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September 2010 This info in Spanish | Esta información en español IDEA requires that students with disabilities take part in state or districtwide assessments. These are tests that are periodically given to all students to measure achievement. It is one way that schools determine how well and how much students are learning. This page will tell you how students with disabilities participate in this type of testing. Here’s a quick Table of Contents. In a nutshell
The long story
Back to top In a NutshellTo support the participation of children with disabilities in such large-scale testing, accommodations or modifications may be necessary in how the test is administered or how a given child takes the test. It’s the responsibility of the IEP team to decide how the student with a disability will participate, and then to document that decision in the child’s IEP. Alternatively, the IEP team may decide that a particular test is not appropriate for a child. In this case, the IEP must include:
Let’s take a look at both of these scenarios and what type of information is then included in the IEP. Back to top IDEA’s Exact WordsWhat, precisely, is the provision in IDEA related to assessment accommodations? Found at §300.320(a)(6), it states that the IEP must contain: (6)(i) A statement of any individual appropriate accommodations that are necessary to measure the academic achievement and functional performance of the child on State and districtwide assessments consistent with §612(a)(16) of the Act; and (ii) If the IEP Team determines that the child must take an alternate assessment instead of a particular regular State or districtwide assessment of student achievement, a statement of why— (A) The child cannot participate in the regular assessment; and (B) The particular alternate assessment selected is appropriate for the child… In these words, you can easily see the two scenarios we’re going to discuss now.
Back to top The Short-ish Story on Assessment AccommodationsChildren with disabilities must participate in their state’s grade-level assessments to determine their level of content mastery, just as their peers without disabilities must participate, unless a child’s IEP Team determines that a given assessment is not appropriate for the child. Recognizing that disability has its impact, IDEA permits children with disabilities to participate in large-scale assessment programs with accommodations. Those accommodations are individually determined for a given child by his or her IEP team. What Kind of Accommodations Are There?Making an accommodation in testing generally means that some aspect of the testing condition has been altered so that a child with a disability can more fully show what he or she knows or can do. Accommodations in the classroom and those in assessment situations tend to fall into several types of changes—timing, scheduling, setting, presentation, response :
The type of accommodation any one child with a disability receives is based on an individual consideration of that child’s needs. Presentation accommodations:
Response accommodations:
Setting accommodations:
Time/Scheduling:
Assessment accommodations tend to be—and should be—similar to classroom accommodations children with disabilities receive, so that the children are familiar with the accommodation before using it in a formal testing situation. However, IEP teams should not confuse classroom accommodations with assessment accommodations. What is permitted in class may not necessarily be permitted in state or districtwide assessments. Back to top Finding Out More About Your State’s PoliciesThe best place, of course, to find out more about your State’s policies for assessment accommodations—what’s allowable, in other words—is your State Department of Education. (Local policies may also be a factor to consider, so the LEA should also be contacted.) That said, one place you might consult for this information and to gain a sense of what other states are doing as well:
Back to top What about Alternate Assessments?What happens if an IEP Team determines that it is inappropriate for a specific child with a disability to participate in a state or LEA’s large-scale assessment, even with accommodations? Well, alternate assessments happen, and so do statements in the IEP explaining why this is an appropriate approach to use with a given child. IDEA requires states to develop and implement at least one alternate assessment, unless all children with disabilities in the State can be assessed via the general assessment, with or without accommodations. Alternate assessments may be based on:
These options are discussed at length below, under “The Long Story.” Here, we’re interested in giving you a broad overview of the possibilities. Keep in mind that a state is not required to make all of these options available to children, so it’s important to know what your state’s policies and options are. Additional information on alternative assessment is widely available. A few “Starter” resources include: Alternate Assessments for Students with Disabilities State Alternate Assessment Policies Back to top Where to Find Out More About AccommodationsHere’s a brief “Starter List” of resources on assessment accommodations that will undoubtedly lead you to yet more resources. Be aware that these may include discussion of classroom assessment accommodations and are often linked to discussion of classroom accommodations in general. An Introduction to Assessment
Accommodations: Accommodations for Students with Disabilities Types of Assessment Accommodation Back to top The Long Story on Assessment AccommodationsMore? Oh yes. Namely—more about the assessment options available to children with disabilities that the IEP team will consider. The 5 Assessment OptionsAccording to the Department of Education (2007), there are five basic assessment options, as follows:
