Samuel Meisels, Sally Atkins-Burnett, Yange Xue, Donna DiPrima Bickel, Seung-Hee Son, Education Policy Analysis Archives
February 28, 2003
This study, released last month by the Education Policy Analysis Archives, examined the change in scores on the Iowa Test of Basic Skills (ITBS) of low-income, urban, third and fourth grade students enrolled in classrooms where the Work Sampling System (WSS) was used for at least three years. (WSS is a curriculum embedded performance assessment.) Participants' performance on the ITBS was compared with students from matched schools who had not been exposed to the program. The study's premise was that traditional standardized tests are not effective assessment tools because they do not evaluate students based on a specific set of skills taught throughout the year. It is contended, therefore, that if teachers focused on preparing students for a performance-based assessment of the curriculum, students would both learn more AND score higher on the ITBS. Not surprisingly, results indicated that students in WSS classrooms displayed yearly growth in reading that "far exceeded" the contrast group. But the study had significant limitations that may affect these results. In particular, WSS was enacted as part of a district restructuring effort that also included implementation of new reading, mathematics and social studies curriculum, but the authors did not know in which schools the curricula were changed. Hence they had no way of knowing for sure whether the measured gains in student achievement were due to WSS or other factors. To see the study, go to http://epaa.asu.edu/epaa/v11n9/.
