ACCOUNTING FOR PROGRESS

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ACCOUNTING FOR PROGRESSONE CHILD AT A TIME

• TOPICS
• ISTAR (Indiana Standards Tool for Alternate
  Reporting)
• Assessment System
• Purpose, Functions, and Content Sheron Cochran
• Technology Demonstration Dawn McGrath
• General Supervision Enhancement Grant
• Outcome Measurement Tool for Children in First
  Steps
• Dawn Downer
• Description of Grant Activities -
• Ann Ruhmkorff

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ISTAR OVERVIEW

• Broad Description of ISTAR Assessment
• Multiple Purposes of ISTAR
• Why It Was Selected to Measure Progress for
  Preschool Children with Disabilities
• Connection to the Foundations
• ISTAR Content

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WHAT IS ISTAR?

• It is a web-based standards-referenced assessment
  system provided free of charge by the Department
  of Education, Division of Exceptional Learners.
• It utilizes teacher ratings to measure the
  progress of students.
• It is a continuous process. The child does not
  take a test.

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ISTARMULTIPLE PURPOSES

• Indianas Alternate Assessment Component under
  IDEIA and NCLB for grades 3-10. Legal Basis
• Academic Assessment of Limited English Proficient
  Students Legal Basis
• Supplemental Assessment
• May be used to measure progress of any student in
  relation to grade level expectations.
• Gifted and Talented Students

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ISTARMULTIPLE PURPOSES

• Beginning with the 2004-2005 school year, schools
  must assess all early childhood students with
  disabilities using ISTAR so that the SEA can
  carry out its duty to collect information
  regarding performance goals. Legal Basis
• Indianas SPP/APR must address improvement in
  positive social-emotional skills, acquisition and
  use of knowledge and skills including early
  language and communication, early literacy, and
  use of appropriate behaviors to meet their needs.

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Why ISTAR Selected as Indianas Early Childhood
Assessment

• Builds on previous work
• Authentic assessment for ALL children
• On-going assessment
• Provides parents and teachers with graphic
  representation of the progress of the child
• ISTAR indicators are aligned to Foundations for
  Young Children and Academic Standards
• Helps guide instruction
• Can assist the IEP team in forming IEP goals

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CONNECTION TO THE FOUNDATIONS AND ACADEMIC
STANDARDS

• ISTAR is a direct derivative of the Foundations
  for Young Children to the Indiana Academic
  Standards and the Indiana Academic Standards.
• Extensions to the Foundations and academic
  standards have been included to create a
  continuum of access for all children beginning
  from birth.

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ISTAR CONTENTEXTENSIONS TO STANDARDS

• Extensions to the academic standards of
  mathematics and English/language arts have been
  developed to include four levels of progress
  prior to kindergarten
• Basic 1 (B1) Birth to two years of age
• Basic 2 (B2) Two to three years of age
• Foundations 1 (F1) Three to four years of age
• Foundations 1 (F2) Four to five years of age

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Birth through the highest level of performance
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ISTAR CONTENTFUNCTIONAL ACHIEVEMENT SKILLS

• Functional Achievement Indicators are in 3
  categories
• Physical Skills
• Personal Care Skills
• Social-Emotional Skills
• ISTAR measures growth throughout life. 100 of
  skills represents what would be expected of a
  fully independent adult. It is reasonable to
  expect low scores for a young child in an early
  childhood program.

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ISTAR CONTENTSeparate Speech Interface

• There is a separate interface designed for
  speech-language pathologists (SLP). If a child
  receives speech services from an SLP , the child
  must be rated on communication skills through the
  separate interface.
• The SLP items are grouped into four areas
  social interaction, comprehension, expressive
  communication, and speech intelligibility.

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ISTAR CONTENTSeparate Speech Interface

• These areas contain assessment elements in the
  general listening and speaking standard plus
  additional items that are specific to SLP
  expertise. Students with communication disorders
  who receive services solely from the SLP may be
  rated strictly in these 4 areas.

