Professional Services

Welcome to NZCER Assist. 

This guide is designed specifically for teachers like you, providing expert advice on various aspects of using NZCER Assist. We will walk you through the process of logging into the system, choosing the right test for your students, preparing for assessments (both online and paper-based), administering the tests effectively, and viewing and printing reports.

Step 1: Log into your NZCER Assist account by simply using your credentials. 

If you don't have an account, reach out to your school's administrator to share the onboarding link with you. This link is unique to your school and will allow you to register and create your account. Here are the next steps once you have received the link: How do teachers create their account within Assist?

In some cases, administrators can create teacher accounts on behalf of teachers. If this applies to you, ask your administrator for your login credentials, which you can change later if needed. How do I reset my password?

Step 2: Choosing the right test for your students

Once you are logged in to Assist, it is likely that the administrator has already set up the tests for your students and assigned you the classes. 

Please ensure that the appropriate test has been assigned to your students by clicking on the Manage Users (Crowd icon) button on the right-hand side of your dashboard to view the list of your students. 

Guidelines for selecting the appropriate tests for your students:

Our assessments, including PATs, STAR, and STwE, are specifically designed to assess student position and progress against the NZ curriculum. Each test is carefully aligned with a specific area of the curriculum, and the progression of tests corresponds to the expected average progress. It is essential, then, to consider the implications for  students making well above, or well below, average progress.  It is important to note that tests that are too easy or too difficult may not yield precise achievement measures. Such tests can result in ceiling effects, where many students achieve perfect or near-perfect scores, or floor effects, where students answer very few questions (if any) correctly. Therefore, it is crucial to ensure that the level of content in the chosen test is suitable for the students being assessed. Adaptive testing may be suitable for these students.

To obtain the most  accurate curriculum-based information about a student's knowledge, choose a test that matches their ability level.  It is recommended to choose the year-level test that aligns with the student's actual position in the curriculum. For example, Curriculum Level 2 Year 4 test, Curriculum Level 3 Year 6 test, Curriculum Level 4 Year 8 test, and Curriculum Level 5 Year 10 test.

See: Choosing the Appropriate Test

Step 3: Data Entry: Paper-based assessments or Online assessments

(a) Completing Data Entry for Paper-based assessments

Teachers will click on Dashboard > Choose the assessment > Click on Manage Learners (Crowd icon) > click on the data entry icon > Enter the data > Once done click on CREATE button to save the record. Detailed steps here: How do I input data for students?

See: Guidelines for administering paper based assessments

(b) Data Entry: Exporting tokens for online assessments

Teachers will click on Dashboard > Choose the assessments > Click on Manage Learners (Crowd icon) > Click on Export tokens (on the top right-hand side of the screen) > Choose PDF as the option and print the tokens. Detailed steps here: How do I print tokens for online testing?

See: Guidelines for administering online testing

See: Troubleshooting for online testing

Step 4: Viewing reports.

All data is saved in real-time, which means that once the students complete their tests reports will become available. You have a range of reports to choose from, so we suggest three approaches all based on thinking, grouping, and analysing students at roughly the same scale level, aka curriculum level.:

1. Individual/target/at risk students: LIST report - find students quickly (alphabetically) , order the Scale Score column - below to above average quickly, group students using the Scale score drop down, CLICK on student's name to see individual reports.
2. Class Range: Scale Score Report - box plot, choose multiple filters to compare cohorts, view student groups against the scale aka the curriculum, CLICK on student's name to see individual reports.
3. Subject content knowledge:  Item Report (not available in Adaptive) - use the Question Scale column toggle to see easiest to hardest, CLICK on Question number to see student reponses, use filters for cohorts.

To view teacher-class reports: Click on Dashboard> Choose the assessment subject> Click on the reports icon.

Detailed steps here: How do I view reports?

To view aggregated school-wide reports: Click on Reports> Choose the appropriate report option> Choose the filter options> Click on generate reports.

Detailed steps here: How do I view Schoolwide Reporting?

Step 5: Bulk print the individual reports

Teachers can bulk print the individual reports: Click on Dashboard> Choose the assessment> Click on 

the report button (report-looking icon, right-hand-side of the screen) > Choose the Individual Report option from the top bar > On the right-hand side under Filters, for Users change it to All > Click print.

Detailed steps here: How do I print reports?