Age of Learning Offers Comprehensive Kindergarten Readiness Resources to Families and Educators

Releases In-Depth Analysis of What It Means to Be Kindergarten Ready in All 50 States; Launches ABCmouse Assessment Center to Help Families Evaluate School Readiness

 GLENDALE, Calif., April 21, 2016 – Recognized as the No. 1 digital learning resource for young children, the award-winning ABCmouse.com Early Learning Academy has become a trusted curriculum for millions of parents and more than 65,000 teachers across the United States. To further support families and early childhood educators in preparing children for kindergarten, Age of Learning, Inc., the creator of ABCmouse, today released an unprecedented, comprehensive analysis of Kindergarten Readiness standards across all 50 states. The Kindergarten Readiness Report, available at www.ageoflearning.com/KR, reveals substantial common ground among state Kindergarten Readiness standards, with 15 specific skills that 85 percent or more of states would like to see children acquire before entering kindergarten.

Based on the common standards identified in the Kindergarten Readiness Report, Age of Learning has developed and today also announced the launch of an in-depth Kindergarten Readiness assessment, which parents can use with the ABCmouse curriculum to help better prepare children for kindergarten. With more than 7,000 learning activities and 650 lessons, ABCmouse is available on computers, tablets, and smartphones and is used by millions of children at home, in more than 65,000 U.S. classrooms, and in more than one third of all U.S. public libraries. Large-scale research studies assessing the effectiveness of ABCmouse have concluded that ABCmouse accelerates learning and helps children make significant gains in early literacy and math skills.

Available in a new ABCmouse Assessment Center, the easy-to-use Kindergarten Readiness assessment was developed with guidance from the leading education and assessment research organization SRI International, and from the independent research institution NORC at the University of Chicago.

Academic areas covered in the assessment include Language, Literacy, and Math—domains in which 100 percent of the 50 states have established specific Kindergarten Readiness standards. To learn more about the ABCmouse Assessment Center, visit www.abcmouse.com/take-intro-assessment.

“Kindergarten Readiness is a critical indicator of long-term success in school,” explained Dr. Rebecca Palacios, a National Teachers Hall of Fame Inductee, National Board Certified Teacher, and Curriculum Board member at Age of Learning. “The ABCmouse Assessment Center empowers parents and caregivers to be effective first teachers, by helping them to evaluate and develop their children’s school preparedness skills in a fun and engaging way.”

ABCmouse Assessment Center features include

·         A comprehensive preschool academic skills assessment, composed of 11 Language, Literacy, and Math skills that can be taken as one assessment or as 11 individual assessments

·         A comprehensive kindergarten academic skills assessment, composed of 12 Language, Literacy, and Math skills that can be taken as one assessment or as 12 individual assessments

·         Customized lessons targeted to help a child improve in specific skill areas identified by the assessments for further practice

·         Unlimited access to the assessments for up to three children, including tracking for each child on comprehensive academic skills assessments, as well as on individual reading, oral language, and math skills

·         A user-friendly interface with clear, color-coded tables, charts, and graphs that present and illustrate assessment results