Tejas LEE Toolkit

El Inventario de Lectura en Español de Tejas (Tejas LEE) is an assessment tool that measures student’s reading, comprehension and reading related skills in Spanish of students in grades 1 and 2 and can be used to fulfill the requirements of the Texas Education Code §28.006.

The Tejas LEE Progress Monitoring System is a user-friendly, technology-driven tool that enables a teacher to quickly assess a child’s progress in a particular skill area. This simple yet reliable data collection prompts teachers to focus on lessons that target their students’ least developed skills.

The Tejas LEE Progress Monitoring System:

• is on the current Commissioner’s List of Approved Grades 1 & 2 Progress Monitoring Instruments
• is available at no cost on CLI Engage to all Texas public school districts and charter schools
• offers three waves of assessment with benchmarks and function like the other assessments on the platform
• provides links to CIRCLE activities that target specific skills based on assessment results
• includes a wide range of reporting features instantly accessible
• demonstrated high reliability and validity in multiple research studies

Tejas LEE is the intellectual property of the University of Houston System and the Texas Education Agency. Tejas LEE is hosted on CLI Engage at no cost for Texas public school districts and charter schools through ongoing partnerships.

The Inventory Section allows teachers to acquire more data to help match reading instruction with specific student needs. This additional information can assist teachers and administrators as they assemble educational resources and plan the most effective instruction possible for students.

Table 1. Overview of Tejas LEE Measures and Administration

Your first step is to register your account on CLI Engage:

• New to CLI Engage? View our registration video for information.
• See our matrix to find which CLI Engage package is the best fit when you sign up for access.
• Most CLI Engage users log in using their Google account. If you do not have a Google account, you can create one using your existing email account or create a Gmail account by going to our Account Set-Up How-to-Guide page.
• Refer to Uploading Teacher and Student Data to learn about several options available for uploading data into CLI Engage. Click here to download a how-to guide on finding schools in CLI Engage.
• You can integrate CLI Engage with existing Clever, ClassLink, Okta, or Microsoft login. Submit a help ticket on CLI Engage with any questions.
• If a user has forgotten their login information, administrators can reset their account so they can login to CLI Engage again: Reset Account How-to-Guide

The Tejas LEE User Guide is a comprehensive guide that includes “need to know” information about the administration of Tejas LEE in first and second grade classrooms.

Tejas LEE User Guide

The Grade 1 Classroom resources page provides extensive information about how to use the tools and resources on CLI Engage in public school first grade classrooms.

The Grade 2 Classroom resources page provides extensive information about how to use the tools and resources on CLI Engage in public school second grade classrooms.

Comprehensive training for Tejas LEE is available in the Online Courses section of CLI Engage. Users can earn certificates for the completion of each course.

• Tejas LEE Assessment Training (35 minutes)
• 1st GR Tejas LEE Dyslexia Screening (12 minutes)
• Analyzing 1st GR TPRI/Tejas LEE Data for MOY (38 minutes)
• Analyzing 2nd GR TPRI/Tejas LEE Data for MOY (28 minutes)

When logged in, access the courses directly here: Tejas LEE Self-Instructional Assessment Training Course

Review how to access these courses once you have logged in: How to Access Self-Instructional or Facilitated Online Courses

CLI Engage offers two tools to support dyslexia screening for 1st Grade students in English and Spanish. These tools can be used together to identify students who may be at risk for dyslexia.

• Dyslexia Screener is a direct assessment that align with the student skill criteria for dyslexia screening in accordance with Texas Education Code §28.006 and §38.003(a)
• Dyslexia Referral Checklist is a supplemental questionnaire that build a link between direct assessment of early reading skills and classroom observations

The dyslexia screener on CLI Engage (administered at wave 2/MOY) 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.

• Word Reading Accuracy or Fluency:
  • Tejas LEE measure: Reconocimiento de las palabras
• Phonological Awareness:
  • Tejas LEE measures: Segmentación de los sonidos and Unión de los sonidos

Review additional information on the dyslexia screening tools on CLI Engage: Dyslexia Screening

Tejas LEE offers scoring resources, and each are available for all three waves (BOY, MOY, and EOY), if applicable. Scoring resources include:

• 1er Grado Comprensión de lectura
• 1er Grado Dictado
• 2do Grado Comprensión de lectura
• 2do Grado Dictado

Access the scoring resources on our webpage: Tejas LEE Scoring Resources

Utilize CLI’s resources for alternative remote administration functionality and protocols for Tejas LEE. Visit our detailed webpage to access teacher’s guides, webinars, and visual schedules to support teachers as they administer assessments remotely: Remote Assessment Administration

The offline assessment feature can be used to assess students when an internet connection is not available at the time of administration. The offline feature for Tejas LEE can be accessed from the assessment practice area (for practicing the offline feature) or directly from the class view in Tejas LEE (when conducting the assessments): Tejas LEE Offline Assessment

Learn about the various reports available on CLI Engage and find how-to guides along with support resources for first and second grade programs. Many of the following reports can be generated at the class, individual student, class, schools, and community/district levels.

