Education

For Educators

Testing Accomodations: Keep Kids with Learning Disabilities in the Picture

An interview with Stephen N. Elliott, Ph.D

In his standard presentation on testing accommodations, Dr. Stephen Elliott, Associate Director of the Wisconsin Center for Education Researchways opens with the same slide, an elementary school collage photo of fourth or fifth graders. He tells the audience, "To my knowledge, I've never heard a photographer who takes these photos ask kids with disabilities to step out of the picture." Yet, he adds, "that is what we've been doing historically with many large scale assessments. Sometimes, in testing kids, we ask those with disabilities to, literally, step out of the picture."

This happens for a number of reasons, Dr. Elliott says. Some of the reasons, he emphasizes, may be empathetic; "these children have been tested a lot, they struggle academically, we don't want them to carry a burden they're unable to bear so let's not put them through additional stress. Besides, they might lower the test scores of our class."

The Goal: 100% Accountability
When it comes to the issue of testing accommodations, Dr. Elliott notes, "there are many agendas." His agenda, he declares, is clear: find a way to include all students in testing in order to achieve 100% accountability.

According to Dr. Elliott, who is also a professor of educational psychology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, from a legal and legislative standpoint, the purpose of testing accommodations is two-fold:

To facilitate participation and strive to develop an "accountability picture" that is accurate
To increase the validity of the interpretation of the resulting test scores

Explains Dr. Elliott: "If our goal is to find out how our kids are doing in school, we somehow must include all the kids in testing and provide those who need them with the most appropriate test accommodations so that the information we glean from these tests is accurate." A test, if presented appropriately, can yield useful information about student learning areas in crucial areas such as math, reading and language arts

Math: A Cloudy Area
He cites math testing as an area in which the validity of interpretation can be clouded. He asserts that many math items on tests administered to grades 4-5, and particularly in middle school grades, are "story items." Students, he says, "must read a lot of text; they have to read graphic materials and tables. If students do not read well, "the result on their math test will probably be lower than if a student possessed good reading skills."

The math test's publisher, Dr. Elliott explains, as well as those in states and districts who purchase the test, "want the math test to tell us about kids' mathematical reasoning, mathematical computation and mathematical communication vis a vis a written response. These math tests, he notes, "are not intended to be reading tests. Yet we know from much research that reading and math scores are correlated."

The goal of a testing accommodation, he insists, is to reduce the reading demand so that the resulting test score is a much more accurate indicator of math ability unclouded by reading difficulty.

On a math test, reading support is a typical accommodation for students with reading problems. However, Dr. Elliott cautions, "that doesn't mean that everything has to be read to the student, although it might mean helping children read through some of the difficult words as well as getting them started in terms of direction so that direction-following and material-locating does not become part of the test."

Like Using an Entrance Ramp
Dr. Elliott explains that test publishers want to target reading or math skills, whereas test-takers need a way to gain entrance to the test, "sort of like using an entrance ramp to gain access to a building." The goal, he adds, is "to help the test-taker get into the test and be able to respond to the test without undoing, or complicating," the target skills that the test publisher wants to assess.

Testing accommodations, he declares, "are all about access skills, such as attention span and minimizing distractibility." For test publishers, "the goal is to eliminate many things that a disability might bring to bear on test, things that students without disabilities would not have to think twice about."

Stress is generally believed to be another factor that can impact test scores for those with learning disabilities. However, his revealing research results, he says, can frame advice for parents concerned about the stressful nature of proficiency testing on children with learning disabilities.

"When they emerged from a test, we asked kids with and without disabilities, on index cards, to rate the stress levels they'd experienced, with 1 being stress-free and 5 indicating the highest level of stress. A 3 rating, for example, would indicate moderate stress, 'I felt nervous and anxious.'" Kids without disabilities gave an average stress rating of 3.1. Those with disabilities averaged a 3.2 stress level rating.

"My point is that kids with and without disabilities find testing about equally stressful. There are measures that can be taken to reduce stress, but not too much, because research tells us that a moderate level of stress is not necessarily counterproductive." In fact, Dr. Elliott adds, "moderate stress might actually be helpful in test-taking."

Time Accommodation: More Psychological Than Real
Many parents believe that increased test-taking time can result in improved test scores. Dr. Elliott's research, he says, largely dispels that belief. "The bottom line on what we've learned about time is this: The benefit of time is more psychological than real."

In fact, he notes, time is the most frequently requested accommodation.

Most research on the time affect has focused on college students, Dr. Elliott notes. His studies, however, concentrate mainly on elementary school children.

"There are differences between the two groups of children," he explains. One difference is that college-bound students have a range of disability narrower than their younger counterparts. Secondly, the two tests serve different purposes. Time is actually a more important factor on college admission tests. It is college admission tests, he says, that parents remember from their own testing experience.

"If you want to make predictions about who will do well in college, you find the students who can get the questions right and answer them quickly. It adds to the predictive validity of the test. However, that's not the purpose of educational accountability in K-12. There, complete answers are needed. The issue of time needs to be unpacked so that parents understand."

"Do Math Quickly" is Not the Goal
Instead, in electing to focus on the typical test administered nationwide for accountability purposes, "we found out some important things about time." Chiefly, test publishers are not building tests that are "speeded tests" for purposes of large-scale accountability. That purpose, declares Dr. Elliott, "would be inappropriate because, if you read state standards - and I've read standards in 35 states - you will not find any that command "do math fast" or "read quickly." Time is not an outcome variable that is being measured. "Yes, we do have time limits," he adds, "but those are management issues for the test provider, the teachers and the administrators who set the test up."

Tests, he says, are currently being designed that can be completed by 90-95% of student test-takers in the allotted time. "It's unfortunate that many parents don't yet realize that tests are not designed so that kids are unable to finish them." That doesn't mean, he adds, "that some kids won't need extra time, but that's usually because someone is assisting them with the test, which slows the test process. For example, a teacher may be assisting more than one student. In this case, extra time is probably needed. Otherwise, it is not."

Not a Listening Comprehension Test
Having the reading test read to students is another oft requested accommodation, Dr. Elliott says. "Nine states allow the reading test to be read. I'm against that, unless the reading test is actually a listening comprehension test. When you read the reading test to a student, you are no longer testing their basis reading skills, you are, instead, testing their listening comprehension skills."

The objective of most reading tests and most state learning standards, he emphasizes, is to discover if children can read process symbols, turn them into words that have meaning, integrate that information and then respond.

Stay in the Picture
To keep your child in the picture and for overall guidance on testing accommodations, Dr. Elliott recommends the following rules of thumb for parents of children with learning disabilities:

Be knowledgeable about testing accommodations
Encourage your child to be part of the decision-making process about accommodations, if possible
When testing is finished, encourage teachers to reflect on accommodations that were effective and those that were not. Document your findings, so that next year teachers have a record of that information.

Source: FCTD

Send This Article To A Friend