Montana Practice Tests
Montana's State Tests at a Glance
In grades 3 through 8, Montana tests English language arts and math every year with MAST, plus science in grades 5 and 8 with the Montana Science Assessment. MAST is not one big spring test: students take short testlets online in three eight-week windows spread across the school year, and the testlets add up to one through-year score. Paper forms are available for students whose IEP or 504 plan calls for them. The science test is a single online test given in the spring.
English Language Arts
| Grade | Format | Time | What’s tested |
|---|---|---|---|
| Grades 3 to 8 | Six reading testlets and one writing performance task, spread across three windows; online; fixed forms; one written response in the performance task | About 15 to 30 minutes per reading testlet; about 20 to 30 minutes for the performance task; more time allowed when needed | Reading literary texts, reading informational texts (both including vocabulary and sentence meaning), and writing |
The ELA testlets follow the same statewide schedule for every student in a grade, and the passages grow more complex from the beginning to the end of the year. The writing performance task comes in the middle of the year.
Mathematics
| Grade | Format | Time | What’s tested |
|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 3 | Twelve short testlets across three windows, one strand each; online; fixed forms; no calculator; no reference sheet | About 15 to 30 minutes per testlet; more time allowed when needed | Twelve strands: concepts of multiplication and division, multiplication and division equations, multiplying and dividing within 100, time, liquid volume and mass, real-world problems and patterns, place value and operations in base ten, fractions as numbers, comparing and finding equivalent fractions, unit squares and square units, area problems, data and graphing, two-dimensional figures |
| Grade 4 | Twelve short testlets across three windows, one strand each; online; fixed forms; no calculator; no reference sheet | About 15 to 30 minutes per testlet; more time allowed when needed | Twelve strands: place value in base ten, addition and subtraction algorithms, extending multiplication, multi-digit multiplication, multi-digit division, real-world problems and patterns, comparing and finding equivalent fractions, adding and subtracting fractions, multiplying fractions, decimal fractions, measurement problems, angles and geometry |
| Grade 5 | Twelve short testlets across three windows, one strand each; online; fixed forms; no calculator; reference sheet | About 15 to 30 minutes per testlet; more time allowed when needed | Twelve strands: numerical expressions, place value and powers of ten, representing and comparing decimals, multiplying and dividing whole numbers, operations with decimals, adding and subtracting fractions, multiplying fractions, division with fractions, unit cubes and cubic units, volume problems, the first quadrant of the coordinate plane, attributes of geometric figures |
| Grade 6 | Twelve short testlets across three windows, one strand each; online; fixed forms; built-in four-function calculator on most testlets; reference sheet | About 15 to 30 minutes per testlet; more time allowed when needed | Twelve strands: ratios and unit rates, percents and measurement conversions, dividing fractions, computational fluency, rational numbers and absolute value, algebraic expressions and exponents, equivalent expressions, variables in expressions and equations, inequalities, area and volume problems, the coordinate plane, statistics |
| Grade 7 | Twelve short testlets across three windows, one strand each; online; fixed forms; built-in four-function calculator on most testlets; reference sheet | About 15 to 30 minutes per testlet; more time allowed when needed | Twelve strands: ratios and proportional relationships, ratio and proportion problems, adding and subtracting rational numbers, multiplying and dividing rational numbers, expressions with rational numbers, equations, inequalities, problems with rational numbers, angle relationships and triangles, problems with geometric figures, measures of center and variability, probability |
| Grade 8 | Twelve short testlets across three windows, one strand each; online; fixed forms; built-in scientific calculator on most testlets; reference sheet | About 15 to 30 minutes per testlet; more time allowed when needed | Twelve strands: irrational numbers, exponent rules and scientific notation, understanding functions, comparing and interpreting functions, constructing functions, linear equations in one variable, proportional relationships and lines, systems of equations, the Pythagorean theorem, geometric transformations, similarity and congruence, bivariate data |
Each district schedules the math testlets to follow its own curriculum, three to five in each window, so students take a testlet soon after the class has studied that strand. In the last window students may also take one longer math anchor test of about 25 to 40 minutes.
Science
| Grade | Format | Time | What’s tested |
|---|---|---|---|
| Grades 5 and 8 | One test; online; adaptive | Untimed; about 1.5 to 2 hours | Life sciences, physical sciences, earth and space sciences |
Montana is also piloting a through-year science test for grades 6 to 8, but eighth graders in the pilot still take the Montana Science Assessment.