These options sound uncomfortably alike, don’t they? What, exactly, are “academic achievement standards” and the difference between those that are alternate, modified, or at grade-level? To start, it’s useful to know that grade-level assessments must be closely aligned with grade-level content standards. Content standards establish the information or skills that a child in a specific grade is expected to learn. Grade-level assessments are intended to find out if the child, in fact, has learned that content and to what level of proficiency. Keep this in mind as you read through the options described below. Back to top Options 1 and 2: Participation With or Without Accommodations You’ve already read about Options 1 and 2, above. Option 3: Participation in Alternate Assessment Based on Grade-Level Academic Achievement Standards This type of alternate assessment is intended for children who cannot take the regular assessment, even with accommodations, but for whom the State’s grade-level academic achievement standards are nonetheless still appropriate. An example of this might be a child who has a severe physical disability that cannot be accommodated in the general assessment without invalidating his or her test scores but who nonetheless is working to achieve the academic standards established for his or her grade level. This type of alternate assessment allows the child’s mastery of grade-level content to still be determined. Back to top Option 4: Participation in Alternate Assessment Based on Modified Academic Achievement Standards This type of alternate assessment is a new option recently made available to states (April 2007) with the publication of final regulations in NCLB governing its use. States are not required to develop such assessments, but they can if they so choose. Alternate assessments based on modified academic achievement standards are intended for a small group of children “whose disability has precluded them from achieving grade-level proficiency and whose progress is such that they will not reach grade-level proficiency in the same time frame as other students” (U.S. Department of Education, 2007, p. 8). For these children, the general grade-level assessments are too difficult, and the alternate assessments based on alternate academic achievement standards are too easy (they’re meant for children with the most significant cognitive disabilities; Option 5, described below). Either type of assessment will not provide teachers, children, families, and others with accurate information on what a child with a disability knows or can do and, thus, what type of instruction or supports will help the child progress toward grade-level achievement. The Department of Education (2007) has responded to this gap in assessment options by giving states “the option of developing modified academic achievement standards for a small group of students with disabilities who can make significant progress, but who may not reach grade-level achievement in the time frame covered by their IEP” (p. 20). Using this approach does not alter the content standards established by a state for a specific grade level. In fact, such an alternate assessment must cover the same grade-level content as the general assessment. However, “the achievement expectations are less difficult than those on the general test” (emphasis added), which means that “the same content is covered in the test, but with less difficult questions overall” (p. 28). Two final points about alternate assessments that are based on modified academic achievement standards. First: A child may take this type of alternate assessment in one subject (e.g., reading), yet take the general assessment in another subject (e.g., math). Deciding how the child will be assessed in each applicable subject area is the responsibility of the IEP team. However, just as it is the state’s choice to develop (or not) an alternate assessment based on modified academic achievement standards, it also can decide to modify academic achievement standards only for certain grades (e.g., grades 6 through 8, or for high school) and develop only those alternate assessments corresponding to those modified standards. Similarly, the state can choose to “develop an alternate assessment based on modified academic achievement standards in only one subject (e.g., reading), but not in all subjects (e.g., math, science)” (Ahearn, 2006). Second: Every year the IEP team must review its decision to assess a child based on modified academic achievement standards. As the Department of Education (2007) states: We expect that there will be students with disabilities who take an alternate assessment based on modified academic achievement standards one year, make considerable progress during the school year, and then take the general grade-level assessment the following year. Therefore, an IEP Team must consider a student’s progress annually based on multiple, objective measures of the student’s achievement before determining that the student should be assessed based on modified academic achievement standards. (p. 23) The option that states now have to develop and implement alternate assessments based on modified academic achievement standards clearly adds another dimension to how children with disabilities may participate in a state’s assessment programs. However, as has been said, a state is not required to develop such assessments. For your convenience, here are direct links to the new regulations, the Department’s 51-page guidance for states, and its two-page Fact Sheet on this option to assessment. Regulations on Alternate Assessment Based on Modified Academic Achievement Standards: Department’s Non-Regulatory Guidance: Fact Sheet: http://www.ed.gov/parents/needs/speced/twopercent.html