STAAR FAQs

STAAR is important to your child’s academic progress because it measures grade level concepts and skills your child needs to learn to stay on track from year to year. STAAR measures how well students meet the grade level expectations in each subject determined by the Texas State Board of Education in partnership with educators. It is a cumulative test that happens at the end of the year to allow teachers to see how much your child has learned, how ready your child is for the next grade level, and where he or she may need additional support to accelerate learning.

STAAR is only one way to measure learning and is not meant to tell the whole story. It is meant to be combined with report card grades, teacher input, and classwork to give families and teachers a more complete picture of student learning.

Required STAAR tests vary by grade level as follows:

• mathematics and reading every year in grades 3–8,
• science in grades 5 and 8,
• social studies in grade 8, and
• end‐of‐course (EOC) assessments for Algebra I, English I, English II, Biology, U.S. History (passing required for high school graduation).

The basic checklist for parents to help their child be ready for STAAR includes:

• setting regular teacher meetings to discuss goals,
• reviewing sample STAAR questions and tests,
• taking an online practice test at home, and
• making sure your child gets a good night’s sleep the night before and a healthy breakfast on test day.

Sample test questions and test forms are available on the STAAR Released Test Questions webpage. Have your child take a STAAR online practice test that shows what the online testing environment and tools will be like.

Children are expected to complete STAAR tests in about three hours. Any child who needs additional time may continue testing until the end of the school day.

Children with special needs may qualify for accommodations to help them complete a STAAR test. The online STAAR tests offer features and supports to make testing more accessible for children who routinely receive accommodations. You can watch a video that shows the online accommodations. Accommodation decisions are based on the individual child’s need and are made in partnership with parents. To learn more, visit the Accommodation Resources webpage.

Several accommodations are available for EB children to help them complete a STAAR test. STAAR Spanish may be right for children in bilingual programs who are receiving most of their academic instruction in Spanish or for an EB children in an English as a Second Language (ESL) program. Decisions about which children meet the participation requirements are made based on the individual child’s need. To learn more, visit the Assessments for Emergent Bilingual Students webpage.

The STAAR test supplies scores for students using both raw scores and scale scores. The basic score on any test is the raw score, which is simply the number of questions answered correctly. Scale scores convert the raw score into a scale that is common to all test forms for that assessment and takes into consideration the difficulty level of the specific questions on the test form. The scale score identifies a student’s performance based on the passing standards. You can watch a video to learn more about scale scores.

Please watch this video.