Assessments of Reading, Writing and Mathematics, Primary and Junior Divisions
Primary and Junior Divisions: Preparing for the Assessment Administration
On direction from the Ministry of Education, the assessments are being made available to students who are learning in person.
If students who are learning remotely wish to participate in the assessments, the board may plan for students to participate in person.
The use of personal student devices must align with school and school board policies as well as with the technical requirements for the e-assessment system.
Primary and Junior Divisions: Reporting
Student results will be available by the end of September 2024. An Individual Student Report will be generated for each student, and provincial, school board and school results will be available on EQAO’s public website.
Grade 9 Assessment of Mathematics
Grade 9: Preparing for the Assessment Administration
On direction of the Ministry of Education, the assessment is being made available to students who are learning in person. Should students who are learning remotely wish to participate in the test, the board may plan for their participation in person.
The use of personal student devices must align with school and school board policies as well as with the technical requirements for the e-assessment system.
Grade 9: Reporting
Teachers will have access to reports shortly after the results have been submitted. Principals are required to validate student information before the reports are made accessible.
The literacy graduation requirement was restored beginning with students graduating in the 2022–2023 school year. Students graduating in 2022–2023 are required to meet the literacy graduation requirement. All students in Grades 10 and 11 and non-graduating students, including those who are learning remotely, must also work toward the literacy graduation requirement by participating in the OSSLT or completing the Ontario Secondary School Literacy Course (OSSLC).
To provide maximum flexibility for students to acquire the literacy graduation requirement, particularly for students enrolled in remote learning, students can be enrolled in the OSSLC without having attempted the OSSLT in 2022–2023. As of the 2022–2023 school year, the eligibility criteria for the adjudication process for the literacy graduation requirement will revert to the policy outlined in Ontario Schools: Kindergarten to Grade 12: Policy and Program Requirements, 2016 (pp. 65–66).
All students will have access to a Practice Test to familiarize themselves with the overall appearance and features of the online OSSLT. Support materials are available for all students once they log in to the online OSSLT. A set of accessibility tools, located in the student toolbar, is available for every student taking the OSSLT and includes the following tools:
- A help menu
- A text-to-speech function that reads the text on the screen out loud
- Zoom in and zoom out capabilities
- A line reader that helps students focus on one line of text at a time
- A high-contrast view
- Annotation tools (highlighter, line, eraser) and rough notes
All students will also have access to virtual breathing exercises, reminders of test-taking strategies and a minds-on activity to help them as they launch into the modernized OSSLT. School administrators and teachers can create a plan for any students who require the following:
- Additional time
- A quiet, individual and/or small group setting
- Preferential seating
- Prompts (for students who are off task)
Accommodations for each student with special education needs must be consistent with assessment accommodations on the student’s Individual Education Plan (IEP) and can include, but are not limited to, the following:
- Extended periodic supervised breaks
- Sign language or an oral interpreter
- A Unified English Braille version of the test with or without the audio version
- Additional assistive technology
- Verbatim scribing of answers
The e-assessment system has a built-in text-to-speech function. The following is a list of third-party software that are also supported by the e-assessment platform:
- Read&Write for Google Chrome
- Dragon NaturallySpeaking
- Kurzweil 3000
- NVDA Screen Reader
Provisions for English-language learners can include the following:
- Extended periodic supervised breaks
The following alternative formats of the test have been created for students with special education needs, including students with a visual impairment:
- A Unified English Braille version of the test (contracted or uncontracted)
- MP3s with audio descriptions
- An alternative version of the test in the e-assessment system with audio descriptions
Results will be released after the open-response questions have been scored. An Individual Student Report will be generated for students after the scoring of the test.
Please note that with the release of the new Ontario language curriculum, the OSSLT practice test is in the process of being updated. The new practice test will be released in early fall 2023.
The OSSLT Practice Test is available on the EQAO website. EQAO will be hosting a series of live webcasts for teachers, administrators, literacy leads and board IT staff to register.
The EQAO Outreach team will also offer additional support to boards and schools. Please contact EQAO for additional information.
The OSSLT is a computer-based assessment that comprises two sessions (Session A and Session B) containing a total of 33 questions: 31 multiple-select questions (e.g., multiple-choice, drag and drop, drop-down menu, checklist, text selection) and two constructed open-response questions.
Each session is designed to be completed in 60 minutes, and students will complete each session in one sitting. Additional time can be provided for any students who require it. The sessions can be completed one after the other, either back to back with a break in between, or on two different dates and times.
At the end of the two assessment sessions, students will be presented with a questionnaire that asks them about their experiences, attitudes and perceptions with respect to literacy.
The two sessions are presented to students in six groupings of the following types of questions:
- Real-Life Narrative (RLN): a reading selection and seven multiple-select reading questions.
- Information Paragraph (IP): a reading selection and six multiple-select reading questions.
- News Report (NR): a reading selection, one written response and five multiple-select reading questions.
