Is the pre-assessment available as a PDF?

While we want the CommonLit pre-assessment to reach as many students as possible during distance learning, for test validity and security purposes, we unfortunately cannot generate or offer a PDF of any of our pre-assessment materials this year. For the same reason, we do not offer answer keys for pre-assessments.

It is possible to use existing CommonLit resources to develop your own version of a pre-assessment PDF for students who do not have reliable internet access. We recommend choosing three texts from the free CommonLit library and saving their PDFs to combine and create your own pre-assessment. Since you will not be using the online data tracking tools, this will give a very similar experience to a PDF of the pre-assessment. This is the same non-technical solution recommended for teachers who wanted a pre-assessment during the time of year when it was not being offered, and it seemed to work well!

To choose your texts, search in the library for 3 grade-level texts of similar (short) lengths and Lexile levels. We recommend a mix of non-fiction and literary passages. Informational texts and short stories work best (we do not recommend drama, speeches, documents, or poems). When sharing PDFs with students, you can tell them to skip the short answer questions, as the pre-assessment does not use short answer questions.

If you need further advice for what texts to choose, email help@commonlit.org with the grade levels you are testing for assistance brainstorming choices.

Note: If your district has chosen to purchase CommonLit’s Interim Assessments, you will not have access to the Pre-Assessment feature on CommonLit.org. Instead, you’ll be able to collect baseline data through the first interim assessment that your district administers.