Linking Curriculum Standards,

Assessment, and Instructional

Practices
. . .when Educating Children with Disabilities

Martha L. Thurlow
National Center on Educational Outcomes February 11, 2003
 Assessment
Standards

Instruction
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 Topics for Discussion
• Why talk about linking?
• Expectations and success
• Building blocks of success
• Some steps for you to take

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 Why talk about linking?
• Standards-based reform
• Individuals with Disabilities
Education Act (IDEA 1997)
• No Child Left Behind Act
(NCLB 2001)
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Standards-Based Reform Context

--- Everything else

is negotiable ---
schedules, place, time, structure,
curriculum, instructional methods,
methods of assessment. . .
 IDEA 1997
. . . a law created within the
context of the standards-
based reform movement . . .

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 Key Provisions in IDEA 97
• Statement of present levels, needs,
and how they affect involvement
and progress in general curriculum
• Annual goals and objectives to
allow involvement and progress in
the general curriculum

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 Key Provisions in IDEA 97
• Services needed to be successful in
the general curriculum
• Modifications and supports to be
successful in the general
curriculum
• LRE statements

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 Key Provisions in IDEA 97
• General educator collaboration
• Assessment – full integration into
standards-based reform
The key provisions in IDEA 97 really
address equity concerns – access to
common standards, challenging
curriculum, and effective instruction
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Standards!
Content standards = what all children
should know and be able to do

Performance/achievement standards =
how well children can demonstrate what
they know and are able to do

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National Center on Educational Outcomes
Status of Content Standards
WA MT ND VT NH
All regular SD
MN ME
OR ID WI
WY MI NY
states, except NV UT
NE IA
IL INOH PA
MA
RI
CO WV CT
KS
Iowa, have CA OK
MO KY
VA
NC
TN DE
NJ
AZ NM AR SC MD
state-level TX LA
MS AL
GA
AK
standards FL
HI

PREL (Pacific Resources for Education and

Learning) has good information on standards-
based learning
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 AFT (2001) recommends that:
• Standards should be explained, along
with the performance levels required to
meet them
• Examples of standards and student work
at various grades and performance levels
should be available to teachers, students,
parents, and the public so that there is a
shared understanding of them
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 Step 1: Dig into your
state’s standards so
that you know what
they are like and
understand them

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 No Child Left Behind
. . . reinforces standards-based
education for all students and
introduces accountability for
results

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 Stated purpose of
No Child Left Behind
“…to ensure that all children have a
fair, equal, and significant
opportunity to obtain a high-quality
education and reach, at a minimum,
proficiency on challenging State
academic achievement standards and
state academic assessments”

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 Key Provisions in NCLB
• Development of grade level
standards and assessments aligned
to those standards
• Inclusion of all students in
assessments, including students
with disabilities and limited
English proficient students
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 Key Provisions in NCLB
• A state accountability system that
defines adequate yearly progress
to ensure that all students reach
proficiency by 2014
• School improvement plans and
consequences when AYP is not
evident
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 Within a Content Area

AYP
Test
Data
combines

Progress
over time
% Proficient + Advanced 12 Years to 100% Proficient
AND Intermediate goals
95% tested Annual measurable objectives
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 This is high stakes!
 For the
system –
schools,
districts,
and states
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National Center on Educational Outcomes
National Center on Educational Outcomes
 The “why” is primarily
about the LAW and
assessments
Is there more to it
than that?
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 Assessment will drive improvements
in instructional programs

For students with disabilities,

participation in assessments will
increase their access to the general
education curriculum, thereby
increasing their opportunity to learn to
high standards.

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 Students who are tested are those
who get taught!

When educators know that students

will be tested, and that their scores will
count, they are more likely to make
sure that they learn what they need to
learn – that they get the resources they
need.

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 Inclusion in assessments may result in
other inclusive opportunities

As students are included in

assessments, the need to access to the
general curriculum becomes more
evident, and promotes the need to
develop instructional activities that are
more appropriate for all students.

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 Negative effects of exclusion are
avoided

Inappropriate referrals to special

education are often avoided – if special
education is an avenue to exclusion

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 Higher expectations emerge for
students who have been suffered from
low expectations

Students in special education

particularly have been subjected to low
expectations (in the guise of protecting
and caring for them), and these in turn
has limited their opportunities to learn

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We obtain data on student
performance, so that we know whether
students are learning and programs
are working – for all students

If we have no data to look at, we have

no basis for making decisions, and we
do not know whether students are
learning and programs are successful
in meeting the goals for students.

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 Instructional programs improve
(especially with professional
development) and student learning
improves!
Evidence is now accumulating that
indicates benefits to educators and to
students.

