mCLASS® with DIBELS® 8th Edition for Alaska
mCLASS with DIBELS 8th Edition is the adopted literacy assessment for Alaska!
As a comprehensive screening, diagnostic assessment, and progress monitoring system, it rapidly measures student progress toward reading proficiency, and helps identify students who may be at risk of future reading difficulties, including dyslexia.
What is mCLASS?
mCLASS is a best-in-class assessment platform that houses a suite of proven, gold-standard assessment measures and tools that can be flexibly combined to meet the unique literacy needs of both teachers and students across grades K–6, including:
- Universal screening
- Diagnostic assessment
- Dyslexia screening
- Text Reading and Comprehension (a.k.a. running records via mCLASS: Reading 3D)
- Progress monitoring
- Dual language reporting
- Targeted teacher-led instruction
What is the DIBELS 8th Edition assessment?
Developed by the University of Oregon, the DIBELS 8th Edition is the latest version of the DIBELS® (Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills) assessment.
With this latest version, the University of Oregon Center on Teaching and Learning (UO CTL) made significant efforts to ensure measures would meet state-level screening requirements for universal screening, diagnostic assessment, and dyslexia screening. To support this, measures were updated based on the latest research to meet increased standards of reliability and validity. In addition, adaptive procedures and discontinue rules focus on the assessment of priority skills and prevent over-testing.
Summary of changes:
- Consistent measures within grades will provide improved growth measurement.
- All subtests have been revised to be grade-specific and to increase in difficulty, covering a full progression of skills and minimizing floor and ceiling effects. This provides the opportunity for students to demonstrate what they know and further pinpoint what they don’t know.
- Phoneme Segmentation Fluency replaces First Sound Fluency. The expanded coverage minimizes floor effect and provides information about difficulty in Phonemic Awareness skills without the additional First Sound Fluency measure.
- A new subtest, Word Reading Fluency, helps identify students with poor sight word reading skills that other subtests miss.
- For all measures, the basic scoring procedures remain the same. For Nonsense Word Fluency, credit is given for recording words as whole words even if the student misses in the first attempt.
- Oral Reading Fluency is now only one passage, instead of three. Retell has been removed. Thus, Oral Reading Fluency assessment will take a third of the time.
Assessment measures by grade
| DIBELS measures at each grade level | |||||
| Measure | Grade K | Grade 1 | Grade 2 | Grade 3 | Grades 4–6 |
| Letter naming fluency |  |
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| Phonemic segmentation fluency | |
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| Nonsense word fluency | |
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| Word reading fluency | |
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| Oral reading fluency | |
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| Maze (basic comprehension) | |
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| Amplify measures at each grade level | |||||
| Oral language | |
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| Vocabulary | |
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Assessment measures sample videos
DIBELS 8th Edition measure: Phonemic Segmentation Fluency (PSF)
DIBELS 8th Edition measure: Nonsense Word Fluency (NWF)
DIBELS 8th Edition measure: Letter Naming Fluency (LNF)
DIBELS 8th Edition measure: Word Reading Fluency (WRF)
DIBELS 8th Edition measure: Oral Reading Fluency (ORF)
What makes mCLASS with DIBELS 8th Edition different?
mCLASS with DIBELS 8th Edition combines the power of the mCLASS assessment platform and the effectiveness of the DIBELS 8th Edition assessment measures. As a result – educators are empowered with the latest and greatest assessment tool.
More than a test, mCLASS with DIBELS 8th Edition is an integrated system that closes the knowing-doing gap by helping teachers take immediate instructional action that’s right for each and every student.
Assessment systems must enable and compel educators to answer not just the “What” questions, but also the “So What” and “Now What” questions. These are the questions that are essential in transforming classroom instruction, and the questions that mCLASS with DIBELS 8th Edition helps teachers answer with confidence.
What makes mCLASS with DIBELS 8th Edition different?
- It gives teachers access to the latest digital version of the DIBELS assessment. Amplify is the only licensed provider of the digital DIBELS 8th Edition assessment. As such, our solution is the only one to enhance the DIBELS 8th Edition assessment with the power, reliability, and quickness of the mCLASS system.
- It makes it faster and easier to understand where every student is in their early literacy journey. By combining 1:1 observational diagnostic assessments, dyslexia screening, progress monitoring, instant scoring, rigorous reporting, automatic student grouping, and targeted instruction all in one place, it reduces the instructional delays associated with manual scoring, manual data analysis, and manual lesson planning.
- It makes every instructional minute count. In addition to one-minute measures that quickly gauge student progress toward reading proficiency, it leverages a teacher’s most powerful instructional tool — their own 1:1 observations.
- It drives growth more efficiently. Rather than relying on broad composite scores alone, granular data and in-depth insights for every student help teachers pinpoint exact skill gaps and areas of unfinished learning, making whole-group, small-group, and 1:1 instruction more targeted and effective.
- It saves teachers time. Instant reports, automatic student groups, and ready-to-teach lessons mean teachers spend less time cobbling together materials and more time working directly with students and responding to their needs.
How does mCLASS with DIBELS 8th Edition support screening for dyslexia risk?
