Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
The thing that bothers me the most during testing is having to cover the rooms for every standardized test. We teach them to use strategies such as using resources around the room to help them all year, then have to yank those away for tests. So unfair. I had first graders taking the writing part of ACCESS who were almost in tears and shut down because they wanted to write a word and then looked around the room for the alphabet to help them with the letter sounds, but then realized it was covered. Way to make testing a stressful experience for them. I realize there has to be some consistency, because teachers could put tons of stuff on the walls, but the alphabet should be allowed, at least for ACCESS in my opinion.

-another ESOL teacher

I teach ESOL as well -- are you sure that you have to cover the room walls of instructional materials for WIDA ACCESS? We weren't told we needed to do that!

ACCESS is a tool that tells you whether a child is ready to exit ESOL services, and participate independently in ESOL (or at least it is in DC, I've never taught in MD). It makes sense that if a child needs the resources provided by an ESOL teacher to pass the test, they should continue with ESOL services. In that circumstance there's no benefit to the child to providing the resources during the test. There may be benefit to the teacher, who will end up with a reduced caseload or improved test scores.

I'd explain to your kids why the resources aren't available, and when they'll come back. I'd also practice once or twice what to do when there isn't an alphabet chart.

I'm not sure I understand what you mean by "participate independently in ESOL." The students have the same alphabet strip in their classrooms so it isn't anything specific to ESOL or ESOL teachers. If they can use it for everything else including all other assessments, why not with the ACCESS?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
The thing that bothers me the most during testing is having to cover the rooms for every standardized test. We teach them to use strategies such as using resources around the room to help them all year, then have to yank those away for tests. So unfair. I had first graders taking the writing part of ACCESS who were almost in tears and shut down because they wanted to write a word and then looked around the room for the alphabet to help them with the letter sounds, but then realized it was covered. Way to make testing a stressful experience for them. I realize there has to be some consistency, because teachers could put tons of stuff on the walls, but the alphabet should be allowed, at least for ACCESS in my opinion.

-another ESOL teacher

I teach ESOL as well -- are you sure that you have to cover the room walls of instructional materials for WIDA ACCESS? We weren't told we needed to do that!

ACCESS is a tool that tells you whether a child is ready to exit ESOL services, and participate independently in ESOL (or at least it is in DC, I've never taught in MD). It makes sense that if a child needs the resources provided by an ESOL teacher to pass the test, they should continue with ESOL services. In that circumstance there's no benefit to the child to providing the resources during the test. There may be benefit to the teacher, who will end up with a reduced caseload or improved test scores.

I'd explain to your kids why the resources aren't available, and when they'll come back. I'd also practice once or twice what to do when there isn't an alphabet chart.

Agree, but it should be a consistent rule to either cover or not cover for all schools in the county. How are the results valid if students at some schools are allowed to use resources on the walls but students at other schools aren't? It shouldn't be left up to testing coordinators at individual schools.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
The thing that bothers me the most during testing is having to cover the rooms for every standardized test. We teach them to use strategies such as using resources around the room to help them all year, then have to yank those away for tests. So unfair. I had first graders taking the writing part of ACCESS who were almost in tears and shut down because they wanted to write a word and then looked around the room for the alphabet to help them with the letter sounds, but then realized it was covered. Way to make testing a stressful experience for them. I realize there has to be some consistency, because teachers could put tons of stuff on the walls, but the alphabet should be allowed, at least for ACCESS in my opinion.

-another ESOL teacher

I teach ESOL as well -- are you sure that you have to cover the room walls of instructional materials for WIDA ACCESS? We weren't told we needed to do that!

ACCESS is a tool that tells you whether a child is ready to exit ESOL services, and participate independently in ESOL (or at least it is in DC, I've never taught in MD). It makes sense that if a child needs the resources provided by an ESOL teacher to pass the test, they should continue with ESOL services. In that circumstance there's no benefit to the child to providing the resources during the test. There may be benefit to the teacher, who will end up with a reduced caseload or improved test scores.

I'd explain to your kids why the resources aren't available, and when they'll come back. I'd also practice once or twice what to do when there isn't an alphabet chart.

