Evaluating Young Children from Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Backgrounds for Special Education Services

Author(s): Banerjee, Rashida, Mark Guiberson

Published: March 2012 in Young Exceptional Children

URL to article

Research Focus Area: English Language Learners: instructional strategies, assessments, developing academic language

Abstract:

With the increasing diversity in the United States, there has been a call for early intervention/early childhood special education (EI/ECSE) services to be responsive and sensitive to the diversity of children and families represented in communities. Culturally responsive practice is particularly important for EI/ECSE professionals because of the clear focus on family involvement and partnerships in providing appropriate early intervention and educational experiences for young children with special needs. In this article, the authors first describe the issues and challenges that EI/ECSE professionals face when assessing young children and their families from culturally and linguistically diverse (CLD) backgrounds for determining eligibility for EI/ECSE. Second, they provide a brief synthesis of research-based and promising evaluation practices for EI/ECSE professionals when working with these children, families, and other professionals. The practices they include are grounded in best practices described by several national organizations.

Research Question(s):

What are the issues and challenges that EI/ECSE professional face when assessing young children and their families from CLD backgrounds for determining eligibility for EI/ECSE? What strategies can EI/ECSE professionals use to better address the assessment needs of these populations?

Methods:

Literature Review, Ethnography

Setting:

American k-12 schools

Key Findings:

Challenges and Issues in Assessing Children from Diverse Backgrounds:

a complicated issue that professionals face when assessing children from CLD backgrounds is communicating with families who speak a language other than English.
A major challenge for practitioners is the lack of knowledge about language development in linguistically diverse children. For instance, some professionals hold the misconception that introducing two languages will confuse children.
Another challenge in evaluating young children from CLD backgrounds has to do with the lack of appropriately standardized assessment tools for use with these populations. Translated tools are almost always inadequate because of problems with the fidelity of translation or other sources of bias.
There are many potential sources of bias when using translated assessment tools that were originally normed for use with European American populations, including cultural bias, construct bias, and method bias.
- Cultural bias:
- Construct bias:
- Method Bias

Implications:

In addition to understanding a child’s language development in his or her first language, practitioners must be familiar with second language acquisition during the evaluation process.
EI/ECSE practitioners and administrators have identified that they require more training in
- Conducting evaluations and assessments of children and family resources for children and families from CLD populations
- Selecting appropriate tools for conducting assessment
- Gaining knowledge about developmentally appropriate assessments
- Working with families as partners in the assessment process
To better conduct evaluations and assessment of CLD children, the researchers suggest that assessment practitioners
- Choose the right tools and methods of assessment. Culturally appropriate assessment methods should
  - Allow for professionals and families to collaborate
  - Be developmentally appropriate
  - Provide useful information for goal development and intervention
  - meet legal requirements
  - To avoid bias associated with translated or adapted standardized assessment tools, evaluation teams should also consider other assessment methods such as a variety of non-standardized, rich observational, and interview strategies in the assessment process
- Use authentic assessment methods
  - A thorough assessment of young children and their families must involve identifying the environmental, maturational, and social factors that may impact the child’s development and learning
  - An ecological perspective to the assessment of young CLD children
  - can be applied in multiple ways.
One such method is criterion-referenced play-based assessment methods in which the evaluation team has the opportunity to observe natural parent-child interactions and to observe the developmental priorities held by the parent
For older children, curriculum-based assessments that are aligned with the current philosophical orientation of the early childhood development and curriculum may be useful.
- Develop culturally relevant assessment procedures from a homelanguage and culture framework.
  - EI/ECSE professionals need to ensure that children maintain their home language, with the knowledge that a child’s home language supports a child’s linguistic, social, and educational development, as well as the child’s future English language proficiency
- Effectively use interpreters and develop the role of a cultural mediator.
  - EI/ECSE professionals and interpreters need very specific training on how to work together in creating high-quality evaluation and assessments that effectively involve families from CLD backgrounds.
- Include parents as partners in the assessment process
  - Besides the rights granted to families under Individuals With Disabilities Education Improvement Act of 2004 to participate in their child’s evaluation and assessment process and program planning, it makes sense to involve families because they know their child the best and are most invested in their child’s well-being.
  - Active parent involvement may also aid in addressing challenges associated with understanding linguistic development in CLD children.
- Present evaluation results in a clear, family-friendly, and culturally sensitive manner.
  - Sharing results of a child’s delay with families is especially difficult in the context of CLD learners and their families
  - Practitioners should share results using simple, easily understandable, and interpretable language, speaking camply and slowly so that professional translators (who should be present) can easily translate between the evaluators and family members
  - Evaluators should be careful to address questions and comments to the family members of the child rather than to the interpreter
  - Evaluators should make use of diagrams, charts, and pictorial description to share the results of the assessment.
  - Beliefs differ across and within cultures and even families with similar cultural backgrounds may hold very diverse views on disability.

Limitations:

A limitaiton of this study is that it analyzes only one case study.

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