Stanford Achievement Test Series, Ninth Edition – Complete Battery

The Stanford Achievement Test Series is the standard of excellence for careful and accurate assessment. Millions of administrators and teachers have relied on the Stanford series. You can count on this widely used test to provide the content, information, technical qualities, and options you need for a strong testing program. Instructionally friendly materials help to inform parents, guide classroom planning, and interpret results.

Dedicated to Fairness

• Clear, simple directions assist teachers in administration.
• Students get complete directions at the beginning of each sitting to avoid starts and stops that interrupt concentration.
• Page layout is designed to aid students in following easily from question to question.
• With the easy-hard-easy format, difficult questions are surrounded by easy questions to encourage students to complete the test.
• All items are grade-level appropriate.
• All possible precautions have been taken to avoid bias—statistical analyses as well as review by a panel of prominent minority-group educators.

2000 Norms

Year 2000 norms for Stanford 9 were developed from a norm group sample from more than 10 million students who were administered Stanford 9 . The sample statistically represents the current U.S. student population as described by Census data.

Enhanced Multiple-Choice

Enhanced multiple-choice items in Stanford 9 have the following characteristics:

• They are framed within classroom or real-life situations.
• Many of them measure strategies or processes.
• They integrate process with knowledge .

Open-Ended Testing

The open-ended subtests address instructional objectives that are best measured with performance-based tasks and student constructed responses. Use the open-ended component separately or as a supplement to the multiple-choice battery.

Stanford 9 Assessment Features

• Multiple-choice and open-ended assessment
• A variety of battery configurations
• Innovative multiple-choice questions
• Emphasis on thinking skills
• Current norms
• Performance Standards
• Reading selections commissioned from published authors
• Lexile™ measures to target students with appropriate reading material
• Emphasis on the NCTM Standards
• Listening assessed realistically
• Separate Writing test—paper-and-pencil format or online
• Emphasis on process skills in Science and Social Science
• Combination testing with the Otis-Lennon School Ability Test, Seventh Edition
• Customization options, including adding local items
• Wide selection of score report packages
• Graphic display of results on score reports

Multiple-Choice batteries available through this catalog:

Complete Battery , Form S

• Reading Study Skills
• Mathematics Listening
• Language Science
• Spelling Social Science

Complete Battery, Form SA

• Reading Listening
• Mathematics Science
• Language Social Science
• Complete Battery, Form SA, includes an alternate, integrated Language subtest and does not have separate Spelling and Study Skills subtests .

Abbreviated Battery , Form S

• Reading
• Mathematics
• Language

Stanford 9 Domains
Multiple-Choice

• Reading
• Mathematics
• Language
• Spelling
• Study Skills
• Listening
• Science
• Social Science

Open-Ended

• Reading
• Mathematics
• Science
• Social Science
• Language (Stanford Writing Assessment Program, Third Edition; Stanford Writing Online)

The open-ended assessments for Reading , Mathematics, Science, and Social-Science, available at grades 1-13, consist of nine questions that can be administered in a single class period. The writing assessment, available at grades 3-13, can also be given in one class period.

Reading

• Includes reading passages written for Stanford 9by well-known authors of children’s and young people’s literature
• Includes illustrations drawn for Stanford 9by published illustrators of children’s books
• Provides both multiple-choice and open-ended assessment
• Aligns with NAEP
• Reports process scores
• Provides Lexile measures
• Assesses reading strategies

Three types of reading selections are used:

• Recreational: Material read for enjoyment or literary merit, including folk tales, historical fiction, contemporary fiction, humor, and poetry.
• Textual: Expository material with content from the natural, physical, and social sciences, as well as other nonfiction general information materials.
• Functional: Material encountered in everyday life both inside and outside of school, including directions, forms, labels, schedules, and advertisements.

Reading Items
The Reading Comprehension subtest contains a variety of item types that assess important reading processes:

• Initial Understanding questions measure students’ understanding of directly stated details or relationships.
• Interpretation questions measure students’ comprehension of implicit information and relationships and their ability to make connections beyond the text.
• Critical Analysis questions assess students’ abilities to analyze and evaluate explicit and implicit information and relationships.
• Reading Strategy questions assess the ability to determine or describe strategies used by the writer or appropriate reader strategies.  

