Tips for Assessing ELL Students

1) Use Authentic Assessments that draw on Real-life Experiences

* Because cultural background and previous experiences greatly influence how students’ think and achieve, ELLs will learn more effectively when tasks connect to their personal experiences and prior knowledge.

  

2) Use Multiple Forms of Assessment

* Standardized testing is often not fair, reliable, or valid for ESL students. Therefore, in order to gain a better understanding of what an ESL understands, observational and formative data should be noted throughout each lesson, and students need to be provided with a variety of opportunities to show how they learn and to demonstrate what they know. Performance-based assessments are especially appropriate.

3) Use Performance-Based Assessments

* Performance-based assessments are especially appropriate for ELL students because these assessments provide the opportunity to express content knowledge though essays, oral presentations, open-ended problems, hands-on problems, and real-world simulations. However, when using performance-based assessments, teachers must be sure to set clear expectations by carefully defining criteria connected to the ESL or content standards in order to ensure each student is evaluated on knowledge, as opposed to language ability.

4) Allow Students to Evaluate Themselves

* Self-assessments provide students with the opportunity to identify their accomplishments and areas of further development. Reflecting on their own educational performance encourages ELL students to be to be active participants in their learning.

5) Provide Appropriate Accommodations

* Test accommodations are important in order to accurately evaluate a student’s knowledge and understanding. Because ELL children face the added challenges of language development and culture differences, accommodations act as a way to level the playing field. Examples of accommodations include extended time, assistive technology (text-to speech software, grammar/spellcheck, etc.), simplified language, prompting/cueing, the use of a scribe, manipulatives, and test modifications. These accommodations should be used all year long and be incorporated into regular instruction.