This online toolkit is a “one-stop shop” for locating a variety of materials and resources, each tailored to support the understanding and implementation of Circle Kindergarten Progress Monitoring (KPM). This section offers content related to exploring the purpose, design, and research behind Circle KPM. Please note, Circle Kindergarten Progress Monitoring was previously known as TX-KEA.
Circle KPM provides teachers and specialists with a comprehensive understanding of students’ learning, enabling them to design differentiated instruction to better meet students’ unique needs and share information with families.
Circle KPM provides multiple implementation options to school districts and charter schools in English and Spanish. The KPM User Guide provides information for these implementation options:
View the Unboxing Assessment Toolkits webinar to quickly unpack the toolkit’s comprehensive collection of materials. Watch to explore the included resources and see how to get started using the KPM assessments.
Circle Kindergarten Progress Monitoring (KPM) covers multiple child development domains to provide a holistic understanding of each student and better informs kindergarten teachers about the children in their classes, helping them to design differentiated instruction to meet students’ needs and share information with families.
KPM was originally developed through a collaborative effort between the US Department of Education, the Texas Education Agency, and the Children’s Learning Institute (CLI) at UTHealth Houston to develop and validate a kindergarten entry assessment that can be reliably administered by kindergarten teachers in Texas at the beginning of the school year. KPM originally launched in August 2017 under the name Texas Kindergarten Entry Assessment (TX-KEA) and was later expanded by CLI to include additional administration waves. The original TX-KEA measures remain part of KPM’s beginning-of-year (BOY) assessment. Learn more about the research project to develop TX-KEA, now known as KPM, on CLI’s website.
Now available in Circle Kindergarten Progress Monitoring (KPM), all language and literacy measures are available at all three waves in English and Spanish. Updated online training and supporting resources are now available on CLI Engage to help educators prepare for administration.
These measures can now be administered at all waves (previously, some administration waves were not available for one or both languages):
After logging in to CLI Engage, educators can preview the new measures in the Assessment Practice Area.
The following table shows the KPM measures available in English in each wave, the type of response collected in the measure, and the administration time per student. Refer to the KPM User Guide for additional information about the measures.
| Table 1. KPM English Measures | Response Type | BOY (Wave 1) | MOY (Wave 2) | EOY (Wave 3) |
| Vocabulary | Teacher-recorded | 1 min | 2 min | 1 min |
| Listening Comprehension | Student-selected | 2-3 min | 3 min | 3 min |
| Letter Names | Teacher-recorded | 1 min | 1 min | 1 min |
| Decoding | Teacher-recorded | 1-2 min | 2-3 min | 1-2 min |
| Letter Sounds-Receptive | Student-selected | 2 min | 1 min | 1 min |
| Letter Sounds-Expressive | Teacher-recorded | 1 min | 1 min | 1 min |
| Blending-Receptive | Student-selected | 4 min | 3-4 min | 1 min |
| Blending-Expressive | Teacher-recorded | 1 min | 1 min | 1 min |
| Spelling | Student-written | 5 min | 5 min | 5 min |
| Math, Part 1 | Teacher-recorded | 4-5 min | 1-2 min | 3-4 min |
| Math, Part 2 | Student-selected | 4-5 min | 1-2 min | 3-4 min |
| Science | Student-selected | 5 min | 5 min | 5 min |
| Social Emotional Competence | Behavior Checklist | 2-3 min | 3 min | 3 min |
| Emotion Management | Behavior Checklist | 2-3 min | ||
| Working Memory | Student-selected | 2-3 min | ||
| Inhibition | Student-selected | 2-3 min | ||
| Attention | Student-selected | 2 min | ||
| Academic Motor | Behavior Checklist | 3 min | ||
| Total Administration Time | Per Student | 44-52 min | 29-33 min | 29-32 min |
The following table shows the KPM measures available in Spanish in each wave, the type of response collected in the measure, and the administration time per student. Refer to the KPM User Guide (or Guía del usuario KPM) for additional information about the measures.
| Table 2. KPM Spanish Measures | Response Type | BOY (Wave 1) | MOY (Wave 2) | EOY (Wave 3) |
| Vocabulario | Teacher-recorded | 1 min | 2 min | 1 min |
| Comprensión auditiva | Student-selected | 2 min | 3 min | 4-5 min |
| Nombres de las Letras | Student-selected | 1 min | 1 min | 1 min |
| Decodificación | Teacher-recorded | 1-2 min | 1-2 min | 1-2 min |
| Sonidos de letras-Receptivo | Student-selected | 1 min | 2 min | 2 min |
| Sonidos de letras-Expresivo | Teacher-recorded | 1 min | 1 min | 1 min |
| Combinación de sonidos-Receptivo | Student-selected | 2 min | 2 min | 2 min |
| Combinación de sonidos-Expresivo | Teacher-recorded | 2 min | 2 min | 2 min |
| Ortografía | Student-written | 5 min | 5 min | 5 min |
| Matemáticas, Parte 1 | Teacher-recorded | 4-5 min | 1-2 min | 3-4 min |
| Matemáticas, Parte 2 | Student-selected | 4-5 min | 1-2 min | 3-4 min |
| Ciencias | Student-selected | 5 min | 5 min | 5 min |
| Socio-emocional | Behavior Checklist | 2-3 min | 3 min | 3 min |
| Manejo de emociones | Behavior Checklist | 2-3 min | ||
| Memoria | Student-selected | 2-3 min | ||
| Inhibición | Student-selected | 2-3 min | ||
| Atención | Student-selected | 2 min | ||
| Motricidad académica | Behavior Checklist | 3 min | ||
| Total Administration Time | Per Student | 42-49 min | 29-32 min | 33-37 min |
The Kindergarten Literacy Screener is comprised of the Vocabulary, Letter Names, and Spelling subtests. Students will score within the “on track” (green), “monitor” (yellow) or “support” (red) benchmarks ranges for each subtest. These scores assist districts in informing student instruction. The composite score produced can be used to identify students who meet the “support” benchmark because they are in the bottom 25th percentile.
