Teachers’ perspectives on the Kindergarten Readiness Assessment in year 2: Easier to administer but what role can it play in instruction?

In this white paper, we present the results of a survey completed by teachers from across Ohio concerning their perceptions of Ohio’s Kindergarten Readiness Assessment (KRA). We examined teachers’ perceptions during year 2 of KRA implementation and compared those results to findings from a similar survey completed in year 1 of the assessment implementation. Over 3,000 Ohio public school kindergarten teachers were invited to complete the survey; of which 841 responded. In year 2, teachers reported that administering the KRA was easier, compared to year 1. However, they expressed concerns that the assessment took too long to administer, distracted from creating a classroom community, and decreased instructional time. Similar to findings from year 1, teachers reported that the assessment was not useful for guiding instruction or otherwise benefiting students; yet, teachers did report an increase in using the KRA to identify students at risk for later academic problems. In contrast to year 1, teachers seemed to better understand the purposes of the assessment although there were still some remaining misconceptions. Overall, despite some changes in perceptions, teachers continued to express concerns with the KRA’s implementation and remained unclear as to its role in improving instruction or outcomes for students