Assessment in Special Education PDF

Assessment in Special Education ​ Assessment: A process that involves collecting information about a student to make decisions. ○​ Testing: A set of questions or tasks administered to an individual to determine knowledge or skills. ​ Three ways in which a student may be identified fo...

Assessment in Special Education ​ Assessment: A process that involves collecting information about a student to make decisions. ○​ Testing: A set of questions or tasks administered to an individual to determine knowledge or skills. ​ Three ways in which a student may be identified for assessment of a suspected disability: ○​ The student’s classroom teacher may identify specific symptoms within the classroom that seem to indicate the presence of some problem. ○​ The student’s parents may call or write to the school or to the director of special education and request their child be evaluated. ○​ Other school personnel or outside professionals may suspect the presence of a learning disability and ask the student’s parents for permission to evaluate the student individually. ​ Under IDEIA, an evaluation of a child for a suspected disability must be made by a multidisciplinary team (MDT) of qualified professionals. ​ Observation: An assessment technique whereby one observes the student in his or her natural environment. ○​ Ecological Assessment: Involves directly observing and assessing the child in the many environments in which he or she routinely operates. ​ Ecological Assessments provide valuable information about: ​ Academic skills ​ Motor/Physical skills ​ Communication skills ​ Social skills ​ Management skills ○​ Common Observational Techniques: ​ Anecdotal Recording: The observer describes incidents or behaviors observed in a particular setting in concrete, narrative terms. ​ This DOES NOT draw inferences about feelings or motives. ​ It provides insight into cause and effect: ○​ Antecedent: What happened before the behavior occurred? ○​ Behavior: What did the student/child do? ○​ Consequence: What happened after the behavior occurred? ​ Event Recording: The observer is interested in recording the number of times a specific behavioral event occurred. ​ Ex: How many times does the student hit or get out of his or her seat? ​ Duration Recording: This method requires a watch or clock so that a precise measurement of how much time a student spends doing something of concern to the teacher or assessment team can be recorded. ​ Interview: An assessment technique is conducted face to face, whether in person or via video call or telephone, between an interviewer and interviewee, where recorded responses to questions are obtained. ​ Portfolio Assessments ○​ A purposeful collection of student works that exhibits the student’s efforts, progress, and achievement in one or more areas. ​ Validity: The extent to which an instrument measures what it is supposed to measure ​ Reliability: The consistency of measurements. ○​ In assessment, reliability relates to the confidence in an instrument to give the same score for a student if the test was given more than once. ○​ A reliable test produces similar scores across various conditions and situations, including different evaluators and testing environments. ​ Types of Tests ○​ Norm-referenced test (NRT): Designed to compare student performance to that of other students. ​ In special education, almost every NRT compares an individual’s student’s score against national averages ​ Emphasizes how the student’s performance compares with that of a particular group of individuals ○​ Standardized tests: Administered and scored consistently; all children receive the same questions and procedures. ​ In special education, these include intelligence tests, math, reading, spelling, writing tests, and perceptual tests. ​ Basal: The starting point of the test. ○​ All items before the basal are not given to the student. These items are considered already correct. ○​ Example: The examiner may start with question 14 on an IQ test because of the child's age. ​ Ceiling: The point where the student has made a predetermined number of errors and stops administering all other items on this test. It is the “ending point” of the test. ○​ Criterion-Referenced Tests (CRT): Scored according to a standard, or criterion, that the teacher, school, or test publisher decides represents an acceptable level of mastery. ​ Mastery: A level or performance on a CRT that shows that a student has demonstrated the knowledge, skills, and abilities for a unit of instruction or subject area defined by a predetermined standard. ​ In other words, it describes “what a student can do.” ​ Basic Statistical Terminology Used in Special Education Assessment ○​ Central Tendency: A measure that attempts to describe a whole data set with a single value representing the middle or center of its distribution. ​ Mean: The average is calculated by adding up all of the scores in your distribution by the total number of scores. In the distribution: 8, 10, 8, 14, and 40, what is the mean score? Step 1: 8 + 10 + 8 + 14 + 40= 80 Step 2: 80/5= 16 The mean is 16. ​ Median: The midpoint in the distribution. It is the middle score. ​ Calculating the median is done by ordering the scores from LOWEST to HIGHEST. Then, cross off the low score and the high score. Repeat step 2 until there is only one number left. In the distribution of scores: 8, 10, 8, 14, 40, calculate the median. Step 1: 8, 8, 10, 14, 40 Step 2: 8, 8, 10, 14, 40 The median is 10. ​ What happens if you have an even number of units? ○​ Repeat the steps above, and when you get to the final two numbers, you take the average of the two numbers. In the distribution of scores: 8, 10, 12, 8, 14, 40, calculate the median. Step 1: 8, 8, 10, 12, 14, 40 Step 2: 8, 8, 10, 12, 14, 40 Step 3: 10 + 12 / 2 = 11 The median score is 11. ​ Mode: The score that occurs most frequently in the distribution. Create a tally and frequency chart. What is the mode in the distribution of 8, 10, 8, 14, 40? Step 1: Score Tally Frequency 40 I 1 14 I 1 10 I 1 8 II 2 The mode is 8.  What is the mode in the 8, 10, 8, 10, 14, 40 distribution? Step 1: Score Tally Frequency 40 I 1 14 I 1 10 II 2 8 II 2 The modes are 8 and 10. (Bimodal distributionion= 2 modes) What is the mode in the distribution of 8, 9, 10, 12, 14, 40, 14 40, 12, 10, 9, 8? Step 1: Score Tally Frequency 8 II 2 9 II 2 10 II 2 12 II 2 14 II 2 40 II 2 There is no mode since all scores appear twice. ○​ Range: The difference between the highest and lowest score in the distribution. In the distribution 8, 10, 8, 14, 40, what is the range? Step 1: 40–8= 32 The range is 32. ​ Importance of the Normal Curve ○​ Standard deviation: Tells you how spread out the data is. ​ About 68% of values will be within 1 standard deviation of the mean. ​ About 95% of values will be within 2 standard deviations of the mean. ○​ Normal Curve:  In a normal distribution with a mean of 90 and a standard deviation of 10, approximately what percentage of scores fall between: ​ 80 and 90? (Answer: 34%) ​ 80 and 100? (Answer: 68%) ​ 80 and 110? (Answer: 81.5%) ​ 100 and 110? (Answer: 13.5%) ○​ Percentile Rank (%ile) ​ A score indicating the percentage of people or scores that occur at or below a given score Example 1: If a student receives a percentile of 75 in a class, this means that he did as well as or better than 75% of the students in the class. Example 2: If a students scores in the 16th percentile, this means she scored as well as or better than only 16% of the population. ○​ Stanines ​ An abbreviation for standard nines, is a type of standard score that has a mean of 5 and a standard deviation of 2. ​ A stanine of 7 is 1 standard deviation above the mean (5+2) ​ A stanine of 9 is 2 standard deviations above the mean (5+2+2) ​ A stanine of 1 is two standard deviations below the mean (5–2–2)