Back to top Option 5: Participation in Alternate Assessment Based on Alternate Academic Achievement Standards Option 5 sounds almost the same as Option 4, but it isn’t. Fortunately, the difference between modified academic achievement standards and alternate ones can be easily described. Alternate assessments based on alternate academic achievement standards are intended for children with the most significant cognitive disabilities. While this type of alternate assessment must be linked to grade-level content, it typically does not fully represent grade-level content, only a sampling of it. Moreover, this type of alternate assessment may be linked to “extended content standards” that a state develops, standards that may restrict or simplify grade-level content in order to make it accessible to children with the most significant cognitive disabilities (U.S. Department of Education, 2007, p. 18). The state may define these content standards in grade clusters (e.g., grades 3-5). (In contrast, Option 4, alternate assessments based on modified academic achievement standards, must define content standards grade by grade.) Back to top Summing Up The OptionsEach of the five options described above represents a way in which children with disabilities may participate in large-scale assessments. Looking at them one by one is useful for grasping what each is about, but when it comes to choosing among them—that is, deciding which represents the appropriate way to assess a specific child with a disability—a comparison of their key elements can be a handy tool. To that end, the Department of Education provides a chart of comparisons in Appendix 1 of its non-regulatory guidance on alternate assessment based on modified academic achievement standards. This chart is available online at: http://www.ed.gov/policy/speced/guid/nclb/twopercent.doc Back to top Decisions, DecisionsThe IEP team needs to know which of these options are available to it (based on state and/or on local policies) and determine which one of those is appropriate for the child. How a team determines what’s appropriate for the child will vary from state to state based on state policy, which the state must make clear to IEP teams so that they can make informed and appropriate choices. Back to top So what goes in the IEP?Let’s bring the discussion full circle and back to the component of the IEP that this article addresses: any “individual appropriate accommodations” necessary for the child’s functional and academic achievement to be measured on a state and districtwide assessment. If participating in such an assessment is appropriate for a specific child with a disability, then that child’s IEP Team must enumerate in the IEP any individual accommodations the child will need during testing. Some children may need no accommodations. Many will need accommodations. It’s important for IEP teams to know what type of accommodations can be made without invalidating a child’s test scores and which accommodations the state permits. Back to top ReferencesAhearn, E. (2006). Standards-based IEPs: Implementation in selected states. Alexandria, VA: Project Forum, National Association of State Directors of Special Education (NASDSE). Thompson, S.J., Morse, A.B., Sharpe, M., & Hall, S. (2005, August). Accommodations manual: How to select, administer, and evaluate use of accommodations for instruction and assessment of students with disabilities (2nd ed.). Washington, DC. Council of Chief State School Officers. Available online at: https://osepideasthatwork.org/node/109 U.S. Department of Education. (2007, April). Modified academic achievement standards [non-regulatory guidance draft]. Washington, DC: Author. Available online at: http://www.ed.gov/policy/speced/guid/nclb/twopercent.doc Back to top Would you like to read about another component of the IEP?If so, use the links below to jump there quickly. _________________________________________________ Present Levels Annual Goals Benchmarks or Short-Term Objectives Measuring and Reporting Progress Special Education Related Services Supplementary Aids and
Services Program Modifications for School Personnel Extent of Nonparticipation Accommodations in Assessment (you’re already here!) Service Delivery Transition Planning Age of Majority Back to top Which one of the following provides the best definition of special education?Special education may be best described as a purposeful intervention designed to overcome or eliminate the obstacles that keep children with disabilities from learning. In other words, it is about providing children with disabilities with individualized plans of instruction to help them succeed.
Which of the following is used to activate students knowledge and encourages the use of predictions?Anticipation guides stimulate students' interest in a topic and set a purpose for reading. They teach students to make predictions, anticipate the text, and verify their predictions. They connect new information to prior knowledge and build curiosity about a new topic.
Why are drill and practice programs typically effective with students who have special needs?Research has shown that using drill-and-practice software is an effective instructional strategy to use with students who have a specific learning disability in mathematics because such software provides students with repeated opportunities to practice facts, immediate feedback, and the opportunity to experience ...
What do we call skills that help students make decisions and direct their own behavior to achieve their goals?Metacognition refers to a student's knowledge of their own thought process. A metacognitive thinking process allows students to self-regulate and direct their thoughts, behaviors, and actions toward their goals.
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