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 Recent article in the Boston Globe
(December 22, 2002)
Katie Bartlett has spent all of her 17 years
exceeding the expectations the world placed on
her when she was born with Down syndrome. . .
.Still no one was quite sure what would happen
when Bartlett took the MCAS exam, now a
requirement for a high school diploma in
Massachusetts.
This is what happened: She passed

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 Other Data Also Coming to Light
16,000
13,528
New York Regents 14,000
12,607

Number of Students
12,000
Exam, 2001: Number 10,000
of students with 8,000
5,647
9,514
7,545
disabilities passing is 6,000
4,419
4,000
higher than the 2,000 3,414 4,175

number taking in the 0

past 1997 1998 1999 2000

Number Tested Number Passing with Score of 55-100

Trend data across grades in

large southern state – special
education population changes
over time mask closing of gap
between special education and
general education students
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 These success stories are
related to the content
standards, a defined
general curriculum,
aligned instruction, good
assessments, and good
assessment decision
making

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Access to the General Curriculum
is essential, but:
 Is the general curriculum linked to the
content/curriculum standards?
 Has the general curriculum been defined?
General curriculum does NOT = books
General curriculum does NOT = regular
classroom placement

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 Step 2: Identify the
linkages among standards,
especially grade to grade,
then define the general
curriculum
Define access,
participation, and
progress in the general
curriculum for students
with disabilities
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 Building Blocks
• State system of academic content standards
What all students should know and be able to do for future
success
• Curriculum and instructional plans
What and how all students will learn – varied and rich,
multiple settings, resources, authentic applications in the
general curriculum
• Individual student needs, strengths considered
Services and supports to be successful
• Assessment of student performance
Appropriate assessments to document knowledge and skills
rather than disabilities
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National Center on Educational Outcomes
 Assessment Requirements
No Child Left Behind

• Aligned with challenging State standards

• Adequate technical quality for the purpose
• Involve multiple up-to-date measures,
including measures of higher-order
thinking and understanding
• Measure achievement against State
standards in at least mathematics,
reading/language arts, and (beginning in
2007-08) science
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 Reminder: Types of
Assessments – All Important

Eligibility
Classroom Tests Assessments

Large-Scale Assessments
District-wide
Statewide
National

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 Ways to Participate in Assessments

 Same way as other students

 With accommodations
 In an alternate assessment

But, this does not mean that it is simple

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  School accountability systems
 High stakes for students
 Bubble of students without access to the
general curriculum, high expectations
 Lawsuits that suggest new ways of
thinking about accommodations and
other alternatives
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National Center on Educational Outcomes
 Step 3: Recognize the
importance of individualized
assessment decisions –
evaluate these decisions and
revisit them

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 Accommodations
Accommodations are changes in assessment
materials or procedures that allow the
student’s knowledge and skills to be assessed
rather than the student’s disability.

Setting, Timing, Scheduling,

Presentation, Response, Other

Clarify what is okay and not okay!

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 Good Accommodations Decisions
 Start with good instructional decisions
 Raise systematic questions about
accommodations for individual students
What helps student learn or perform better?
What has student or parents told you?
What gets in the way of the student showing skills?
What has the student been taught to use?

 Use data to aid decision making

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 Individualized accommodation decisions
should be linked to the standard, the
construct assessed, the nature of instruction
or the assessment, and the student’s
characteristics
Purposeful reading – reading to select and apply
relevant information for a given task
Does this allow different modes of print
interaction? And, what are the
implications of these different modes for
accommodations?
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 Universally-Designed Assessments
Be part of the movement toward
assessments designed from the beginning
for the widest range of students – not to
assess different standards but to better
assess the standards that we have
 During item development
 During item tryouts
 During item reviews
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Step 4: Push for universally
designed assessments.
Participate on item review teams

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 Alternate Assessments
First introduced in IDEA 97 -

for students unable to

participate in general
state assessments

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National Center on Educational Outcomes
 Alternate Assessments
• Vary from state to state
• Reflect shifting goals for students with
significant cognitive disabilities
 Developmental approaches – 1970s
 Functional approaches – 1980s
 Academic approaches – 1990s

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 Alternate Assessments:
Examples of Current State Practices
• Portfolio, body of evidence - Kentucky
• Performance assessment – Colorado and
Louisiana
• Checklist – Montana, and in one portion of
Oregon’s alternate assessment
• IEP analysis/multiple measures – Vermont

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 Step 5: Explore your state’s
alternate assessment, even if
you do not work with the
students in the alternate
assessment

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Getting back to instruction . . .

This is the critical

cog in the system!

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 AFT recommends:
• Teachers involved in development of grade-
by-grade curriculum aligned to standards
• Specify the learning continuum in the core
subjects to show the progression and
development of critical knowledge and skills
from grade to grade
• Use information on instructional strategies
or techniques to help teach the standards

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 AFT recommends:
• Develop and use performance indicators
of the quality of student work required for
mastery of the content standards
• Create lesson plan data banks that include
exemplary lessons and student work
related to standards-based instruction

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 NEA book suggests:
• Identify needed instructional
accommodations on an individual basis
• Instruct students to identify their own
accommodation needs
• Maintain positive attitude and high
expectations
• Use effective instructional techniques
• Reflect on test results
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 Thurlow, Ysseldyke, and Elliott
recommend:
• Carefully examine existing state and
district assessment data
• Explore trends in performance over
time
• Identify and obtain other data

. . . all to inform programmatic decisions

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 Elliott and Thurlow recommend:
• Integrate transition needs and standards-
based requirements
• Prioritize learning without sacrificing the
foundations for later learning
• Don’t fall prey to teaching-to-the test
unless it is meaningful narrowing of the
curriculum
• Create collaborations and support within
and outside
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or Search for NCEO

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