Assessments used in Educating Children for special services.
- Comprehensive Assessment.
A comprehensive assessment is a coordinated combination of various assessments that are valid and reliable to be used for a specific purpose for a given environment. In education, a comprehensive assessment is used to organize the context of the process of educating children who need special services to make effective training decisions. Examples include environmental assessment and the quality of adult-child interactions. - Formal vs. Informal Assessment.
Formal assessment is the process of using a standardized procedure such as an exam to analyze a student while informal assessment involves observations and interactions with no clear guidelines. Formal assessment is commonly used in schools to rate students’ academic and skill achievement. It can also be used as a measure of intelligence in some instances. Informal assessment may involve asking questions and interactions, while formal assessment includes questionnaires and tests. - Norm reference tests
Norm reference tests are tests that offer a ranking in terms of percentages. The test uses graphs, charts, and other statistical approaches to find a rating of a given case. Success tests include IQ tests and SATS. For example, the average score of many people in an IQ test is 100. 130 to 134 levels of IQ are moderately gifted, while average intelligence is between 84 to 114 and 115 and 129 averagely gifted.
- Why is it essential for standardized testing procedures to be strictly followed when administering norm-referenced tests? Standardized approaches are used in norm-referenced tests to ensure equality in rating the student’s necessary assessment parameters such as IQ. Standardized procedures are used to provide the candidates under examination are given an equal testing environment.
- Criterion-referenced tests. Criterion reference tests are tests used to analyze the test scores for a student to predict their behaviors. The National Assessment of Educational Progress is an example of a criterion-referenced test.
- Intelligence tests. Intelligence tests are tests that are done to students to measure the levels of IQ. The most commonly used intelligence test it the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children.
- Communicative and language tests
This is a test that was developed to analyze how elaborate a student can be in language proficiency. The test is considered a restructured communicative approach used in teaching language. - Academic achievement tests. Academic achievement tests show the performance of a child in a standard test done in a given school. The prevailing academic achievement tests that are done include ACT and SAT tests. Generally, the SAT is considered a more skill-oriented and aptitude test, while the ACT measures academic performance in various subjects. Some schools have a minimum requirement in specific subjects like math and science.
- Behavior emotional and social development assessments. Social and emotional development tests are tests meant to determine the perceptions that children have towards their families, friends themselves, and the environment and their reactions towards the same. This tests supplements psychological tests and determines the child’s personality and other social traits. To do emotional and social development assessment, a standardized method is used. The ways that are commonly used are gifted assessments and psychoeducation tests.