual Acuity tests, we will observe strict test taking procedures, as we always do. Lois Eddy Ed Smith School 4/4/07 I am sorry, I should have mentioned that it was a practice test, it was not the actual test and was not an actual testing situation- my point was just that it could happen anywhere and it was a concern that came up at a couple trainings. I knew that this would never happen during the actual test. Good luck everyone and have a nice break. Laurie Holtsbery IST for Technology in ELA

ESL

From Janet Gillmeister Good question. I would say yes, but only for those ESL students who would normally use a translator (or take a test in a foreign language) on the state test. If students were exempt for this round of ELA state tests, remember that they will have to take the state test next year (for which this is beginning baseline data).Other thoughts? Sent: Tue 4/3/2007 2:00 PM To: Gillmeister, Janet A. Subject: ESL Since our ESL students won't have translators for Acuity tests, can they listen to the math tests as a student with "Test Read" modification would? This would allow us to assess their math skills, not their reading skills. Danielle Petersen Reading SpecialistFrazer School

Special Ed Students

Hello Everyone! I am having a hard time finding our special ed students in acuity. I searched every one of them and it says they are not found. I also tried to log in as a few and it says they are not set up. When I try to add them as a new student it says it is a duplicate student. There are 5 groups of students with this problem. Any ideas? Jennifer Harris Shea We have three self-contained sped classrooms. Should I just enter each class once as ELA or Math? Or enter each class twice? Molly Hartnett Library Media Specialist Clary MST Middle School

Shortcut to Acuity on MAC

Heather Buck is working on the image for the new Macs. She is going to experiment with putting an Acuity icon on the dock. This will only affect new macs but it will give us an idea of what can be done. Patricia Vilello, School library System From: Stephen Bittner Sent: Mon 4/2/2007 3:13 PM In icon could be added to the dock or a bookmark could be added on the bookmark bar on the browser. This might be better since it would not clutter up the desktop. Stephen F. Bittner Educational Technology Specialist Syracuse Teacher Center On Apr 2, 2007, at 2:44 PM, Lefever, Laurie A. wrote: Could an icon be added to the dock on the imacs/emacs so that it was even easier to get to Acuity? My VP is curious. Thanks. Laurie LeFever, LMS Frazer School Library

K-8 teacher assignment change

Has anyone had to change a teacher assignment within a K-8 building from Elem to Middle or Middle to Elem? I am having trouble changing some of our Spec Ed teachers to the appropriate level so I can add them on as an additional teacher to the classes they service. When I select the teacher name and try to edit it will not let me change what "school" they are assigned to (in this case she is assigned to Huntington Elem. but should be assigned to Huntington MS.) I would appreciate any help with this! Thank you, Francine Grannell Reading Specialist Huntington K-8 ******To change the building assignment of a teacher you will have to let either Kelly Malone or me know which teachers they are - only District Admin can change from school to school. Janet Gillmeister

Alternative assessment students

Sorry I thought I sent a message about this this morning -- nyssaa are spec. ed. students who get an alternative assessment, which is a very small part of our student body. Jean Van Doren From: Wonders, Aran B. Sent: Fri 3/30/2007 3:24 PM Subject: RE: NYSAA students in Acuity What are NYSAA students? Aran Wonders Library Media Specialist Danforth Middle School ________________________________ From: Gillmeister, Janet A. Sent: Thu 3/29/2007 11:25 AM Subject: NYSAA students in Acuity A clarification regarding NYSAA students: Unless you really want to, do not set up or test NYSAA students in Acuity. We certainly do not want to cause undue stress. We would like to thank all of you for the feedback you have been giving regarding the Acuity class lists. As a result, we have been digging deeper into the relationship between the Pentamation and Acuity systems in order to make the uploads more accurate next year. As we better understand Acuity, we can make sure that we accurately input information into the correct spot in Pentamation, and that correct information is extracted. Janet A Gillmeister Director of Evaluation, Assessment, and Planning

Reading Levels

Just a thought - It is most likely the same level that the State Assessments are on because the two assessments are both created by McGraw-Hill. This is an assumption - but the two are expected to mirror each other. Laurie Holtsbery IST for Technology in ELA -----Original Message----- From: Vandoren, Jean M. Sent: Fri 3/30/2007 2:22 PM Subject: reading levels on acuity as compared to lexile I have been given the task of finding out how the reading levels that are assigned by acuity compare to lexile scores (i.e., a conversion chart). I am surpised by this, because i was not aware that acuity had a report that correlated to reading levels. I have researched their web site, called their customer service and i have not found any information that would help me to ascertain if a reading level is assigned and if it is, what scale it uses. Any help, guidance etc. would be greatly appreciated. thanks,

Password problems

Wed 4/4/2007 4:26 PM To: soliver@scsd.usSubject: Acuity - Forgot Password Issue - 163795jld I finally heard back from the developers regarding the issue where the “Forgot Password” link was not working. It appears that this is a firewall issue at the school level (for now). The link requires that Port 25 be opened in order for the site to submit your request, in Syracuse’s case the port is not opened so the request is not leaving the Acuity appliance. The quick fix is to ask your tech to open Port 25; however the engineers plan to move the information off the actual appliance (stored at each district) and onto the host server. By doing this all Acuity teachers will be able to retrieve their passwords; not just districts who have Port 25 open. The scheduled date for the change is not until August though. So if you (and the other teachers) want the feature to work; Port 25 must be opened. Please include the following alpha-numeric record # in all responses regarding this issue: 163795Any new inquires should be directed to: acuityforschool@mcgraw-hill.com Thank you, Jennifer Detty Software Support AnalystSEG Software Support 4/4/07 I spoke with the woman at Acuity again yesterday. I can now login with the password she reset. She indicated that the problem with the forgot password link may be that the email is trapped by a spam blocker, but I don't buy that since all my other spam ends up in my Junk email folder. She asked me to click the link again and let her know what time I did it, so that they could have the programmers look at it. I did that yesterday but I have not heard back from her. Sharon Oliver This is from Sharon Oliver - update about passwords. Thanks, Sharon, for contacting Acuity for all of us. Janet From: Oliver, Sharon M.Sent: Fri 3/30/2007 12:18 PM To: Gillmeister, Janet A. Subject: lost Acuity passwords Janet,I was unable to log into Acuity yesterday. I thought this was odd, since I use the same password for everything, but I clicked on the link to have the password sent to me. The screen showed the correct email address, but the email never came. I called Acuity and had the password reset, but I still couldn't login. I told the woman I spoke to that others in the district had also been unable to retrieve their passwords. She said she would send a message to the developer to alert them to the problem with password retrieval and to try and figure out why I can't get logged in, even with the password reset by them. She said she would get back to me ASAP.