Assessment Outcomes:

Recommendations for
Weak Mathematic
Performers
By: Katie Chock

Background
O Educational assessments are to

evaluate current school achievement,

predict future achievement, and,
possibly prescribe educational
interventions for children who do not
show enough progress in school.

Background
O During the last decades, educational

psychologists and other professionals

in the field psychology and
educational assessment noticed the
increased demand by teaches to
provide recommendations tailored to
the needs of the individual child.

Background
O The necessity to adapt the curriculum

and instruction by evidence-based

methods to the needs of the students
is expected to be part of the
repertoire of special education
teachers, but is now expected from
regular education.

Study
O 1- How meaningful will this be for

teachers?
O 2- How do teachers estimations of
learning potential would be
influenced by the testing reports
O 3- Investigate teachers opinions
regarding testing information for
guiding individual education plans

Participants
O 116 2nd graders
O 78 girls
O 38 boys
O 23 schools in large cities of

the western part of the

Netherlands
O Ethnicity: Half were Dutch,
half had ethnic minority
background

Qualifications
O Teachers and schools were

interviewed first
O Math scores needed to be in the

bottom 20 percentile with no prior

grade retention

Study
O Students were tested on:
O Grade level cognitive-intellectual

ability
O Memory tasks
O Arithmetic tests
O Dutch school behavior checklist
O Situating an object within a series

Study
O Reports included:
O Description of assessment
O Recommendations regarding math

difficulties
O Explanation of test

Results
O Racial background was irrelevant to

the study
O Not much difference in the arithmetic
and memory tasks
O Experimental group: increases in
scores for number measurement

Results
O It answered the hypothesis of

Experimental teachers would value this

information more than the control group
teachers.
O Experimental group teachers liked the
observation and instruction (2/3-very
meaningful)
O Control group teachers: 1/3 very
meaningful

The End