Critique and Assessment Test for ELLs with Disabilities

Document Type:Research Paper

Subject Area:Education

Document 1

The right assessments is essential for setting an educational program for ELLs with disability since such learners show various signs which make it difficult to identify. In certain instances a student who is suspected to be an ELL with disability may score below the average in English, an outcome which can also be an indication of inadequate exposure to English as opposed to the disability. When assessing ELLs a number of factors need to be put into consideration and these include English language literacy abilities, cultural factors, family background and native language literacy abilities. Moreover, educational background is also an important factor to be put into consideration during evaluation of these learners. Incorporating such factors during evaluation is essential as they affect the school performance.

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It assess the learners on the basis of their work in classroom from which their proficiency is determined. The instrument is made of certain components that enhances its performance. They include a 30 minute questionnaires which is filled by the parent at defined ages, initial assessment, which involves measures carried out by the teacher to ascertain the knowledge of the learners about the topic in question, formative assessment which incorporate current checks undertaken by the teacher to establish if the learners are understanding the concept and skills as the aims of the learning and lastly the summative assessment which is an assessment carried out at the end of the class to ascertain the level of understanding of the learners regarding the skills taught in class.

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This last component of the instrument is what constitutes the report submitted to the learner`s parents. Procedure for conducting the test include selecting an individual learner every day as the main focus followed by selection of one mastery and then evaluating all ELLs after a specific class session. Finally, varying linguistic background is a factor in selection provided that a large number of ELLs exhibit a wide variation of linguistic history for example with the majority coming from Spain. This is confirmed by Scott, Hauerwas and Brown (2014), where estimates indicate that a total of 400 different languages are spoken by ELLs and therefore it is important to factor in such variations when selecting and assessing the learners. There also exists a number of issues that influence the assessment of ELLs which include cultural and linguistic bias, political, social and psychological factors, community factors as well as accommodation for the ELLs with special needs.

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Cultural bias may be a factor considering that ELLs come from diversified cultural backgrounds thus, cultural variation has a potential in placing some learners at a disadvantage depending on the consistency of the evaluation used. It has been established for example that learners who are not familiar with American culture are always disadvantaged as compared to their peers since they possess different assumptions concerning the learning environment as they have different history and experience. Accommodation strategy and methodology is another factor of concern when using ESI-R assessmentto evaluate ELLs. The learners being special require specialized direction and instructions due to the learning disability (Klingner, Vaughn & Boardman, 2015). Some ELLs with disabilities fail for a number of reasons including lack of access to English as their second language during instruction and some especially from poor family backgrounds may experience difficulty in circumstances where the instructions comply with the experiences of middles class learners.

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Furthermore, other students may encounter difficulties attributed to cultural diversity as well as language differences. More complications can arise if learning and assessment instructions are not tailored to meet the requirements for the learners with special need and consequently this can result to poor performance as compared to that of their peers. ESI-R assessmentpossess a narrow collection of test items suitable for assessing a specific skill for the special learners because the instruments are mostly designed to evaluate varieties of skills and the instructors usually limit the number of items for a given test. Narrowing down the items reduces the chances of improving the accuracy of the assessment. ESI-R assessmenton the other hand, have various strengths. For instance, it provides detailed descriptions of language ability for particular grade divisions (Orosco & Connor, 2014).

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It also supports learning programs in schools since it delivers effective instructions for English language it many ways such as facilitating identification of first language proficiency of learners, fosters collaboration about interaction concerning the learning development and also helps to develop persistence assessment of English ability in learners. In cases where the intervention fails to work then the instructor may turn to formal education for special education. This is followed by determination of whether the student is eligible for special education which is done by the committee on special education (Klingner, Vaughn, & Boardman, 2015). When the student is established to be eligible for special education then team puts in place the program for special education. Overrepresentation and underrepresentation of ELLs in G/T and SPED In many instances, learners have been unequally categorized in special learning classes a scenario which has resulted to ELLs being over-represented and under-represented in the learning disabilities grouping.

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A number of reasons have been attributed to this including lack of effective and accurate identification methods and criteria. Conclusion The challenges for identifying ELLs with disabilities revolves around training levels of the teachers and unfamiliarity of the teachers with student`s culture, family backgrounds and diversities. Assessment methods also have certain weaknesses including being designed only in white culture, usage of English language to gather information at home where native language is sole language used and use of formal assessment as well as standardized testing making decisions. However, early intervention for ELLs can help in curbing these challenges. The early intervention can include minimizing the number of students believed to be disable by employing effective education and training teachers to understand the diversity of students in terms of their cultures and backgrounds.

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