Lithuania

Monitoring Student Progress in Reading

There are no national examinations at the primary level in Lithuania. At the end of basic education, students in Grade 10 are evaluated in Lithuanian language, mathematics, and mother tongue (optional for students taught in a language other than Lithuanian). To graduate from secondary school, students in Grade 12 must pass two maturity examinations: a Lithuanian language examination and one examination to be chosen from 11 examinations.

Since 2012, two types of testing using standardized tools have been used to assess and monitor student achievement in reading:

• National sample-based surveys on reading and writing in Lithuanian in Grade 4—The aim of these surveys is to assess student achievement and monitor it at the national level. Following their completion, examples of test items with scoring instructions and national level statistics are made available for teachers to gauge the relative achievement of their students.
• Optional nationwide standardized testing based on the Grade 4 reading curriculum—Administered in schools with Lithuanian, Russian, and Polish as languages of instruction, the main aims of standardized testing are to identify the strong and weak points of schools and students and to ensure learning support for reading and writing. The development of test items, assessment instructions, and recommendations for how to interpret the results of standardized tests is centralized, but schools are responsible for test administration, accommodations, and scoring procedures.

Instead of grades, primary school students (Grades 1 to 4) receive written detailed explanations of their achievements based on teachers’ observations. Beginning in Grade 5 following a transitory period of about six months, teachers begin giving grades on a scale of 1 to 10 with 4 being the minimal “passing” grade and 10 considered an “excellent” grade. The curriculum provides general directions for assigning grades to particular levels of attainment, but teachers generally use their professional discretion to determine them.