001In this video, you will learn how to create proctored and unproctored test sessions in the test administrator interface of the test delivery system. This training will cover the following topics. How to create an unprocedured test session using the test administrator interface and how to create and monitor a proctored test session. Within proctored test sessions, we will also cover how to approve or deny a student entry to a test session, pausing or stopping a test session, and transferring sessions between computers and mobile devices. The test administrator interface and the student interface are both part of the test delivery system or TDS. The test administrator interface is where test administrators create and manage test sessions for students who will use the student interface to take online assessments. There are two ways for test administrators to access TDS.
002You can log in from the Texas assessment website using the test delivery system TDS test administrator interface card or you can open the system switcher menu in the test information distribution engine tide to access TDS via the test administration for interim and operational testing application. On the login screen, enter the district email address and password associated with your TIDE account. Then select login. All returning Tide users will have to reset their passwords for the new school year. To do so, click reset password and follow the on-creen instructions. The first step in administering any test is to create a test session. Proctored sessions can start immediately after they are created or they can be scheduled in advance and open by the test administrator at the scheduled start time. Test administrators can also use the test administrator
003interface to monitor student testing progress in real time. One proctor is required for every 30 students. Unprotoed sessions are scheduled in advance and begin automatically at the scheduled start time. In unproctored sessions, test administrators are unable to use the test administrator interface to monitor student testing progress. Designated testing personnel should use the monitoring test progress module in TIDE to monitor student progress. Note that both proctored and unproctor test sessions can be created 3 weeks in advance of the testing window. If a test session is scheduled with an end date after the end of the assessment window or a start date before the start of the assessment window, the user will receive a popup warning indicating that the date selected is outside the official assessment window. Let's first look at how to create an unprocedured test
004session in the test administrator interface. Unprotoed test sessions are test sessions that a test administrator schedules in advance. The session automatically starts at the scheduled start time and ends at the scheduled end time. In addition, the test administrator is unable to view student testing progress through the test administrator interface. However, test administrators may monitor test progress through the monitoring test progress module in tide. More information is available about that process in a separate training. After logging into the test administrator interface, you will see the dashboard. At the top of the dashboard are three tabs. Active proctored sessions, schedule proctored sessions, and schedule unprotoed sessions. To create an unproctored test session, select the schedule unproctored sessions tab, then select create session. If you are associated with multiple institutions, select one from the drop- down menu in
005the pop-up window. In the start and end fields, select a start date and time and an end date and time for the test session. The test session will remain open during this interval, and it will be the only time when students can access the test. Be sure to check the A.M. and PM settings and confirm that the selected dates are within the applicable testing windows. Let's create a test session. We want the test to be open for one day. So, we will select August 28th, 8:00 a.m. as the start date and time and August 28th, 400 p.m. as the end date and time. Select next to continue. The choose a testing category pop-up window then displays tests that will be live during the time frame you previously selected. Select the testing category by clicking the
006category name. Next, select the plus sign to expand the testing category and mark the check box next to the test for which you are scheduling a test session. The test name will show in the test selected column. You may add multiple tests to your session by marking their checkboxes. As a best practice, please create one session per subject, per grade level, and per language where applicable each day. Enter a name for the session and select save session. The session window will open and display the session ID. This session ID must be provided to students before they can log into a test. again for summitive assessments such as star and telpass students must log into their test through the CI secure browser and they will need a session ID in order to log in. However, for
007optional tests such as Texas formative assessment resource Tfar assessments and star interim assessments, the session link can be shared with students who may take the test using conventional web browsers such as Chrome, Firefox, Edge or Safari. To copy the test session information to your clipboard, select copy. You can also add the session information to your calendar by clicking add to calendar. Select the X in the top right corner of the window to close the session information popup. The test session you just scheduled will then display in the schedule unproctored sessions tab. Because this is an unprocedured test session, the test session will start automatically at the scheduled start time. Now let's turn to proctored test sessions. You can create a proctored test session in two ways. You can create a session that starts immediately or
008you can create one in advance and schedule the session to start later. First, we will look at how to start a test session immediately. From the active proctored sessions tab, select the start a new session now button. If you are associated with multiple institutions, select one from the drop- down menu in the pop-up window. The test selection window appears displaying color-coded testing categories for tests that are available that day. To expand a category and see all the possible tests in that category, select the arrow next to the category name. Once you have selected a testing category, you can click the plus sign next to a test group name to view the tests in that group. To create a test session, select one or more tests to administer or select the checkbox for a test group
