Standardized achievement tests that are used for assessment and accountability purposes may not provide reliable and valid outcomes for English language learners (ELLs) because extraneous sources may confound the outcome of assessments for these students. Performance assessments, by contrast, may offer opportunities for these students to present a…

This research project addresses the validity of assessments used to measure the performance of English language learners (ELLs), such as those mandated by the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB, 2002). The goals of the research are to help educators understand and improve ELL performance by investigating the validity of their current…

Explores methods of assessing opportunity to learn (OTL) and presents data collected as part of a pilot study of an eighth-grade statewide mathematics assessment to explore issues of validity. Investigates the integrity of various dimensions thought to constitute OTL, analyzes the relationships among teachers' and students' self-reports, and draws…

Assessments in English that are constructed for native English speakers may not provide valid inferences about the achievement of English language learners (ELLs). The linguistic complexity of the test items that are not related to the content of the assessment may increase the measurement error, thus reducing the reliability of the assessment.…

Describes research on the development of a measure of student metacognition. The brief, domain-independent measure serves as a collateral measure in construct validation, supporting exploration of the self-regulatory demands of performance assessment. Results show that metacognition can be directly and explicitly measured in the context of…