KESA Kindergarten Essential Skills Assessment

Measures Critical Skills that Predict End-of-Year Kindergarten Success

• School Readiness
• At-Risk Identification
• Ages 4 to 5
• Individual Administration
• Norm-Referenced

The KESA supports early identification and intervention for children who are at risk for kindergarten retention and special education referral. It can help providers determine the need for additional classroom support and/or further evaluation. The KESA works well as a global screener and can provide the teacher with a snapshot of the range of skills and challenges in a class, or specifically for children who are at known risk or present with early struggles and may need special education referral.

The KESA can be used in the last year of preschool and also at the start of kindergarten. It covers the major factors that have been identified as predictive of school success:

• Motor skills
• Ability to comprehend and follow oral directions
• Visual memory and visual attention
• Academic skills
• Phonemic awareness
• Vocabulary
• Behavioral regulation

The KESA fulfills the following purposes:

• Provides objective data on a child’s kindergarten readiness and risk for poor kindergarten achievement
• Assesses skills in all five student readiness domains identified by the National School Readiness Indicators Initiative
• Complements curriculum-based and observational measures
• Can be used as an RTI Tier 1 universal screener
• Can assist schools in making kindergarten entry decisions for underage children

Data was collected from a nationally representative sample of 486 children ages 4-0 through 5-11 years. Results of reliability and validity studies are provided in the Manual, including predictive validity to end-of-school-year-outcomes.

Administration and Scoring
The KESA takes 25 30 minutes to administer. Scoring can be completed in only 5 10 minutes. The raw score is quickly converted to one overall standard score and percentile rank.

Test kits include: Manual, 25 Record Forms, 25 Examinee Workbooks, Test Plates, Timer, Transparency, 8 Building Blocks, 1" Masking Tape, 8-Crayon Box, all in a sturdy messenger bag.

User Qualifications:

To administer this test at least a master’s degree is required, with state licensure OR certification from a professional organization (ASHA, AOTA, APA, AERA, ACA, AMA, NASP, NAN, INS) that requires formal training and experience in ethics, psychometrics, statistics, and scoring and interpretation. Tests of perceptual, academic, and functional processes used in schools, clinics and rehabilitation settings are of this level. “All test users, regardless of level and profession, are expected to abide by the standards set forth by the APA, AERA and NCME regarding the ethical use, protection and dissemination of all test materials. All orders for the products listed below, must be placed on official institutional purchase order forms or professional letterhead.