DIBELS 8th Edition measures have been updated based on the latest research. They now offer stronger measures of processing speed, phonological awareness, and alphabetic principles for dyslexia screening purposes.
To support this, a new subtest in Word Reading Fluency was introduced and revisions were made to Letter Naming Fluency, Phonemic Segmentation Fluency, and Nonsense Fluency subtests to improve their ability to screen for deficits commonly associated with dyslexia risk, such as phonological awareness, rapid naming ability, and alphabetic principle. These measures provide early warning signs for neurological processing difficulties that contribute to risk for dyslexia (Wolf & Bowers, 1999; Denckla & Rudel, 1974).
Moreover, measures in Oral Language and Vocabulary are included to provide additional information to help evaluate additional risk areas associated with dyslexia risk.
How does mCLASS with DIBELS 8th Edition support the use of running records?
Track your students’ reading progress from every angle with the Text Reading and Comprehension (TRC) assessment. When TRC is paired with the DIBELS 8th Edition assessment, classroom teachers unlock the ability to record reading behaviors through running digital records. Available in English and Spanish, it measures reading comprehension and provides insight into how each student finds meaning in text.
Measures include:
- Lesson plans for whole class, small-group, and one-on-one instruction.
- Small-group advisor, which organizes students into groups based on strengths and gaps.
- Item-level advisor, which drills deep into student responses to uncover patterns, strengths, and gaps.
- Instructional resources for each student’s parent/guardian(s).
How does mCLASS with DIBELS 8th Edition turn data into instant action?
mCLASS with DIBELS 8th Edition gives you instant results and clear next steps for each student.
Quick and actionable reports provide detailed insight into students’ reading development across foundational literacy skills for teachers, specialists, administrators, and caregivers.
Diagnostic assessment
mCLASS with DIBELS 8th Edition analyzes individual student response data through a proprietary scoring algorithm that pinpoints a student’s specific area(s) of growth and improvement, providing classroom teachers in-depth insight into a students’ instructional needs.
Ready-to-teach instruction
Immediately following the analysis of individual student responses, mCLASS with DIBELS 8th Edition provides an in-depth diagnostic report complete with suggested next steps, also known as “mCLASS Instruction.”
mCLASS Instruction evaluates each student’s responses on each individual subtest and instantly:
- Provides a list of specific needs by student, such as struggling with medial vowel sounds or difficulty reading words with consonant blends.
- Groups students automatically based on similar discrete skill needs, not simply composite scores like other assessment tools.
- Recommends a variety of ready-to-teach lessons that specifically target each individual student’s areas of need or common areas of need for small-group instruction.
Classroom skill and benchmark summary
The Classroom Skill Summary report is a dashboard showing benchmark performance on each skill. Teachers can use it to determine which skill areas need instructional focus at a classroom level.
The Classroom Benchmark Summary report is a classroom-wide view of overall reading performance. Teachers can use this report to determine if composite scores improved, declined, or remained the same each semester.
Detailed benchmark performance
Teachers can see each student’s performance during the current school year, on each subtest as well as the overall composite. The benchmark goal displays below the subtest name when applicable. The ability to sort the columns in this report gives teachers more flexibility to analyze data the way they prefer.
Dyslexia screening
Identify students who are at risk for reading difficulties, including dyslexia, based on their results from foundational skills measures and additional measures as needed by local policies.
Progress monitoring summary
See which subtests have been assessed since the most recent benchmark assessment, how students performed on the three most recent progress monitoring assessments for each measure, and which students have not been progress monitored since the benchmark assessment.
Goal setting tool
The Zones of Growth (ZoG) analysis uses a rich set of national data to determine student goals for the next benchmark period. Teachers can use the Goal Setting Tool to view these recommended goals or modify the default goals for individual students as they see fit, if the default goal is too challenging or not challenging enough.
Growth outcomes
Teachers and interventionists can see each student’s actual growth achieved and how it compares to the goal that was set for the student.
Caregiver supports
The mCLASS Home Connect website houses literacy resources for parents and caregivers, including at-home lessons organized by skill. Our mCLASS parent/caregiver letters in English and Spanish ensure that families know how to best support their child.
Self-guided tour
Our self-guided tour is a great way to orient yourself to the organization of our mCLASS platform. Click the button below to get started.
Demo access
Follow the instructions below to login to your demo account.
- Click the mCLASS Demo button below.
- Select Log in with Amplify.
- Enter the username: d8demoD
- Enter the password: 1234
- Click the Reading tile.
Once you are logged in:
- Find the Class/Group dropdown field and select Grade 1.
- Right above the Class Summary, click Beginning of Year or Middle of Year and explore the data.
- Scroll down to the class list. Each column within the class list is sortable by clicking the double arrow in the column header.
- Click on any score to see the measure transcript.
- Click on a student’s name to see historical data and progress monitoring graphs.
After exploring the Benchmark tab in the purple bar:
- Click on the Instruction tab.
- If you don’t see groups, click Updated recommendations.
- Explore freely! The Groups, Students, and All Activities tabs have rich information.
- Click the Progress tab.
- Click on Home Connect to see a sample of our caregiver letters.