While Kansas educators know what standards their students need to be taught, identifying whether their instructional materials are appropriately aligned with those standards presents a much more complex challenge. To support these efforts, the Kansas State Department of Education has developed standards alignment toolkits. 

These toolkits are resources designed to support the alignment of curriculum, instruction, and assessments with the Kansas State Standards. These toolkits simplify the process of interpreting the standards, helping educators save time and effort so they can concentrate on planning effective and meaningful instruction.  

"The Standards Alignment Toolkits streamline the alignment process by clearly identifying what’s being taught, uncovering gaps, and guiding educators in aligning instruction to state standards with clarity and confidence," said Jennifer Hamlet, an assistant director on KSDE’s Career, Standards and Assessment Services (CSAS) team. 

Hamlet said standards alignment is one of the Four Fundamentals that serve as the foundation of the new school improvement model that is part of the second iteration of the Kansas Education Systems Accreditation, known as KESA 2.0. She said the toolkits are the result of the school improvement workgroup determining what would benefit educators most when aligning standards. Program managers on KSDE’s CSAS team, along with their teacher-leader consultants and field educators, created the standards alignment toolkits this school year for English language arts (ELA), mathematics, science, history, government and social studies (HGSS). Hamlet said the toolkits, which KSDE will continually review and revise, have been well-received by educators through professional development sessions across the state. She said the toolkits are meant to be used by districts when they are working together to align the standards with their high- quality instructional materials. 

“What’s most powerful is how these resources drive collaboration and deep, strategic conversations,” she said. “That level of collaboration is key to meaningful school improvement in districts.” 

The KSDE program managers, teacher-leader consultants and field educators, will gather to evaluate, revise, and discuss the toolkits and other resources on June 5-6, in Topeka. Hamlet said the group will look back at what they accomplished during the 2024-25 school year, what work they are currently working on, and set goals for the coming year. 

“The amount of work our KSDE teacher leader teams have invested in developing the standards alignment toolkits and other resources has been truly tremendous. Their dedication ensures that educators have clear, practical resources to support the Four Fundamentals.” 

Click here to view all standards alignment toolkits and resources.