009to include all tests in that group. Once you select tests to add to the session, they will appear in the test selected column on the right side of the window. If you need to remove a test that you have previously selected, uncheck the box next to the test you want to remove. To add tests from different test categories, select the back button to return to the list of categories. You can also filter a list of tests by grade and subject to focus on specific types of assessments. The filter function is useful when managing a large number of tests. To filter a list of tests, select add filter. Select the plus sign to expand a filter category. Then select the filters you want to apply. If you want to remove a filter, select the X button
010next to the filter you want to remove. When you have finished choosing filters, select apply filters. Add test from your filtered results and select start operational session. Now let's schedule a proctored test session. From the dashboard, select the schedule proctored sessions tab. Then select schedule a session. If you are associated with multiple institutions, select one from the drop- down menu in the popup window. In the start and end fields, select a start date and time and an end date and time for the test session. The test session will remain open during this interval and it will be the only time during which students can access the test. Be sure to check the A.M. and PM settings and confirm that the selected dates are within the applicable testing windows. Let's create a test session. We want
011the test to be open for 1 day. So, we will select August 28th, 8:00 a.m. as the start date and time and August 28th, 400 p.m. as the end date and time. Select next to continue. The choose a testing category popup window then displays tests that will be live during the time frame you previously selected. Select the testing category by clicking the category name. Next, select the plus sign to expand the testing category and mark the checkbox next to the test for which you are scheduling a test session. The test name will show in the test selected column. You may add multiple tests to your session by marking their checkboxes. Enter a name for the session and select save session. The session information window will then open and display a session ID. This session ID
012must be provided to students for them to log into a test. It is important to note that for summitive assessments such as star and telpass, students must log into their test through the CI secure browser and they will need a session ID in order to log in. However, for optional tests such as TFAR assessments and STAR interim assessments, the session link can be shared with students who may take the test using conventional web browsers such as Chrome, Firefox, Edge, or Safari. To copy the test session information to your clipboard, select copy. You can also add the session information to your calendar by clicking add to calendar. Select the X in the top right corner of the window. The test session you just scheduled will now show in the schedule proctored sessions tab. Scheduled proctored or
013unproctored sessions can be edited at any time before the session starts. Here you see all scheduled proctored sessions. To edit an upcoming session, select the pencil icon in the actions column. Let's edit this session's end time to be 1 hour later than the time that was originally scheduled. When you have finished editing the session, select save session. To delete an upcoming session, select the trash icon. To retrieve the session ID and link, select the share link button. From the session information window, you can copy the test session information to your clipboard or add it to your calendar. Remember that for summitive assessments, students will not use the link that is generated for the test session. They must take their summitive assessments using the CI secure browser. Once a proctored test session has started, the session
014ID will appear in a tab at the top of the test administrator interface. This session ID must be provided to students in order for them to log into a test. You may write it somewhere visible to all students or provided to students on a printed card or by similar means. If you provide students with the session ID on paper, be sure to collect and destroy the papers when the session ends since the ID is secure. You should also note the session ID for your own records. If you accidentally close your browser, entering the session ID will allow you to resume the session. If you do not have this ID when you try to resume, you will be unable to do so. Because the student test progress tables in the test administrator interface often contain sensitive
015student information such as student IDs, the test administrator interface contains a screen saver function that hides the data from view. The screen saver will automatically turn on if you are not active in the test administrator interface for 5 minutes. To manually turn on the screen saver, select the menu button and then select toggle screen saver. The screen saver displays the session ID and will also display notifications if students are awaiting approval or if students require other interventions. The screen saver will turn off automatically if any mouse or keyboard activity is detected. It will also turn off automatically if the test session times out due to test administrator or student inactivity. If a student is having trouble logging in, use the student lookup feature to verify that the students login credentials are correct. You can use
016either the quick search or advanced search option to view the data entered for the student and tied. With quick search, simply enter the student's TSDS ID and select submit. The students information will then display below. Advanced search allows you to narrow your search using several filters, including enrolled district, enrolled campus, grade, first name, and last name. Let's search for students in demo district TX1, demo campus TX1, and grade 6. If you see the student record you are looking for, select the I icon in the details column. The students information will then display below. Once you have finished searching for students, select the X button in the top right corner of the window to return to the test session dashboard. Once you have started the test session and students have logged in, you must approve students