- Dialogue (DI): a reading selection and five multiple-select reading questions.
- Writing Multiple-Select (WMS): eight multiple-select writing questions.
- Opinion Essay (OP): one written response composed of a series of paragraphs supporting an opinion.
OSSLT: Reporting
Scoring Activities
- Scoring Window: a specific period (with predefined start and end dates) during which the e-assessment scoring system is available for training and scoring.
- Item: a question or task that appears on an assessment or test.
- Response: a student’s response to an item on an assessment or test.
- Training Module: material for the training session, which includes an introductory video, a scoring guide, training responses, a practice test and a qualifying test.
- Practice Test: a test that scorers complete as part of the training module, used to prepare scorers for the qualifying test.
- Qualifying Test: a test used to assess a scorer’s ability to score student responses accurately.
- Batch: a predefined number of student responses to a test question. (Each batch is expected to take an average of one hour to score.)
- Partial Batch: a batch that is partially scored, or a batch with a partial number of responses to be scored, which was automatically assigned by the system.
- Rolling Batch: a set number of scored batches used to calculate the scorer’s average validity on those batches. (This average is used to compare against the minimum validity threshold.)
- Expert Scorer: an experienced scorer with high validity.
- Validity: the measure of a scorer’s accuracy assessed by examining the agreement between the scores assigned by the scorer and those assigned by expert scorers. The following indices are computed: percentage of exact agreement, percentage of exact-plus-adjacent agreement, percentage of adjacent-low agreement and percentage of adjacent-high agreement.
- Adjacent: a difference of one score code between the score assigned to a certain response by the scorer and that assigned by the expert scorers.
- Adjacent-low: the score assigned to a certain response by a scorer is one score code below the score assigned by the expert scorers.
- Adjacent-high: the score assigned to a certain response by a scorer is one score code above the score given by the expert scorers.
- Non-adjacent: the difference between the score assigned to a certain response by a scorer and that assigned by the expert scorers is greater than one score code.
- Exact Agreement: the score assigned to a certain response by the scorer and the expert scorers is the same.
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- Cumulative Exact Validity Percentage: the total percentage of validity responses scored that match the score preassigned.
- Cumulative Exact + Adjacent Validity Percentage: the percentage of validity responses scored that are either a match with the score given by the expert scorers or are one score code different (higher or lower).
- Validity Response: a response that matches the anchors in the corresponding scoring guide.
- Average Rolling Validity: the average validity achieved on a rolling batch. Average rolling validity is calculated and made available only when the pre-determined number of validity items are scored. (This average is used for comparison against the minimum validity threshold, which is required for scorers to be able to score).
- Minimum Validity Threshold: the minimum average rolling validity required to continue to score without retraining.
- Cumulative Validity Incentive Threshold: the minimum cumulative exact and cumulative exact + adjacent validity percentage required to receive incentive pay.
Training and scoring will be self-directed through the e-assessment scoring system, which will be available 24 hours a day, seven days a week, except statutory holidays, during the scoring window. This means that if scorers meet the technical requirements and qualifications, they can score on their own time and from any location. All the resources required for training and scoring will be available in the e-assessment scoring system.
Once scorers have completed their training and have passed the qualifying test on the e-assessment scoring system, they will be able to select batches, which they will have 24 hours to complete. A batch takes one hour on average to score.
Scorers are not to select any batches unless they are able to score them in the 24-hour period. If a scorer completes the selected batches before the 24-hour period expires, the scorer can select one or more additional batches, for which a new 24 hours is allotted for completion.
Online scoring is self-directed. Scorers do not need to score daily as long as they score a minimum of 10 batches per week during the entire scoring window and meet the minimum validity threshold. These requirements are outlined in the Confidentiality, Non-Disclosure and Employment Agreement for an EQAO Scorer (Online) or Committee Member (Online).
If a scorer falls below the minimum validity threshold, the scorer will have the opportunity to retrain and pass another qualifying test. If successful, the scorer will be able to continue scoring. Otherwise, the scorer will be withdrawn from their current scoring assignment.
Scorers can score as many batches as are available but should not exceed 48 hours in a work week (Sunday to Saturday).
Unfortunately, the task you have been offered cannot be changed.
Do not accept an invitation to score until you can commit to the scoring opportunity.
You need to update your proof of enrolment in each year of your program. Once you receive your Ontario College of Teachers (OCT) certificate and your information is on the OCT website, you will need to update your current educator role and enter the OCT number in your EQAO profile. Ensure that the first name and last name in your EQAO profile matches those on the OCT website.
Your EQAO profile may not be up to date, or your qualifications and experience may not have met the requirements of the scoring position—or, simply, there may not be any more scoring opportunities available at the moment.
A partially scored batch or a fully scored batch with a partial number of responses to be scored is pro-rated according to the percentage completed. For example, if you score a batch that contains only half the number of responses that are in a full batch, you will see 0.5 on your report.
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