Do I understand MAP test scores correctly?

[Anonymous]

So I guess my question is about the RIT (Rasch unit) score/scale - the results make a note of saying the RIT scores are on a range from 100 to 350, but is that adjusted for grade level or is that an absolute scale across grade levels?

I understand the achievement and growth percentiles are relative to peers at the same grade level, but if, for example, a second grader and a fourth grader have the same numerical RIT score, does it indicate the two kids can perform at about the same level in the subject and potentially one is behind and one is ahead relative to their peers?

Hopefully my question is clear.

[Anonymous]

It's an absolute scale for the grades that they are testing. In MCPS, the one my kid takes is for grades 3-5, but I think 2nd graders in some districts take it. In any case, when a kid moves from 5th to 6th grade and takes a new MAP, the scores typically go down.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It's an absolute scale for the grades that they are testing. In MCPS, the one my kid takes is for grades 3-5, but I think 2nd graders in some districts take it. In any case, when a kid moves from 5th to 6th grade and takes a new MAP, the scores typically go down.

This was not my kids' experience between fifth and sixth. It looks like the same scale.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's an absolute scale for the grades that they are testing. In MCPS, the one my kid takes is for grades 3-5, but I think 2nd graders in some districts take it. In any case, when a kid moves from 5th to 6th grade and takes a new MAP, the scores typically go down.

This was not my kids' experience between fifth and sixth. It looks like the same scale.

It looks like the same scale, but it's not. It's a different test for K-2, 3-5, and 6-8, and many kids hit the top of the scale in 2nd and 5th and then go down for the subsequent test.

[Anonymous]

Sorry to add another question to this thread but this is the first year my son is taking MAP. Are the achievement grades relative to ALL of the students, nationwide, who took that grade-level test or only the students at that grade-level in his school district?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Sorry to add another question to this thread but this is the first year my son is taking MAP. Are the achievement grades relative to ALL of the students, nationwide, who took that grade-level test or only the students at that grade-level in his school district?

Nationwide

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's an absolute scale for the grades that they are testing. In MCPS, the one my kid takes is for grades 3-5, but I think 2nd graders in some districts take it. In any case, when a kid moves from 5th to 6th grade and takes a new MAP, the scores typically go down.

This was not my kids' experience between fifth and sixth. It looks like the same scale.

It looks like the same scale, but it's not. It's a different test for K-2, 3-5, and 6-8, and many kids hit the top of the scale in 2nd and 5th and then go down for the subsequent test.

You are correct except it’s not 6-8. The test is called MAP 6+ and covers topics through 12th grade math.

The test finds the score where the answers are about 50/50% correct/wrong. For a strong 5th grader there may not be enough questions to get to that ratio on MAP 3-5, so the score may be artificially high. I’ve seen proud posters that their child scored in ~290 in the 5th grade, which would be 99th percentile for 12th graders so go figure.

Also the equivalence between tests is on average on a national norm, it doesn’t tell you how accurate the correspondence is at distribution ends, likely not very good.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Sorry to add another question to this thread but this is the first year my son is taking MAP. Are the achievement grades relative to ALL of the students, nationwide, who took that grade-level test or only the students at that grade-level in his school district?

Your school or district can ask for national, regional, state, county, city, school and classroom, and by private schools or public.

Some are too secretive to post anything beyond "national." And as we know half the country and K-12 population is illiterate so that's not saying much.

National percentile and school percentile by grade, is most informative to the school and parents. And once the school has the test scores they can easily put percentiles on it - just list out all the grade 5 scores in order of raw score and put deciles on it. presto - useful information on how your school and grade is!