Simple Back to School Assessments for Kindergarten and 1st Grade

Back to School Assessments for Kindergarten and 1st Grade

Hey, y'all. The beginning of the school year is fast approaching, but have no fear! The Tahoe Teacher is here! Just kidding. 

Anyway, at the beginning of the school year, I always like to assess my students to see where there are and what we need to work on. The assessments don't need to be anything fancy. They just need to do the job. So, I created these assessments made simple in order to ease some of the back to school stress we are all under. 

These pages are designed with k/1 in mind, but could be used with 2nd grade as well. There are four different options for assessing students on their letter writing. Two are more for handwriting skills and two are to see if they know the order of the letters. For kindergarten, I might give my students one page on the first day and a different page on another day, just to see if they can put them in order on their own and if they can trace them. 

I also like to see if my students can put words together. I would definitely use both of these with first graders and I might use the CVC page with kindergarteners who are saying the letter writing pages are too easy. Flexibility is key at the beginning of the year!

In math, I want to know who can write their numbers. I start with numbers 1-20 for kindergarten, and by the beginning of 1st grade, I assess students on their ability to write the numbers to 100. Again, there are a few handwriting style pages and a couple of blank pages for filling in an entire 100's chart. 

I also need to know about everyone's number sense abilities so I have students fill in the counting page while we go over how to hold a pencil and how to use crayons gently so they don't break them in half! In first grade, I want to know who can put together a simple number sentence and who is still working on these skills. It seems so simple, but it can really tell you a lot about your students. 

The first week, I also want to get a writing sample, find out more about my students, see who can follow simple directions, and who can track letters and write. We do a simple write the room activity while going over expectations for moving around the room. We fill in All About Me pages to learn more about each other's likes and families, and to see who can follow directions. And we answer a writing prompt (not shown) to assess students on writing conventions. 

Only the first week of school and, with these simple pages, we already know so much about our students! You can check out the full resource in my Teachers Pay Teachers store here.  

I hope you found some things to make your first week back at school a little easier. I'm always adding new resources so check back often to see what's up. You can even follow my store for daily notifications of new resources. Have a wonderful week and I'll talk to you soon. 

Stay cozy,