Accessibility of Computer-Based Testing for Individuals with Disablities and English Language Learners within a Validity Framework

Author(s):  
Eric G. Hansen ◽  
Robert J. Mislevy

There is a great need for designers of computer-based tests and testing systems to build accessibility into their designs from the earliest stages, thereby overcoming barriers faced by individuals with disabilities and English language learners. Some important potential accessibility features include text-to-speech, font enlargement and screen magnification, online dictionaries, and extended testing time. Yet accessibility features can, under some circumstances, undermine the validity of test results. Evidence centered assessment design (ECD) is offered as a conceptual framework—providing sharable terminology, concepts, and knowledge representations—for representing and anticipating the impact of accessibility features on validity, thus helping weigh the consequences of potential design alternatives for accessible computer-based tests and testing systems.

2011 ◽  
pp. 2529-2564
Author(s):  
Eric G. Hansen ◽  
Robert J. Mislevy

There is a great need for designers of computer-based tests and testing systems to build accessibility into their designs from the earliest stages, thereby overcoming barriers faced by individuals with disabilities and English language learners. Some important potential accessibility features include text-to-speech, font enlargement and screen magnification, online dictionaries, and extended testing time. Yet accessibility features can, under some circumstances, undermine the validity of test results. Evidence centered assessment design (ECD) is offered as a conceptual framework—providing sharable terminology, concepts, and knowledge representations—for representing and anticipating the impact of accessibility features on validity, thus helping weigh the consequences of potential design alternatives for accessible computer-based tests and testing systems.


2020 ◽  
Vol 24 (1) ◽  
pp. 2156759X2097956
Author(s):  
Adonay A. Montes ◽  
Erika Ramos

The purpose of this study was to explore the impact of an 8-week academic navigational capital group with English language learner (ELL) students. Minimal research exists examining ELL students’ acquisition of navigational capital skills (skills needed to navigate and succeed in academic settings) in school. We used a pre- and postintervention survey to measure the impact of the group. Results showed growth in the academic navigational capital skills of all participants. Such increases represent a starting blueprint to consider when working with ELL students.


2014 ◽  
Vol 100 ◽  
pp. 153-155
Author(s):  
Lucy Arnold Steele

This review compares the ethnographic research of Jessica Zacher Pandya’s Overtested: How High-Stakes Accountability Fails English Language Learners with the programmatic prescriptions of Yvette Jackson’s Pedagogy of Confidence. Both texts are concerned with the impact of standardized testing on urban students, but the focus of each book is quite different in terms of public policy on education and the way teacher roles are construed.


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