The 19 chapters of this text on assessment in special education are divided into two parts. Part 1 discusses basic concepts in assessment in special education. Part 2 addresses the special education process by describing steps in the assessment continuum. Individual chapters examine the following topics: (1) an introduction to assessment; (2)…

Procedures are described to determine reliability and validity of the Brockton (Massachusetts) Battery's Tests of Reading Readiness and the Adaptive Behavior Scales, which were developed to assess performance levels of Hispanic, Portuguese, and Cape Verdean normal and high risk children. Among reasons given for development of the instruments are…

A detailed description is provided of the variable, procedures fostering coordination and improvement of the school program (GOSB), which is part of the analysis in phase I of the Evaluation of Practices in Individualized Schooling. The variable is defined; the questionnaires on which the variable is based are listed; the procedures used to scale…

High school and college grades are suggested to have the nature of ordinal scales rather than interval scales; hence the median is the appropriate and preferred average, rather than the mean. The use of a median grade point average has some of the major advantages of pass-fail grading. Assuming grades to be ordinal rather than interval data…

Lortie has described teacher sentiments that meld into a structure called the autonomy/equality norm. This norm helps preserve the separation of teaching from organizational and collegial purviews. As part of a larger study which looks for conditions that affect and are influenced by variations in task interdependence among teachers, an effort was…

The study reported here deals with the problem of determining what testing device can best indicate a foreign student's readiness for satisfactory performance at the college level, especially in courses requiring a good command of reading and writing skills in English. The study considers several standard proficiency tests and devises a formula…

Thirty-four papers on educational statistics which were presented at the 1971 AERA Conference are summarized. Six major interest areas are covered: (a) general information; (b) non-parametric methods; (c) errors of measurement and correlation techniques; (d) regression theory; (e) univariate and multivariate analysis; (f) factor analysis. (MS)

Efforts to determine the prevalence of serious emotional disturbance in preschool-aged children have been hampered by the lack of a validated measure. The Preschool and Early Childhood Functional Assessment Scale (PECFAS) is a multi-dimensional measure that assesses the psychosocial functioning of children aged 3-7 years. The concurrent validity…

This booklet is one of six texts from a workplace literacy curriculum designed to assist learners in facing the increased demands of the workplace. The booklet contains seven sections that cover the following topics: (1) meaning of total quality management (TQM); (2) the customer; (3) the organization's culture; (4) comparison of management…

The Auditory Automotive Mechanics Diagnostic Achievement Test assesses an automobile mechanic's ability to determine mechanical faults from auditory cues alone. The 44-item test and its instructions are recorded on magnetic tape; answer choices are presented on tape, and are also written in the printed test booklets. The norming and validity…

The objective of this study was to examine the attitudes of elementary school children toward school and subject matters as they related to such factors as sex and grade level. A two-instrument battery, the Affective Reporting System, was administered to 2,846 elementary school children. Results indicated a general decline in attitude toward…

Forming a sequence covering the various aspects of the simplex model, four articles are presented here under the following titles: "A Simplex Model for Analyzing Academic Growth", "Analyzing Ratings With Correlated Intrajudge Measurement Errors", "The Correlation of States With Gain", and "The Reliability of…

The controversy on the importance of children's attitudes toward their educational experiences has focused on two major questions: First, are attitudes an appropriate concern for educational systems; and second, are attitudes important as correlates of critical educational behaviors or simply as ends in themselves? This study attempted to add some…

The main hypothesis was that the unit is appropriate for use at the kindergarten level. The evaluation was based upon the examination of four factors: 1) the reliability and item characteristics of the unit text; 2) the effect of bias associated with pupil sex, race, socio-economic status on geography achievement and learning gains; 3) the effect…

The effectiveness of the elementary level guidance program, Developing Understanding of Self and Others (DUSO), is assessed. Intended for use by counselors of children ages 5-8, the DUSO program is designed to help children understand social-emotional behavior through listening, inquiry, discussion, and role play. The DUSO Affectivity Device,…