Language Growth in Bilingual ChildrenÂ
Dynamic assessment is a method of evaluating children's language skills that focuses on their learning potential rather than what they have already learned. It can reduce assessment bias for bilingual children.
In collaboration with the Child Language Intervention Lab, we are examining how dynamic assessments and processing-based assessments can improve language assessment for children who speak a language other than English at home. In this project, we are considering how well these assessments predict language growth in kindergarten and first grade.
This study is currently recruiting participants!
What have we learned so far?
Last update: June 4, 2024We began recruiting participants in late summer 2023 and we have followed our first group of children through one academic year. With this first group, we have shown that several different dynamic and processing-based tasks are feasible for children with different amounts of English exposure.
We are also working to show the reliability of each of our tasks. That means they are consistent in what they measure, and it's an important step in evaluating a new assessment.
We are considering how well our tasks agree with each other in terms of the results for each child that completes them. For example, our dynamic assessments of language look like they give related results, which suggests that are all measuring something similar.
What do we still need to do?
Last update: June 4, 2024We plan to continue following our first group of children for one more year. We want to see how much their language skills grow in English and in their home language.
We need to continue identifying more participants so that we have enough children to support conclusions about our tasks.