Request a Demo

Contact us

Help & support

international

Connect with us

What is progress monitoring, and why does it matter?

When students need additional supports in order to succeed, an intervention is provided to help build the specific skill causing students to struggle. But how can educators tell if that intervention is working?

Progress monitoring is the key. Progress monitoring evaluates progress toward a learning target, per the rates of improvement for the specific skill being targeted by an intervention.

With valid and reliable progress monitoring tools, educators can determine whether interventions are working and if they’re working quickly enough—and, therefore, whether to continue, fade, intensify, or change a student’s intervention. Using high-quality progress monitoring tools helps educators efficiently remove students from interventions when they are no longer needed, and prevents students from receiving ineffective interventions for prolonged or indefinite periods of time.

However, only certain assessments can be used as progress monitoring tools. The right progress monitoring tools must be sensitive to growth to show the effects of interventions over short periods. Renaissance’s progress monitoring tools are research-based, brief, and proven to be valid and reliable for the purpose of progress monitoring.

Learn more about our progress monitoring tools below, or reach out to talk to an expert.

Meet Renaissance’s progress monitoring tools

Our research-based progress monitoring tools bring clarity to intervention decisions, so educators can help all students who are receiving interventions to achieve catch-up growth.

Star Assessments

Star Reading (K–12) | Star Math (K–12) | Star Early Literacy (Pre-K–3) | Star CBM Reading (K–6) | Star CBM Lectura (K–6) | Star CBM Math (K–3) | Star Spanish (K–12)

Identify the skills students are ready to learn, drive instruction and practice, and measure student growth

Key Benefits

  • Progress monitoring (and screening) in both English and Spanish at no extra cost
  • Options for both curriculum-based measures (CBMs) for more frequent, 1:1 assessment of specific skills, and computer-adaptive tests (CATs) for time-efficient assessment of broader skills
  • Aligned to Renaissance’s learning progressions and integrated with Renaissance’s practice and instruction products
  • Research-based, brief, valid, and reliable
Learn more about Star Assessments

FastBridge

Reading, Math, and Social-Emotional Behavior (K–12)

Screening and progress monitoring across math, reading, and social-emotional behavior (SEB) in one platform with built-in intervention recommendations

Key Benefits

  • Progress monitoring (and screening) for both academics and SEB with just one subscription
  • Uses curriculum-based measures (CBMs) for more frequent, 1:1 assessment of specific skills
  • Integrated with Renaissance’s practice and instruction products to connect screening with targeted skill-building
  • Research-based, brief, valid, and reliable
Learn more about FastBridge
Teacher helps girl in elementary class with tablet computers

Ready to learn more about Renaissance’s progress monitoring tools?

Request a demo

Progress monitoring FAQs

Learn more about progress monitoring and why it’s essential to student success.

What are progress monitoring tools?

Progress monitoring tools are designed to be brief and sensitive to small changes in growth. This allows them to be used with students receiving supplemental intervention to identify when their instruction needs to be intensified and when they no longer need intervention. These assessment tools can be used for progress monitoring:

How are progress monitoring tools used?

Progress monitoring tools can be used for a variety of purposes within a multi-tiered system of support (MTSS). The three main reasons include:

  • Evaluating student learning outcomes of students who participate in supplemental (e.g., Tier 2 or Tier 3) interventions
  • Considering instructional change
  • Determining eligibility for other educational services

The most straightforward reason for using progress monitoring tools is to track student learning over time to show whether a student has made expected gains in relation to the instruction provided. For students whose current skills are below grade level, progress monitoring can document the gains needed to catch up to peers.

What are the benefits of progress monitoring tools?

Progress monitoring tools benefit students who are struggling in school by providing a feedback loop for instruction or intervention. Specifically, progress data shows, in real time, whether efforts to close a learning gap are working.

When supplemental intervention and progress monitoring are administered as soon as a gap is observed, students can make catch-up growth in one school year. In this regard, progress monitoring tools can help to prevent the need for more intensive supports like special education.

Should I use progress monitoring tools for all of my students?

It depends. If you are a general education classroom teacher, then you should not use progress monitoring tools for all students.

The regular assessments for all students participating in the Tier 1 core instruction include both universal screening and program-based measures (e.g., assessments administered in DnA). For most students, these assessments are sufficient to track their progress.

If you are an interventionist or special education teacher, then yes, all of your students probably need regular progress monitoring according to the intervention schedule or each student’s Individualized Education Program (IEP).

How can I examine data from progress monitoring tools alongside intervention data?

Educators learn more about students’ continued needs by using multiple kinds of data. When determining intervention effectiveness, it’s important to review both progress monitoring data and intervention data.

Progress monitoring data measures how the student is currently progressing. Intervention fidelity data shows whether the implementation was administered as prescribed, providing important context when reviewing the progress monitoring data.

eduCLIMBER allows educators to collect information about the intervention fidelity so they can best interpret progress monitoring data.

Get in touch with an expert

Still have questions about progress monitoring?

Phone (800) 338-4204
Support Contact support
Chat now Chat with us
See it in action Request a demo

Select your school

Searching for schools in ZIP code ---

Loading schools…

Don't see your school?