017to enter the session before they can access their tests. To approve students for testing, select the approvals tab. A list of students will display organized by test name. You should review the list to make sure that all students chose the correct test that is the correct grade, subject, and type of test. You should also ensure that all the settings for each student are correct. To view student test settings, select the eye icon in the C details column. The test settings popup will appear which displays the students information at the top and various test settings organized by their area of need. For operational tests, test settings can be viewed but not changed in this window. These test settings must be set by an authorized TIDE user prior to testing. If test settings are incorrect for a
018student, contact your campus testing coordinator to update the students settings in Tide. Select the check mark to approve individual students for entry to the test session or select approve all students to approve all listed students. Although you can approve all students at the same time, denying students entry to a test session must be done individually. To deny a student entry, select the X button in the action column and enter a reason in the box. In this example, we will deny the student entry to the test because they selected the wrong test. To approve our remaining two students, let's select approve all. If you are sure you want to approve all students, select okay in the confirmation message. Once students log in and are approved to enter the proctored test session, you can monitor their status
019from the table displayed on the test administrator interface. Here you see the two students who have been approved for testing. The test session table shows student information, test progress, test settings, and actions columns. The progress column displays the students progress through the items in the test with the progress bar showing the percentage of items the students have completed. The test settings column displays either standard or custom. When a student's test settings differ from the default settings for that test, this column displays custom. Select the eye icon to view a student's test settings. The actions column allows you to pause a student's test. Test administrators can pin the record of any student whose progress may need to be more closely monitored. This will place the students test session progress information at the top of the active
020testing session page. To pin a student record, select the pin icon in the actions column. The students information will then display in a separate table at the top of the test session page. If TDS detects that a student may be having technical problems or requires assistance, you will see a tests with potential issues table. An I icon will show in the progress column and clicking this icon will display more information about the issue. You have two options within the test administrator interface to pause or stop testing once it has begun. You can pause an individual students test or stop the entire test session. To pause an individual students test, select the pause button in the actions column for that student and select okay to confirm that you want to pause the test. This option would
021be appropriate if a student needed to take a break. For example, in the event of an emergency that requires all students to stop testing, you can pause all students tests by stopping the session. If you stop the session, all in progress tests will be paused. If a session is stopped, it cannot be resumed. You will need to create a new test session and give the new session ID to students so that they can resume testing. To stop the entire test session for all students, do the following. Select the stop session button. A pop-up message will appear requesting verification that the test session should be terminated and the students logged out. Select okay to continue. To print a snapshot of the test administrator interface in its current view, select the print icon. A snapshot can be
022useful for tracking which students did not complete their tests and may need to be scheduled for another test session. You can also select export to export the test session information to a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet. In the event you have problems with your computer or web browser or need to change computers during an active test session, you can transfer the test session from one computer, mobile device, or browser to another without stopping the session or interrupting in progress tests. A test session remains open until the session times out. If you do not return to the active session within 20 minutes and there is no student activity during that time, TDS logs you out and pauses students tests. To transfer an active test session to a new device or browser, do the following. While the session is
023still active, log into the test administrator site on the new device or browser. You will see that the active sessions tab lists the active test session. Select join. The test session page will appear, allowing you to continue monitoring the test session. The test session on the previous computer or browser closes automatically. Remember, only active test sessions can be transferred. If you log out of the session or the session times out, the session closes and cannot be resumed. To log out of the test administrator interface, click your username in the top right corner of the page and then select log out from the drop- down menu. You should log out only after stopping your active test session as logging out will cause all inrogress tests to be paused. A confirmation message will appear asking you to
024verify that you want to exit the website and pause all students in progress tests. If you forget to log out before leaving the testing area, the test session will close automatically after 20 minutes of inactivity on both the test administrator and student computers. You would then need to create a new test session and provide the new session ID to students for students to resume testing. This table identifies some common challenges that you or your students may encounter during a test session. Please take a moment to review this information. Educators and technology staff may contact Texas testing support at at texas testings [email protected] or by using the chat feature located on the Texas Assessment Program website. Thank you for viewing this video.