Cognitive, Sociolinguistic, and Psychometric Perspectives in Science and Mathematics Assessment for English Language Learners

这个为期两年的项目将调查认知和社会语言学的影响，塑造英语学习者[ELLs]在科学和数学评估上的表现。它将解决ELL学生在科学和数学方面的表现在测试项目和语言之间不一致的事实。从这个项目中获得的知识将告知从业者，研究人员和政策制定者关于实现公平测试和获得科学和数学ELL成就的有效措施的新方法。它将为基于课堂的测试和在大规模测试中纳入语言少数群体提供有价值的信息。我们将比较ELL学生的推断认知活动，他们使用的问题解决策略，以及他们在用英语和母语管理的同一组科学和数学项目上获得的分数。此外，我们还将研究当学生接受反映其母语方言的本地化版本的测试时，不同语言和项目之间的表现差异是否以及如何减少。我们将从三个角度来研究英语学习者在不同语言和项目之间的表现：认知，心理测量和社会语言学。这些观点将使我们能够：（1）确定ELL学生测试的语言如何影响他们的认知活动以及他们在科学和数学项目上使用的问题解决策略;（2）确定ELL学生在当地方言测试中的表现是否优于标准方言版本的测试;以及（3）检查ELL学生在项目和跨语言测试中表现的不一致性，作为三个得分变异性来源的相互作用：学生、项目和语言（即，一个特定的ELL学生在某些项目上用他/她的母语比用英语表现得更好，但在其他项目上用英语比用母语表现得更好）。我们希望提高我们对ELL学生解释和解决问题时的认知和社会语言学过程的理解。我们还希望了解这些过程如何反映在这些学生的表现以及他们的分数在语言和项目之间的变化。这些知识将有助于改善课堂和大规模的评估实践。GoalsUltimately，我们的目标是通过提供一种新的方法来测试语言少数群体，从而有助于实现ELL学术成就的更有效措施和更公平的测试实践。这种方法认识到语言和认知现象之间的复杂关系，以及语言的社会性。从我们在这次调查中获得的知识，我们希望能够正式制定一套改进的ELL测试政策的建议。

This two-year proposed project will investigate the cognitive and sociolinguistic influencesthat shape the performance of English language learners [ELLs] on science and mathematicsassessments. It will address the fact that performance of ELL students in science andmathematics is inconsistent both across test items and across languages. The knowledge gainedfrom this project will inform practitioners, researchers, and policy makers about new approachesfor attaining equitable testing and obtaining valid measures of the achievement of ELLs in science and mathematics. It will provide valuable information relevant to both classroom-basedtesting and the inclusion of linguistic minorities in large-scale testing.We will compare the inferred cognitive activities of ELL students, the problem solutionstrategies they use, and the scores they obtain on the same set of science and mathematics itemsadministered both in English and their native languages. In addition, we will investigate whether and how performance differences across languages and items are reduced when students are tested with locally-adapted versions of tests that reflect their first languages dialects.We will examine the performance of ELLs across languages and items from threeperspectives: cognitive, psychometric, and sociolinguistic. These perspectives will allow us to:(1) determine how the language in which ELL students are tested influences their cognitive activities and the problem solution strategies they use on science and mathematics items; (2)determine whether ELL students perform better on local dialect than standard dialect versions of tests; and (3) examine the inconsistency of ELL student performance across items and acrosslanguages as an interaction of three sources of score variability: student, item, and language (i.e., a given ELL student performs better in his/her native language than in English for some items but better in English than in the native language for other items).We expect to improve our understanding of the cognitive and sociolinguistic processes that operate below the surface as ELL students interpret and solve problems. We also expect to gain knowledge on how these processes are reflected in the performance of these students and the variability of their scores across languages and items. This knowledge will contribute to improving both classroom-based and large-scale assessment practices.GoalsUltimately, our goal is to contribute to attaining more valid measures of ELL academicachievement and more equitable testing practices by offering a fresh approach to the testing of linguistic minorities. This approach recognizes the complex relationship between language and cognitive phenomena, and the social nature of language. From the knowledge we gain in this investigation we expect to be able to formalize a set of recommendations for improved testing policies for ELLs.