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ISTAR CONTENTPARTICIPATION

• Assessments should begin as teachers/therapists
  become familiar with incoming students.
• ISTAR assessment should be collected naturally
  and periodically throughout the year.
• ISTAR is to be completed collaboratively if there
  is more than one provider.

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ISTAR CONTENTSCORING

• ISTAR is scored through use of a 3-point rubric
  (See page 30 in Handbook). Educators base these
  ratings on observation, work samples, portfolios,
  and other indicators of performance. Scores are
  used to measure individual and group progress.

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ISTAR CONTENTWHEN DOES REPORTING OCCUR?

• Assessments are to be completed
• During the quarter of entrance
• During the quarter of exit
• During the quarter of each birth month
• If an exit or entrance assessment is done in the
  quarter of the birth month, one assessment serves
  both purposes.

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ISTARDEMONSTRATION

• DAWN McGrath, Director of ISTAR/ICAN Project
• View technology
• Establishing Accounts
• Maintaining Security
• Training, technical support, materials
• www.istar.doe.state.in.us

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Outcome Measurement Tool for Children in First
Steps

• First Steps Annual Outcome Study
• ISTAR

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First Steps Annual Outcome Study

• Entrance Interviews
• Exit Interviews
• IFSP Current Level of Performance
• Crosswalk with SPP/APR Outcomes
• Limitations

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ISTAR

• Measure attainment of skills linked to state
  academic standards
• Basic 1 birth to two years
• Basic 2 two to three years
• Functional Skills
• On-line accessibility
• IFSP Team reporting and review
• Parent Reports

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Early Childhood Assessment

• Enhancement of Basic 1 and Basic 2 for children
  birth through three years
• Include developmental domains (physical,
  cognitive, communication, social-emotional, and
  adaptive) in addition to state academic standards

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Early Childhood Assessment

• Appropriate for children with and without
  developmental delay/disability
• Part C
• Child Care, Healthy Families, Childrens
  Services, Early Head Start
• Crosswalk with SPP/APR child outcomes

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Goal

• Develop the Early Childhood Assessment (ISTAR
  Basic 1, Basic 2 and Functional Skills) into a
  comprehensive system for all children - including
  those who are typically developing as well as
  those identified with a disability and served in
• Part C.
• Develop one assessment tool that could be aligned
  with all reporting requirements
• Indiana Part C Outcomes
• Indianas academic standards
• SPP/APR child outcomes

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Indiana GSEG ProposalPriority A Outcome
Measures

• Focus Area One Developing or enhancing Part B
  State outcomes indicators and methods to collect
  and analyze Part B outcome indicator
• Focus Area Two Developing or enhancing Part C
  State outcome indicators and methods to collect
  and analyze Part C outcome indicators

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Indiana GSEG Proposal

• The GSEG project will allow Indiana to develop a
  comprehensive statewide assessment that will
  serve multiple accountability purposes
• State pre-academic, academic and functional
  skills standards
• Part C assessment domains social-emotional,
  cognitive, physical, communication and self-help

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Indiana GSEG Proposal

• Serve as Indianas accountability measure for
  reporting State performance Plan (SPP) and Annual
  Performance Report (APR) requirements
• Social-emotional skills
• Acquisition and use of knowledge and skills
• Use of appropriate behaviors to meet their needs

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Table 1 Description of Indianas Proposed Statewide Assessment System Table 1 Description of Indianas Proposed Statewide Assessment System Table 1 Description of Indianas Proposed Statewide Assessment System Table 1 Description of Indianas Proposed Statewide Assessment System
Early Childhood Assessment ISTAR ISTEP
Current Status ? To be aligned, normed, and validated as a result of GSEG Already developed and validated Already developed and validated
SPP/APR Targets ? Social-Emotional Skills, Use of knowledge, and Appropriate Behaviors Meeting AYP Targets Meeting AYP Targets
Assessment Domains ? Social-Emotional, Cognitive, Physical Development, Self-Help and Communication and Literacy English/Language Art, Mathematics, Functional English/Language Art, Mathematics
Age Range ? Birth-5 Kdgn and Relevant NCLB Grades Kdgn Relevant NCLB Grades
Content ? Pre-academic, Academic, and Functional skills Academic and Functional skills Academic skills
Target Group ? Typically Developing and Children with Disabilities Students with Disabilities Typically Developing and Students with Disabilities
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Objective 1 - Alignment Activities

• Identify and align Part C and Part B-619
  performance indicators with items and domains of
  the Early Childhood Assessment within the context
  of the Indiana academic standards, SPP/APR, and
  Part C assessment requirements.