MCPS Special ed teacher chiming in. It's not just students with SLD disabilities that this will affect. The way it was presented by the leadership at my school was that any student who has an IEP with 'read to' accommodations would be affected, unless they are reading more than 2 grade levels below, and have data from either the WJ, or another test, to support that identification. We were also given cut scores for each test that would be considered valid. As I understanding it, this is coming from the MSDE, not MCPS, and should be consistent across the state. As far as the paper you're being asked to sign, its an IEP amendment. Of course you can ask to meet with you schools IEP team, but a change to an IEP can be made via paperwork, " In making changes to a child's IEP after the annual IEP meeting for a school year, the parent of a child with a disability and the LEA may agree not to convene an IEP meeting for the purposes of making such changes, and instead may develop a written document to amend or modify the child's current IEP. [614(d)(3)(D)]" (from Wrights Law). As the parent, you should have been called and spoken to about the change, and then gotten the paperwork to sign. Again, the county gave specific directions to all SpEd teachers about how to do this. For the record, I think taking away read to sucks, as do most people I've spoken to, but our hands are tied. It should still remain on your childs IEP as something that can be used in class, and on graded assessments, if that helps at all.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
The thing that bothers me the most during testing is having to cover the rooms for every standardized test. We teach them to use strategies such as using resources around the room to help them all year, then have to yank those away for tests. So unfair. I had first graders taking the writing part of ACCESS who were almost in tears and shut down because they wanted to write a word and then looked around the room for the alphabet to help them with the letter sounds, but then realized it was covered. Way to make testing a stressful experience for them. I realize there has to be some consistency, because teachers could put tons of stuff on the walls, but the alphabet should be allowed, at least for ACCESS in my opinion.

-another ESOL teacher

I teach ESOL as well -- are you sure that you have to cover the room walls of instructional materials for WIDA ACCESS? We weren't told we needed to do that!

Our testing coordinator requires us to. She follows everything in the MAM to the letter. The ESOL office wouldn't specifically say that we absolutely didn't have to cover, so she required us to since the MAM requires rooms to be covered during standardized testing, and doesn't specifically preclude ACCESS from the general rules. Ugh.

Not the poster who posted about covering the walls but I also teach ESOL and we were never told we had to cover up our walls. Only for MSA.

Anonymous wrote:
The thing that bothers me the most during testing is having to cover the rooms for every standardized test. We teach them to use strategies such as using resources around the room to help them all year, then have to yank those away for tests. So unfair. I had first graders taking the writing part of ACCESS who were almost in tears and shut down because they wanted to write a word and then looked around the room for the alphabet to help them with the letter sounds, but then realized it was covered. Way to make testing a stressful experience for them. I realize there has to be some consistency, because teachers could put tons of stuff on the walls, but the alphabet should be allowed, at least for ACCESS in my opinion.

-another ESOL teacher

I teach ESOL as well -- are you sure that you have to cover the room walls of instructional materials for WIDA ACCESS? We weren't told we needed to do that!

Anonymous wrote:Are you in MCPS? There are revised guidelines put in place as of December 2014. It used to be that unless you have decoding goals you wouldn't get "read-to". Now, the guidelines allow for reading significantly below grade level. One criteria is using the MAP-R score, which needs to be more than 2 grades below grade level. They can also use BRI or the San Diego Quick Assessment.

We were told students in MD could receive the "read aloud" accommodation but it needed to be written into their IEP that they had a significant disability in learning how to decode AND that they were receiving intensive remedial instruction specifically in decoding.

Are you in MCPS? There are revised guidelines put in place as of December 2014. It used to be that unless you have decoding goals you wouldn't get "read-to". Now, the guidelines allow for reading significantly below grade level. One criteria is using the MAP-R score, which needs to be more than 2 grades below grade level. They can also use BRI or the San Diego Quick Assessment.

10:25 here. I always teach my ESOL students decoding and comprehension skills. The younger they are, the less I focus on decoding since they are working on that a lot in their general ed classroom. The ESOL teachers of the older students also teach decoding but most of the students are already reading in Spanish (all of our students are native Spanish speakers) so it isn't an uphill battle. The annual ESOL test we give our students tests listening, speaking, reading and writing. The reading part of the test tests their decoding and comprehension ability. If they are not able to decode the words, they will score low so I am quite aware of their actual abilities.