MasterTrack – looking closely at Math Data

In my school, we have started to use a program called MasterTrack. At the beginning of the year, over the course of two weeks, I gave students the benchmark tests to see where they were at with grade level standards.  Next, I took the data, entered it in to MasterTrack and quickly saw where students were at with their understanding of the mathematical standards they should be understanding at grade level.  This information has given me a very clear understanding of math content that I need to revisit, which students are needing more challenging work and – what I really have loved – is there is a setting that can provide groupings based on their scores.  This could be to pair with others who are at the same level OR to pair students who could help support and push other students thinking. Again, this is a completely new assessment technology for me – have you used this before?  Any thoughts. I will continue to give the benchmarks connected with this and monitor student growth and report back on what I am noticing and how it is (or is not) working for our classroom.  So far, one struggle I have with the program is that it does not necessarily match up with the curriculum we are using so are the benchmarks a fair assessment?  I would say no BUT the content is the same just the method of, for example, math models may not be representative to what they actually know if the curriculum has not explicitly taught that yet. More thoughts to come!