i-Ready Kindergarten & 1st Grade Sample Questions
Formerly the i-Ready Diagnostic
If your kindergartner or first grader is taking the i-Ready Diagnostic, you may hear a new name this school year.
Beginning in 2026–27, the i-Ready Diagnostic is called i-Ready Inform™ for Reading and Mathematics.
i-Ready Inform is an online, computer-adaptive assessment designed to determine what your child currently knows in Reading and Mathematics and what they’re ready to learn next.
Why Might My Child See Skills That Seem Too Advanced?
This is one of the most common concerns parents have about i-Ready.
You may hear:
“Mom, they gave me something we haven’t even learned!”
That’s okay.
i-Ready Inform isn’t simply checking whether your child mastered the kindergarten or first-grade curriculum. The adaptive assessment is trying to determine the level at which your child is currently performing.
A child who demonstrates strong skills may encounter increasingly challenging questions.
Likewise, a child who needs more support may receive questions targeting earlier prerequisite skills.
This allows the assessment to provide more detailed information about both strengths and areas for growth.
How Should Kindergarten and 1st-Grade Students Prepare?
At this age, I wouldn’t turn preparation into a stressful test-prep marathon.
Young children benefit most from strengthening the underlying Reading and Mathematics skills they’ll use on the assessment.
For Reading, practice:
- Letter recognition
- Letter sounds
- Rhyming
- Blending sounds
- Segmenting words
- High-frequency words
- Vocabulary
- Listening to stories
- Retelling stories
- Answering questions about what they read or hear
- Identifying important information in nonfiction
For Mathematics, practice:
- Counting
- Number recognition
- Comparing numbers and quantities
- Addition and subtraction
- Patterns
- Shapes
- Measurement concepts
- Sorting and classifying
- Simple graphs
- Age-appropriate problem solving
It’s also useful for children to practice answering questions digitally so clicking, selecting, dragging, listening, and navigating on a screen don’t distract from the actual Reading or Mathematics skill being measured.
What Should I Tell My Child Before i-Ready?
For kindergarten and first grade, keep your explanation very simple:
“You’re going to answer some Reading and Math questions. Some will feel easy. Some may feel hard. Nobody expects you to know everything. Listen carefully, think about each question, and choose the answer you think is best.”
That’s it.
No pressure.
The goal is for your child to be rested, comfortable with the question formats, and ready to show what they know.
Practice i-Ready-Style Questions
TestingMom’s i-Ready-style practice can help kindergarten and first-grade children become familiar with the Reading and Math skills they may encounter.
Practice is especially helpful when it teaches children how to approach unfamiliar questions, rather than simply memorizing answers.
The real i-Ready Inform assessment is adaptive, so no practice test can predict the exact questions your child will receive.
But your child can practice the underlying skills, become comfortable answering digital questions, and learn an important testing lesson:
When a question gets hard, don’t give up. Think—and try.
Below are sample questions representative of the kindergarten and 1st grade questions your child will see on the test, but they are not taken directly from the i-Ready being administered this year.
- Which choice has a short ‘o’ sound?
- Which picture matches the word?
- Which picture is something you do NOT see underwater?
- Which thing is in both pictures?
- How many hearts do you see?
- Which triangle is the smallest?
- What is the name of the coin shown below?
- What number sentence matches the picture below?
Are you ready to start preparing your child for their i-Ready Diagnostic for Kindergarten and first grade? Would you like more i-Ready practice? We have over 1,100 i-Ready practice questions plus expert tutors, engaging test prep, and more! Try out our 100 Free Questions today!
See if TestingMom.com supports your child’s test by your school district. If you don't see your child's school district listed, check with us! We have practice for other tests as well.
Tell us about your experiences
27 Responses
Love it
Gracias
Really helpful
i want my child to learn more
Looking for kindergarten
I’m very interested in i-Ready program.
Excellent
Website looks great.
Number 4, “Which thing is in both pictures”, asks for a singular answer. However there appears a frog and water in both. That makes the question grammatically incorrect.
my daughter needs help would love to get this
I teach a small kindergarten class of 11 students who are required to take MAPS test before being allowed to enter first grade at another school. We are a preschool/kindergarten School then our students feed into another school for first – 9 grade I would like for my students to have online practice of testing before end of May . I would like more info on this program
Me hinteresa mucho por que a mi niño le gusta mucho estudiar .
Excited to help my kinder get ready !
My child has ADHD and will be starting first grade. He is needing support to keep up. I would like to have practice I ready questions I so I can keep him on track and see where he needs extra help.
Thank you, Diana
Love it!
I teach first grade and am trying to get kids ready for their 3rd diagnostic
Great variety of questions. Allows me to see what the child will need help with.
I am a k-1 teacher looking into the program
Love it!