Curriculum Update: Summative Assessments

November 27, 2023

Megan Welk Sr. Manager of Curriculum and Content

Every student learns and demonstrates knowledge differently. As a result, it’s helpful to have assessment options as you work to gain insight into your classroom.

We’ve always been passionate about providing high quality curriculum materials, and we understand that there are many ways to measure computer science learning. Ellipsis curriculum already includes formative assessments, projects, discussions, and now – we’re launching optional summative assessments to round out this suite of materials!

Computer Science Courses Included

Now, every Ellipsis course has an optional summative assessment. The following courses are included in this launch:

Note – CS Foundations K-2 and HSCS Game Development already include summative assessments. You can find pre-assessments and post-assessments included as the first and last lessons in the course.

Exploring Computer Science Assessments

Here is the first page of a summative assessment from Computer Science Fundamentals 3. This PDF can be printed and passed out to students during class:

Then, when it comes time to grade, you can access computer science test questions and answers in the answer key:

We know grading can be a pain, but these two documents help it take just a little less time!

Where to Find Summative Assessments

When you log in to Ellipsis curriculum using the Curriculum Delivery Platform, you’ll land on the courses page.

Click on any course included in this launch.
On the right side of the screen, find “Summative Assessment Questions”. (Hint – it’s located right below the Course Description.)
There, you’ll find your computer science questions and answers PDF.

How to Use Summative Assessments

Summative assessments can serve multiple purposes throughout the course:

They can be used at the beginning of a course as a pre-assessment to gauge student’s prior knowledge of computer science.
They can be provided to students at the end of the course to measure student growth and acquired knowledge.
They can be provided as a computer science practice test as a study tool for students.

See for Yourself

Explore summative assessments in a free trial of Ellipsis Education curriculum. In this 30 day preview, you’ll see sample lessons from each grade-level differentiated course, syllabus, pacing guide, standards map, and more!

Free Trial

Curriculum Delivery Platform Launches Single Sign On Feature

September 14, 2023

Megan Welk Sr. Manager of Curriculum and Content

We’re thrilled to announce the launch of Single Sign-On (SSO) for The Curriculum Delivery Platform (CDP)!

With SSO, you can access our platform with an existing account. No need to remember another username and password! In this blog post, we’ll explain more about this update and how to get started.

Streamlined Access for Teachers

SSO revolutionizes the way teachers interact with the Curriculum Delivery Platform. Educators can now log in to our platform using their existing credentials from their Learning Management System (LMS) or other authentication provider. That means it’s even easier for teachers to access their computer science courses, leaving more time for what they do best – teaching.

Supported Providers

We understand that schools and districts use various different platforms. To ensure compatibility, we partnered with Edlink to integrate our education single sign-on feature with several popular providers. Our supported platforms include:

Blackboard
Brightspace by D2L
Canvas
ClassGather
Classlink single sign on for education
Clever single sign on for education
Google Classroom
HelloID
Microsoft Teams
Moodle
OneLogin
RapidIdentity
Schoology

We frequently add integrations, so if you don’t see your preferred platform, please contact us.

By partnering with Edlink, we also established a dedicated team focused on maintaining the highest standards of security and data integrity for education SSO and rostering platforms. Teachers can rest easy, knowing their data is safe.

Get Started with Single Sign-On for Schools

If you’re an existing Ellipsis Education customer, please have your administrator (or whomever is in charge of managing curriculum decisions at your school or district) email support@ellipsiseducation.com. Your email should include:

What identity provider will you use (Clever, Google Classroom, etc.)?
Who is the administrator for the account (name and email address)?

From there, our customer experience team will reach out to the administrator and guide them through the steps to turn on the new authentication method.

If you’re not a user of our curriculum, sign up for a demo on our website! Our account managers can walk you through the Curriculum Delivery Platform and answer any questions about the new SSO feature.

The introduction of SSO for schools marks a significant milestone in our commitment to removing barriers to teaching computer science. With SSO, it’s even easier for teachers to access and navigate their curriculum. We’re excited to offer this convenient feature, and as always, we look forward to supporting your computer science goals!

Author: Katie Baird