Setting the Stage
• Physical working conditions greatly impact test
performance
• High levels of focus / attention are required
• Minimize opportunities for distraction
The Examiner: Friend or Foe?
• The assessment process can be intimidating for many
students
• Take 3-5 minutes to establish rapport
• Establish a positive relationship
• Demonstrate that you care about helping the student more
than about the test.
Introducing the Assessment
• Explain purpose of the assessment using positive
language
• “I’d like us to do a few activities similar to what you do
in class everyday. This will let me know how you are
doing and how I can help.”
• The goal is for students to perceive the assessment as a
helpful tool instead of a dreaded test
Standardization: a basis for
comparison
• Goal of assessment is to understand an individual’s
skills compared to a representative sample
• Following standardization rules ensures that results can
be interpreted accurately
• Breaking standardization cannot help the student, but
may be harmful
Standard Scores
• Raw scores are transformed into standard scores
based on the performance of the normative sample.
• Most standardized tests we use in the schools have an
average of 100 and a standard deviation of 15.
• Standard scores express how far a student’s score lies
above or below the average of the total distribution of
scores.
Bell Curve
Standard Error Of
Measurement (SEM) and
Confidence Bands
•Tests are imperfect, therefore test scores are imperfect.
No standardized test is perfectly reliable.
•The obtained score on a given day is likely to be
different than what it would be on another day.
•Confidence bands around the obtained score reflect the
known degree of imprecision.
SEM and Confidence Bands
• Most tests allow the examiner to choose the level of
confidence to place around the obtained score: 68%,
90% or 95%.
• As the percentage of ‘confidence’ increases, the width
of the confidence band increases.
• Comparing confidence bands on subtests help guide
the interpretation of cluster scores (more on this
later).
Percentile Ranks
• Shows a student’s relative position compared to the
standardization sample.
• Performance at the 45th percentile means the student
did as well or better than 45 percent of peers in the
normative sample.
• Not the same as percent correct. PR refers to
percentage of people, PC refers to a percentage of
items correct.
Age and Grade Equivalents Cautions:
• They likely do not reflect the student’s actual skill level.
• They are not equal units, therefore they cannot be added,
subtracted or averaged.
• The difference between GE’s of 2.1 and 2.3 are not the
same as differences between GE’s of 7.1 and 7.3.
• That said, AE’s and GE’s on the WJ-III/NU are not all bad.
If Test Results Don’t Support
Teacher’s Observations in the
Classroom
• Compare task demands (e.g., Writing Samples vs more
typical writing tasks in the classroom).
• Compare observed behavior in the classroom to
behavior during the 1:1 testing session.
• Look at RPI vs Standard Score.
Woodcock Johnson Clusters
“What are we measuring?”
1.
2.
Basic Reading Skills—measures skill in applying phonic and
structural analysis skills to the pronunciation of unfamiliar
printed words. Subtests include Letter-Word ID and Word
Attack. Reading passages in science class, books/poems in
English, cell formation in Biology, story problems in Math.
Reading Comprehension—a students ability to read a short
passage and pick an appropriate word so the passage makes
sense. Can a student understand, make sense, and relay what
they have read in sequence? After reading a passage, can a
student answer who, what, where questions?
“What are we measuring?”
1. Written Expression—how quickly/fluently a student
can not only write, but formulate, a simple sentence.
How creative a student can be in formulating
sentences when given certain demands. For
example, in the classroom, this may include journal
entries, stories, poems, essays, etc.
“What are we measuring?”
1. Math Calculation Skills—students basic calculation skills.
The foundations of math skills. Adding, subtracting,
multiplying, dividing, and a combination of these basic
computations. Depending on student level, this could
include some components of trigonometry, geometry,
and calculus.
2. Math Reasoning Skills—a student must listen to the
problem, recognize the procedure to solve this problem,
and do the calculations. This area measures a students
ability to pick out important information from a
paragraph of extraneous information and compute
relatively basic calculations.
How do we explain results to
parent/staff?
1. Bell curve to demonstrate average level and where
the student falls in relation to others the students
same age/grade. Use a laminated copy with white
board marker.
Explanation of Results:
1.
Woodcock Johnson Tests of Achievement Printouts:
TABLE OF SCORES
Woodcock-Johnson III Normative Update Tests of Achievement (Form A)
WJ III NU Compuscore and Profiles Program, Version 3.2
Norms based on age 15-2
CLUSTER/Test
Raw W AE
EASY to DIFF RPI SS (68% Band) GE
BRIEF READING
- 532 15-11 13-3 25 92/90 103 (99-107) 10.4
BASIC READING SKILLS - 543 26 16-0 >30 97/90 112 (108-117) 13.2
READING COMP
- 518 12-11 10-8 16-7 81/90 92 (88-96) 7.5
WRITTEN EXPRESSION
- 511 12-8 10-4 18-1 80/90 91 (86-96) 7.2
________________________________________
Letter-Word Identification 70 556 23 16-2
>30
98/90
112 (108-116)
13.0
Writing Fluency
17 501 10-3 8-11 12-0 46/90 78 (73-84) 4.9
Passage Comprehension 33 509 11-6 9-6 14-11 74/90 89 (84-95) 6.1
Writing Samples
18-D 520 >30 13-9 >30 95/90 109 (103-116) 13.0
Word Attack
30 530 >30 15-3 >30 96/90 109 (102-116) 14.8
Reading Vocabulary
- 526 14-2 11-10 17-7 86/90 97 (93-100) 8.7
________________________________________
WJ Printouts Continue:
1. Age/Grade Profile: graphic depicts where a student
falls based upon his chronological age in relation to
the average level.
2. Standard Score/Percentile Rank Profiles.
3. Parent Report depicts boxes of ‘negligible’, ‘very
limited’, ‘limited’, limited to average’, average’,
‘average to advanced’, ‘advanced’, and ‘very
advanced’. This report puts X’s in the areas where
the student falls for each task. Also provides
national percentiles for each task.
Other Presentation
Styles/Ideas:
1. Document camera so everyone is looking at same
documents.
2. Projector so everyone can follow the IEP/ESER at
the same time and see what notes, changes, or
additions are added.
3. Copies of evaluation results for everyone at the
meeting.
4. Sit near the parent/guardian so you can talk to them
about the results, show them the information on
your charts, graphs, bell curves, etc. and be able to
clarify anything confusing.
Remember….
Not all parents/guardians/staff understand statistics,
standard scores, scaled scores, bell curves, averages,
etc. Talk in simple terms and DESCRIBE
subtests/clusters as they relate to the child in the
classroom!
Resources:
0 WJ-III Assessment Service Bulletins can be found
here:
http://www.riverpub.com/clinical/wjasb.html
#5 compares WJ-III with other achievement tests
#8 discusses educational interventions based on WJ-III/
NU performance.
#11 explains the W scale and the Relative Proficiency
Index (RPI)
0 Essentials of WJ III Tests of Achievement Assessment,
Mather, Wendling and Woodcock, 2001