Lexile Measures

A student’s Stanford 9 Reading Comprehension subtest score can be reported as a Lexile measure. The Lexile Framework ® is a tool to use when looking at the reader’s ability in relation to the difficulty of the text. The Student Reading Pathfinder Report provides a student’s Lexile measure and a list of literature titles that match the student’s reading ability.

Open-Ended Reading
Each form of the open-ended reading assessment consists of a narrative reading selection followed by nine questions.

Mathematics

• Provides both multiple-choice and open-ended assessment
• Has two subtests—Mathematics: Problem Solving and Mathematics: Procedures
• Combines concepts and applications into a single subtest to reflect NCTM recommendations
• Includes optional calculator use for the Mathematics: Problem Solving subtest
• Includes computation in meaningful context
• Emphasizes problem-solving skills
• Requires use of rulers for measurement tasks

The Stanford 9 Mathematics subtests were developed in alignment with the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics’ (NCTM) Curriculum and Evaluation Standards for School Mathematics .  

Open-Ended Mathematics
The open-ended Mathematics subtest includes theme-related questions that assess students’ abilities to communicate and reason mathematically and to apply problem-solving strategies.

Language

• Emphasizes development of effective written communication skills
• Combines Mechanics and Expression into one subtest
• Supports Prewriting, Composing, and Editing stages of the Writing Process Model
• Offers a choice of an alternate, integrated Language subtest

 The Language subtest measures proficiency in both mechanics and expression in one subtest, along with content and organization, and sentence structure. An alternate, integrated Language subtest is also available with Stanford 9 Form SA. It measures prewriting, composing, editing, and spelling in a holistic fashion that reflects the developmental nature of the writing process. When the alternate Language subtest is used, there are no separate Spelling and Study Skills subtests in the battery.

Writing
Offers paper-and-pencil or online assessment
The Stanford Writing Assessment Program, Third Edition, contains prompts in four modes— Descriptive, Narrative, Expository, and Persuasive — that elicit a rough-draft response from the student. Students’ responses are scored holistically on a six-point scale. Analytic scoring on a four-point scale is also available. The six analytic categories are:

• Ideas and Development
• Organization, Unity, and Coherence
• Word Choice
• Sentences and Paragraphs
• Grammar and Usage
• Mechanics

Assess Online
A computer-administered version of the writing assessment is now available in English and 15 world languages. Students complete the assessment online, and their responses are scored online as well.

Listening

• Encourages students to take notes
• Reflects real-life materials

The Listening subtest allows you to assess students’ listening comprehension with dictated selections and questions. Three types of selections reflect the kinds of real-life listening materials that students hear both in school and outside of the classroom. They also correspond to the types of selections used in the Reading Comprehension subtest.

• Recreational selections are stories and poems.
• Informational selections represent the kinds of instructional material and current events students might hear in science, history, geography, health, government, and other areas.
• Functional messages include step-by-step directions, advertisements, and announcements.

Students are encouraged to take notes as the listening selections are being read to them, and they may refer to their notes as they answer questions. As in Reading Comprehension, Listening assesses important processes:

• Initial Understanding
• Interpretation
• Critical Analysis/Strategies

Science

• Provides both open-ended and multiple-choice assessment
• Aligns closely with Science for All Americans, Benchmarks for Science Literacy, and the National Science Education Standards

 Each Science item supports high standards of student achievement in processing science information. Test items allow students to use reasoning skills to reach answers, rather than having to recall memorized, detailed facts and information. Students may be asked to apply an understanding of the concept directly to a situation. More often, they are expected to use what they know to apply information and data, interpret data, draw conclusions, and predict events.

The habits-of-mind skills outlined in Science for All Americans form the foundation of the reasoning skills students are asked to use throughout both the open-ended and multiple-choice subtests. These skills include estimating, making simple calculations, seeking patterns, making observations, recognizing cause and effect, reading standard instruments, and drawing conclusions.

Open-Ended Science
Open-ended items in Science are tied to one or two scenarios. The items are evenly distributed among the life, earth, and physical sciences.

