In education, the goal of forecasting development is to understand and identify risk for poor learning outcomes so that intervention may be designed effectively and initiated early. Tests of learning potential may be categorized along two dimensions. The first is domain specificity. Domain-general abilities, such as reasoning and language ability,…

Differences between curriculum-based assessment and curriculum-based measurement (CBM) are outlined, and a rationale for CBM's standardized, long-term goal approach to measurement is presented. CBM can be used to develop instructional programs in four ways, including judging the appropriateness of goals and contrasting the efficacy of different…

Two approaches to measurement for instructional decision making (specific subskill mastery measurement and general outcome measurement) are described and illustrated with case studies. The paper concludes that measuring general outcome indicators can bridge traditional and contemporary assessment paradigms to form an innovative approach to…

Procedures for developing curriculum-based measurement (CBM) systems are presented as an approach to special education problem solving. CBM procedures are discussed within the context of a decision-making matrix, focusing on "what" and "how" to measure and how to use data. An example applies the method to reading-aloud…