• Completion Report
• Class Summary Report
• Class Growth Report
• Small Group Report
• School Completion Report
• School Summary Report

Learn more about all the levels of CLI Engage Reports.

The CIRCLE Activity Collection: Pre-K to Grade 2 Collection includes the following in each lesson:

• A description of the activity, the learning domains the activity supports, and an appropriate grade level
• Materials needed for the activity
• Activity instructions and soft scripting for implementation
• Helpful hints, including tips to create variations, related books to read aloud, and ways to scaffold student’s learning
• Applicable alignments to 1st and 2nd grade Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS)

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:

• BOY Assessment Resources
• MOY Assessment Resources
• EOY Assessment Resources

Benchmarks are the minimum performance levels students are expected to reach by certain points of the year to indicate skill understanding. Tejas LEE Benchmarks display the cut scores for benchmarks and are helpful in analyzing your data.

Tejas LEE is directly aligned to 1^st and 2^nd Grade Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS):

• Tejas LEE-TEKS Alignment for Grade 1
• Tejas LEE-TEKS Alignment for Grade 2

Teachers using Tejas LEE can share individual student reports with families by printing reports or by providing a personalized identification number (PIN) for families to view results online. Teachers can also send families activities that are designed to support skills of concern at home. Some resources to support you when sharing data with families include the following.

Implementation Guide: Student Report for Parents

This guide was developed for teachers who are sharing the Student Report for Parents with families. It includes the following topics:

• Understanding the Student Report for Parents
• Generating the Student Report for Parents and Sharing it with Families
• Having Conversations with Families about Data
• Supporting Resources

Refer to Understanding Your Child’s Assessment Results to assist families in becoming more knowledgeable about progress monitoring and supporting learning at home.

When sharing assessment results with parents, refer to our Family-Friendly Description of Assessment Measures.

View how-to guides for printing parent reports and viewing results online:

• Generating Student Reports for Parents
• Printing Parent PIN Pages

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 is also available in Spanish and 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 resources make the most of procedures you already have in place, such as progress monitoring, homework, parent-teacher conferences, and open houses.  The following resources are available on CLI Engage to assist with family engagement:

• Family Event Planning Checklist: The checklist helps teachers track key tasks for family event planning starting one month out, as well as recording specific activities and materials needed.
• Teacher Toolkit: Tips for Building Relationships: This is a quick reference guide for strategies that build positive working relationships with families. These strategies are discussed in more depth in the Partnering with Families and Promoting Positive Communication professional learning session
• CLI and PBS Collaboration: CIRCLE STEM Lab: The collection is a library of classroom lessons freely available for use by Texas prekindergarten to grade 2 teachers and administrators. It includes 20 child-directed, interactive lessons with activities that teach foundational STEM skills.
• Supporting Families with Understanding and Tracking Children’s Development includes:
  • Family and Teacher Goal Setting Form (all ages)
  • Words for Hard Conversations with Parents
  • Professional Learning Session
  • Promoting Two-Way Conversations with Families to Individualize Student Support

You may use accommodations for students with disabilities during administration of Tejas LEE. Decisions about accommodations should be made on an individual basis, taking into consideration the needs of the student, and whether the student routinely receives the accommodation during classroom instruction. A student with an Individual Education Plan or an instructional plan developed by a Section 504 committee may use the following accommodations:

• Instructions may be signed for hearing impaired student.
• A student may place a colored transparency over any part of the inventory.
• A student may use a place marker.
• A student may spell words aloud in place of writing them. The teacher or a scribe should record the student’s responses.
• A student may use any other accommodation that is a routine part of his/her reading, writing, or spelling instruction.

Additional information can be found in the Tejas LEE User Guide.

Assessment as part of the teaching and learning cycle reveals a starting point for planning instruction. There will certainly be students in your classroom that may already have proficient skills in content that has not yet been introduced. In these cases, assessment is useful for higher level scaffolding extensions. The results of the assessment will also be a guide for planning more targeted interventions for those students that need additional support.

No. For Tejas LEE assessment administration guidance, please review the Tejas LEE User Guide to decide where to begin assessing individual students at their next assessment wave.

A dyslexia screener is available in Wave 2 of Tejas LEE to quickly and efficiently assess all 1^st grade students before January 31st in the school year for possible risk of dyslexia as required by Texas state law. Screening of first-grade students can begin anytime in the fall and must conclude no later than January 31st of each year.