Technical Information
Stanford 9 provides you with in-depth student information to help you make critical instructional decisions with confidence.

Norm-Referenced Information

Stanford 9 reports are available for multiple-choice and open-ended subtests separately as well as combined. Both the multiple-choice and open-ended subtests yield a full range of norm-referenced scores. In addition, content-referenced information is included with the open-ended assessments. Score reports display norm-referenced information at the battery, domain, test, and cluster levels.

Performance Standards
Stanford 9 performance standards were developed through the expert judgment of national panels of educators in each content area. As an alternative, you can set your own standards to best describe your students’ performance. Performance standards are available for content domains, e.g., Reading and Mathematics, not for battery totals. Performance standards have also been established for the Stanford 9 writing assessment and the open ended assessments.

Objective-Referenced Information

Content Clusters
Stanford 9 sub skills may be reported as content clusters within a subtest or domain. Student performance on clusters is reported in terms of:

• Raw scores, number of items attempted, and number of items possible
• Below average, average, and above-average performance

Process Clusters
Sub skills may be reported as process clusters, which represent the thinking and reasoning skills in each content area.

Content-Referenced Information
Performance Indicators on the open-ended assessments provide information about students’ performance in terms of the test content that is assessed.

Achievement/Ability Information
Administer Stanford 9 with the Otis- Lennon School Ability Test ®, Seventh Edition (OLSAT®7, Form 3), and report Achievement/Ability Comparisons (AACs). OLSAT 7 was developed and standardized with Stanford 9 .

Thinking Skills
These questions address students’ ability to analyze and synthesize information; to evaluate it in order to determine cause and effect, fact and opinion, and the relevant versus the irrelevant; and to draw conclusions, make predictions, and hypothesize. Performance on these items for each content area can be reported on Individual Student reports.

Equating Stanford 9
Stanford 9 is equated to:

• Stanford Achievement Test Series,
• Eighth Edition (Stanford 8)
• Stanford Diagnostic Reading Test,
• Fourth Edition (SDRT 4)
• Stanford Diagnostic Mathematics Test,
• Fourth Edition (SDMT 4)

Creating Your Own Stanford 9

The ability to customize Stanford 9 is an important feature of this edition. Take advantage of the following options to obtain the achievement test you need.

Stanford Catalog

• Stanford 9 Complete and Abbreviated Batteries
• Stanford 9 open-ended assessment booklets

The most cost-effective versions of Stanford 9 are those that already exist as products offered in our catalog:
Complete and Abbreviated multiple-choice Batteries, and open-ended assessment booklets. These choices are available as standard options.

Stanford Select

• Combinations of intact subtests (full-length, abbreviated, or open-ended)
• Custom covers
• Custom Directions for Administering

The option to mix intact full-length, abbreviated, or open-ended subtests within a booklet and to customize booklet covers is the Stanford Select feature of Stanford 9. For instance, you may wish to change the order or selection of subtests within a test booklet. Or you may wish to create a test with the full-length versions of the Reading Vocabulary and Reading Comprehension subtests for a total reading score, then add the Listening subtest. Or you may construct a test booklet with abbreviated Science or Social Science, which are not available in the catalog Abbreviated Battery . You may choose to exclude the Spelling subtest. Your test booklets can be produced in the configuration you select. In addition, you may wish to include one or more open-ended subtests or OLSAT in that same booklet. Those subtests can be added in any order, either at the beginning or end of the booklet, or interspersed among the multiple-choice subtests.

Stanford SelectPlus

• Stanford Select with additional local items added
• Subtests with items added or deleted

You can further customize Stanford 9 with another level of customization known as Stanford SelectPlus . Here all the options included in Stanford Select are supplemented with your ability to add or delete specific items. You can add local items, delete designated items from Stanford 9 subtests, or both. Stanford SelectPlus lets you make Stanford 9 representative of local curricula, while retaining access to national norm-referenced scores through a core of items that meet specific statistical and content criteria. As with Stanford Select , the Stanford SelectPlus Directions for Administering will be customized to match the configuration of the test booklets. Custom answer documents are available for Stanford Catalog , Stanford Select , and Stanford SelectPlus test booklets. Please allow eight weeks for creation of custom test materials.