This article addresses validity and fairness in the testing of English language learners (ELLs)--students in the United States who are developing English as a second language. It discusses limitations of current approaches to examining the linguistic features of items and their effect on the performance of ELL students. The article submits that…

The present framework is developed under contract with the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium (SBAC) as a conceptual and methodological tool for guiding the reasonings and actions of contractors in charge of developing and providing test translation accommodations for English language learners. The framework addresses important challenges in…

The testing of English language learners (ELLs) is, to a large extent, a random process because of poor implementation and factors that are uncertain or beyond control. Yet current testing practices and policies appear to be based on deterministic views of language and linguistic groups and erroneous assumptions about the capacity of assessment…

We contend that generalizability (G) theory allows the design of psychometric approaches to testing English-language learners (ELLs) that are consistent with current thinking in linguistics. We used G theory to estimate the amount of measurement error due to code (language or dialect). Fourth- and fifth-grade ELLs, native speakers of…

Suggests the importance of new paradigms in research and practice on testing English language learners (ELLs) to effectively address the complexities of language and culture, identifying three key issues: test review, test development, and treatment of language as a source of measurement error. Research examples illustrate the importance and…

Conceptual, practical, and logistical issues in the development of science performance assessments (SPAs) are discussed. The conceptual framework identifies task, response format, and scoring system as components, and conceives of SPAs as tasks that attempt to recreate conditions in which scientists work. Developing SPAs is a sophisticated effort…

In a project on the development of performance assessments in science, researchers have developed four types of assessment: comparative, component identification, classification, and observation. They have noted that assessments belonging to the same type of task can be scored for the same performance properties. This paper reports on the…