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Objective 2 - Assessment and Validation Activities

• Establish norms for typically developing children
  and children with disabilities.
• Demonstrate reliability and validity of the Early
  Childhood Assessment in relation to Part C and
  Part B-619 performance indicators related to
  state academic standards and SPP/APR of outcomes.

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Objective 2 - Assessment and Validation Activities

• Focus on addressing SPP/APR performance
  indicators intended to measure
• The extent which schools facilitate parent
  involvement as a means of improving services and
  results for children with disabilities (Part
  B-619)
• Families participating in Part C who report that
  early intervention services have helped the
  family know rights, effectively communicate their
  childs needs, and have helped their children
  develop and learn

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Objective 3 - Reporting Activities

• Implementation of a web-based reporting system
  capable of monitoring the progress of infants,
  toddlers and children with disabilities in
  critical SPP/APR performance indicator areas as
  well as within the context of state academic
  standards and Part C assessment requirements.
• This objective builds upon the states current
  comprehensive system of web-based monitoring and
  reporting.

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Objective 4 - Training Activities

• Conduct statewide training and professional
  development efforts necessary to ensure that
  project objectives related to alignment,
  assessment and validation, and reporting
  activities are implemented and embedded into
  local improvement and accountability efforts.

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Plans for Implementation

• Assemble Project Advisory Group.
• Stakeholders representing Part B and C service
  providers, special education and related services
  personnel, Part C ICC, state assessment and
  standardization specialists, Institute of Higher
  Education, parents of children and youth with
  disabilities, advocates and others

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Plans for Implementation - Alignment

• Alignment based on the methods of alignment
  analyses developed by Norman Webb (Webb, 1999)

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Table 2 Description of Indianas Alignment Activities Table 2 Description of Indianas Alignment Activities
SPP/APR Requirements ? ? Positive social-emotional skills ?Acquisition and use of knowledge and skills ? Use of appropriate behaviors
Indiana Academic Standards ? ? English/Language Arts (Word Recognition, Comprehension, Literacy, Writing, Listening, Speaking) ? Mathematics (Number Sense, Computation, Algebra, Geometry, Measurement, Data Analysis, Problem Solving) ? Speech (Social Interaction, Comprehension, Expressive Communication, Intelligibility)
Part C Assessment Domains ? ? Social/Emotional ? Cognitive ? Physical Development ? Self-Help ? Communication and Literacy
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Plan of implementation Assessment Validation

• Recruit 30-40 qualified early childhood educators
  to administer instruments and collect assessment
  data
• Stratified sample 350 typically developing
  children and 350 infants, toddlers and children
  with disabilities served in Part c and Part B-619
  programs (N700)

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Plan of implementation Assessment Validation

• Administer child assessments (Early Childhood
  Assessment and others - TBD)
• Collect NCSEAM Parent Surveys expected sample
  size 1000 families
• Analysis of data to assess the overall integrity
  of the Early Childhood Assessment with regard to
  identifying which items or clusters of items best
  measure academic standards, Part C developmental
  domains and SPP/APR performance indicators

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Plans for Implementation - Reporting Activities

• Training activities associated with efforts to
  report information to various audiences (public
  reporting, academic standards, SPP/APR)
• On-line assessments over secure internet
• Generating graphs and custom reports

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Plans for Implementation - Training

• Part C and Part B-619 provider/educator trainings
• Assessment training
• Report Training
• On-going technical assistance

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Evaluation

• University of Minnesotas Institute on Community
  Integration (ICI) to conduct evaluation
  activities in two key areas
• Performance Measurement
• Impact Measurement