Universal design principles improve access to learning and assessments for all students. NCEO has created a number of resources about universally designed assessments. The site also links to additional research on the topic.
Assessments
Assessments provide teachers and families with information about a student’s educational performance as they work to achieve CCRS. Formative assessments are used to gather information on a student’s current progress and inform a teacher’s next steps. Summative assessments occur at the end of a learning cycle and measure what a student learned during that cycle.
Some students with disabilities may require accommodations to ensure that assessments accurately reflect their learning. Explore the resources below for additional information on formative and summative assessments, as well as assessment accommodations.
Summative assessments
Formative assessments & informed decision making
The Reform Support Network (RSN) developed an Assessment Design Toolkit to help educators write and select well-designed assessments. The toolkit features 13 modules that address how to plan, write and select well-designed assessments. The modules include videos, Powerpoint Presentations and other materials you can use in professional development trainings. All materials are available to download, edit and repurpose.
Developed in collaboration with nationally recognized researchers and education experts, the Center’s resources about evidence-based instructional and intervention practices—Modules, Case Study Units, Activities, and others (including a number of Web-based tools)—are specifically created for use in college instruction, professional development activities, and independent learning opportunities for practicing educators.
- Accessing the General Education Curriculum: Inclusion Considerations for Students with Disabilities: This Module highlights classroom considerations that promote access to the general education curriculum for students with disabilities.
- Accountability: High-Stakes Testing for Students with Disabilities: This Module presents information on legal requirements and accommodations for testing students with disabilities, in addition to highlighting considerations for interpreting performance data for this population
- Classroom Assessment (Part 1): An Introduction to Monitoring Academic Achievement in the Classroom: This Module discusses how progress monitoring can affect the academic outcomes of students, and it demonstrates how to implement curriculum-based measurement with a classroom of students.
- Classroom Assessment (Part 2): Evaluating Reading Progress: This Module explores in detail the assessment procedures integral to RTI. It also outlines how to use progress monitoring data to determine if a student is meeting the established performance criteria or if more intensive intervention is needed.
- Effective School Practices: Promoting Collaboration and Monitoring Students' Academic Achievement: This Module focuses on the entire school population and highlights partnerships between general education and special education faculty that result in the creation of a 'collective responsibility' and shared high expectations for all students.
- Evidence-Based Practices (Part 3): Evaluating Learner Outcomes and Fidelity: This Module examines how to evaluate whether an evidence-based practice is effective for the young children or students with whom you are working.
- Functional Behavioral Assessment: Identifying the Reasons for Problem Behavior and Developing a Behavior Plan: This Module explores the basic principles of behavior and the importance of discovering the reasons that students engage in problem behavior. The steps to conducting a functional behavioral assessment and developing a behavior plan are described.
- RTI (Part 2): Assessment: This Module explores in detail the assessment procedures integral to RTI. It also outlines how to use progress monitoring data to determine if a student is meeting the established performance criteria or if more intensive intervention is needed.
- RTI (Part 4): Putting It All Together: This Module synthesizes the information in RTI (Parts 1, 2, and 3) to provide teachers and other school.
The Dynamic Learning Maps™ (DLM®) project offers an innovative way for all students with significant cognitive disabilities to demonstrate their learning throughout the school year via the DLM Alternate Assessment System. Traditional multiple-choice testing does not always allow students with significant cognitive disabilities to fully demonstrate their knowledge. By integrating assessment with instruction during the year and providing a year-end assessment, the DLM system maps student learning aligned with college and career readiness standards in English language arts and mathematics.
Accommodations
Developed in collaboration with nationally recognized researchers and education experts, the Center’s resources about evidence-based instructional and intervention practices—Modules, Case Study Units, Activities, and others (including a number of Web-based tools)—are specifically created for use in college instruction, professional development activities, and independent learning opportunities for practicing educators.
- Accommodations: Instructional and Testing Supports for Students with Disabilities: This Module provides an overview of accommodations for students with disabilities; including a definition of accommodations, understanding how accommodations help students with disabilities gain access to the general education curriculum and assessments, understanding the responsibilities of the IEP team for making accommodation decisions for students with disabilities, and information on accessing resources that support the use of accommodations for students with disabilities.
This letter was written and distributed to address the use of a calculator as an accommodation or individual modification for the participation of students with disabilities in State and district-wide assessments.
For Individuals who are Deaf or Hard of Hearing: Accommodations are central to issues of access to education for students who are d/Deaf or hard of hearing (SDHH). However, there are often concerns that accommodations might change the difficulty of a test, particularly when those changes involve different language modalities (e.g., ASL or a signed version of a standardized measure). This paper reviewed the current literature, focusing on the factors that are important to keep in mind when considering the use of accommodations for assessment.
NCEO is a national technical assistance center that provides national leadership in designing and building educational assessments and accountability systems that appropriately monitor educational results for all students with disabilities (SWD), including English learners with disabilities. NCEO works with states and federal agencies to identify important outcomes of education for students with disabilities; examines the participation of SWD in national and state assessments, including the use of accommodations and alternate assessments; evaluates national and state practices in reporting assessment information on SWD; bridges general education, special education, and other systems as they work to increase accountability for results of education for all SWD; and conducts directed research in the area of assessment and accountability.