The Literacy Screener (administered at wave 1/BOY) assesses:
The Statewide Kindergarten Readiness score is comprised of Vocabulary, Letter Names, and Spelling measures. Students must meet the “On Track” (green) benchmark for all three measures to meet the kindergarten readiness criteria determined by TEA. Districts can use the additional measure data to make individual determinations regarding students who may require additional support.
CLI Engage offers two tools to support dyslexia screening for kindergarten students in English and Spanish. These tools can be used together to identify students who may be at risk for dyslexia.
The kindergarten dyslexia screener on CLI Engage (administered at wave 3/EOY) uses the following measures to assess skills identified in TEA’s Dyslexia Handbook (2021). Teachers can use the Dyslexia Referral Checklist as a supplement to support screening.
English
Spanish
Review additional information on the dyslexia screening tools on CLI Engage: Dyslexia Screening
Your first step is to register your account on CLI Engage:
The KPM User Guide is a comprehensive guide that includes “need to know” information about the administration of KPM in kindergarten classrooms. También disponible en español.
Beyond the standard “best assessment practices,” this section offers evidence-based implementation strategies that pre-K programs can use to support educators’ understanding and implementation of CPM. The content in this section offers resources for perspective and practice building while growing awareness of classroom-level strategies. These practices are focused on helping make the most of CPM as an assessment tool, family engagement resource, and professional learning hub. Additional resources are offered for differentiated implementation practices, such as offline and remote assessment modes.
Comprehensive training for KPM is available in the Online Learning and Professional Development section of CLI Engage. Users can earn certificates for the completion of each course.
When logged in, access the courses directly here: KPM Self-Instructional Assessment Training Course
KPM offers scoresheets available for all waves (BOY, MOY, and EOY), as applicable for some direct measures and all observable measures.
Access the scoring resources on our webpage: KPM Scoring Guidelines
The offline assessment feature can be used to assess students when an internet connection is not available at the time of administration: KPM Offline Assessment
Assessment windows are open for each LEA to choose on CLI Engage. Use the optional assessment lock feature to prevent accidental administration outside the LEA’s defined window: CLI Engage Assessment Lock
The KPM Facilitation Guide provides essential information for school leaders and specialists who will be leading training sessions for their teachers on the assessment.
Our resource library is curated to help meet the demand of local needs – from the classroom to the district level. Browse our content to find courses, webinars, and guides to further support programs and educators’ understanding of implementing KPM and analyzing data.
Learn about the various reports and data exports available on CLI Engage with links to how-to guides for pulling reports.
Plan meaningful instruction based on assessment data and explore classroom activities across learning domains.
Explore resources that support school-home connection, designed to fit into your existing activities that engage families.
Learn about the various reports available on CLI Engage and find how-to guides along with support resources for kindergarten programs. Many of the following reports can be generated at the class, individual student, class, schools, and community/district levels.
Learn more about Accessing CLI Engage Reports.
The Circle Activity Collection: Pre-K to Grade 2 Collection (log in required) includes the following in each lesson:
Resources for data-driven instruction can also be found on our beginning, middle, and end-of-year specific pages. These pages were curated to meet the needs of educators across the span of the school year:
The Circle STEM Lab Collection is a virtual laboratory that hosts video segments from PBS Learning Media and hands-on STEM activities to be completed independently by your child. These interactive activities integrate video segments with hands-on activities and can also be used independently by students at school or as a teacher-directed activity.
Benchmarks are the minimum performance levels students are expected to reach by certain points of the year to indicate skill understanding. The KPM Benchmark table displays the cut scores for benchmarks and is helpful in analyzing your data.
Each KPM subtest is directly aligned to Kindergarten TEKS:
ECDS is part of the Texas Student Data System (TSDS). Click on the link below for more information about kindergarten ECDS requirements and uploads:
Teachers using KPM can share student reports with families by printing them or providing a PIN for online access. Teachers can also send families activities that are designed to support skill development at home.
Student Report Resources:
Implementation Guide (available in English and Spanish) includes the following topics:
Helping Families Understand Their Child’s Assessment Results:
Teachers can collect valuable information on their student’s development by sharing these forms with families and asking them to give feedback about their child. Each form is aligned to the KPM measures to support the integration of family information into instructional planning. Family Observation Forms are available in English and Spanish.
CLI Engage provides a Circle Activity Collection specifically designed to support children’s skill development at home with their parents and families. The Circle Activity Collection: Family can be accessed on mobile devices and does not require a login. This collection provides a variety of hands-on activities that families can do at home. This collection is organized around seven learning domains: Language & Communication, Reading & Writing, Math, Science, Social & Emotional, Physical Development, and Art & Sensory.
CLI’s Family Engagement Toolkit resources make the most of procedures you likely already have in place, such as progress monitoring, homework, parent-teacher conferences, and open houses. CLI advocates a new focus for these efforts: supporting families in better understanding children’s development and engaging in fun, developmentally appropriate activities that not only build skills but strengthen the bonds between family members.
The Kindergarten Classroom Environment Checklist (KCEC) is a tool that evaluates the presence and quality level of important areas, materials, and concepts in a Kindergarten classroom. The KCEC enables teachers to set the stage for successful learning as students engage in the classroom experience.
Visit our help center to view answers to frequently asked questions about KPM. Search for other progress monitoring questions or contact the Education Advisor team.
