Curriculum-Based Measurement

Curriculum-based measurement (CBM) is a standardized system of brief, repeated assessments used to monitor a student's academic progress over time. Developed by Stanley Deno and colleagues at the University of Minnesota, CBM uses short, technically adequate probes — such as one-minute oral reading fluency or math computation samples — sampled from the year's curriculum at a fixed difficulty. Scores are charted week by week, and the slope of improvement is compared against a goal line to judge whether instruction is working and to trigger timely changes.