Standards-based reporting: clear communication about each child's learning


1. What are the Illinois Learning Standards (ILS)?
The Illinois Learning Standards (ILS) define what all students in Illinois public schools should know and be able to do in the seven core areas as a result of their elementary and secondary schooling.

The Illinois Learning Standards have not changed since their adoption in 1997.  The ILS contains 30 goals, 98 standards and 1000 benchmarks.  More than 270 Illinois educators, business people, and community members developed the ILS with input from more than 30,000 citizens.

2. What are the components of the ILS?
The standards are divided into seven core areas:  English Language Arts, Mathematics, Science, Social Science, Physical Development & Health, Fine Arts, and Foreign Language.  Each core area included the following information.

• An introduction providing an overview of the learning area that is captured in the standard.
• Five lifelong learning skills that are common to all core areas; these are: Solving Problems, Communicating, Using Technology, Working on Teams and Making Connections.
• Charts of Goals, Standards and Benchmarks that define the essential knowledge and skills for the learning area.
  
  

3. What are Goals?
Subjects are organized into goals, which are are broad statements of knowledge and/or skills.  Each goal includes an explanation of why it is important and how it relates to life beyond school.

4. What are Learning Standards?
Learning standards are specific statements of knowledge and/or skills within a goal.  Taken together, the standards clearly define the learning needed to reach that goal.  They represent the results of schooling and thus may be considered exit standards.

5. What are Learning Benchmarks?
Learning Benchmarks form the basis for measuring students’ achievement over time.  In general, benchmarks for the early grades represent basic skills.  Later benchmarks build in complexity and rigor from one level to the next, culminating in deep understandings demonstrated through complex performance.

The grade-level clusters for learning benchmarks are early elementary school, late elementary school, middle/junior high school, early high school, and late high school.  Specific grade levels are not used to allow schools and districts flexibility in how they structure their education programs.  The focus is on results, not on how the results are achieved.

6. What are the Illinois Performance Descriptors?
The Performance Descriptors were developed by Illinois teachers for Illinois teachers to enhance the ILS and to serve as resources to help teachers determine local performance expectations at each grade level.  The Performance Descriptors were field tested by 400 teachers statewide.

Teachers use the Performance Descriptors to supplement the ILS. The descriptors provide detail and examples so that teachers and districts can establish appropriate grade-level performance expectations for students.  Whereas the ILS benchmarks filled in detail on each of the standards at the grade-level clusters, the descriptors provide additional detail at each grade level and indicate how students demonstrate mastery of progressively more difficult content and cognitive skills over ten incremental stages of development.

7. What is the Illinois Assessment Framework?
The Illinois Assessment Framework (IAF) is designed to assist educators, test developers, policy makers, and the public by clearly defining those elements of the ILS that are suitable for state testing.  The IAF forms the basis for the enhanced tests required by state and federal law which began in the 2005-2006 school year.

The Illinois Assessment Framework provides:

• Clarity regarding the knowledge and skills that are measurable on the ISAT
• Focus on core content without excessive narrowing of curriculum
• Thorough coverage of each subject domain as it will be tested, as opposed to just providing sample benchmarks

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