Assessment of diverse, learners,exemption, concessions, adaptation & accommodation

Assessment involves the use of empirical data of student learning to refine programs and improve student learning. Assessment is used in many ways in education. The good deal of attention is given to the use in helping and learning. Assessment consist of the diverse learners needs the learner’s assessment assess the certain level of individual that include concepts of exemptions, concession, adaptation and accommodation. All are perfectly helpful for the assessment of diverse learners.

1. Assessment of Diverse, Learners,Exemption, Concessions, A daptation & Accommodation By Sayyid Muhammed Shafeeq & Sabitha Robin

2. Introduction Diverse student learners include students from racially, ethnically, culturally, and linguistically diverse families and communities of lower socioeconomic status. If educators act on the knowledge research offers, we can realize the educational excellence we desire for all children. Diversity encompasses many characteristics including ethnicity, socio-economic background, home language, gender, special needs, disability, and giftedness. A diverse learner is one of two things: 1) A learner that is racially, ethnically, culturally, economically and or linguistically diverse. 2) A learner who learns differently from the majority. This label is a catchall assigned to many different types of students because of their culture or race, religion, academic ability, native language, or socioeconomic status, among other considerations.

3. In general, the term represents one who differs from the majority of students in some way when it comes to their education. Who are diverse learners?

4. 1 . Students from different language, literacy, ethnic, racial, and cultural background. 2.Students who bring a broad array of learning styles, varying academic histories and needs, and may also have cultural and linguistic differences. 3.General education classrooms are populated with students who have different backgrounds, talk different languages, and have different needs. Frequently, students with disabilities are taught in general education classrooms and can extend the diverse academic and social needs of learners.

5. In order to be successful with the entire student body, a teacher needs to create a classroom in which students feel accepted and respected and where diversity is celebrated. In the classroom, diversity applies to learning styles, background, educational backgrounds, language and support at home. Due to the vast diversity among learners, teachers must work diligently to use different methods of instructions and constantly monitor the comprehension taking place in the classroom to enable all. A teacher will need to push the high achievers a little farther, scaffold the students to use technology, when it can assist or eliminate things such as language barriers.

6. Teachers must reorganize the difference in the learning styles and abilities of the students as each student comes to class with a different background that affects first her ability to succeed and that may cause learning difficulties. Diverse learners can learn in more than one way. The key is to teach in a variety of ways, typically 4 or 5 that there will at least be one of the ways your diverse learners like to learn.

7. EXEMPTION

8. Exemptions from some assessment for disabled students are permitted. It is permitted if there is enough alternative evidence of student’s assessment. E.g. students with visual impairment, a physical disability or dyslexia, take oral examinations. Hearing and speech impaired students take only written examinations. Hearing impaired students are exempt from listening comprehension exams. Students can also be exempted from some aspects of a marking scheme. When assessing the script of hearing-impaired students, confusion between some letter couples (e.g. P and b) is not counted as an error. When assessing the scripts of visually impaired students, confusion between some pairs is not counted as an error (e.g. P and d)

9. CONCESSION

10. The term assessment of diverse learners in concession consist several concepts, that are: Exams written by scribe : the student may be unable to write the exams for many reasons. At that time, the exams are written with the help of a scribe. Liberal evaluation : the disabled diverse learners exam evaluation is not strict. It is liberal that is suitable for the academic performance. Grants: the government offers the grants for the diver’s learners. That is the part of concession. This is very helpful for the impaired children and their family

11. · Reservation : the government give proper reservation seat for all level sectors of our economy. This will ensure powerful participation of the disabled individual. · Support services Allow more time in exams : the impaired children are not required to complete the exams in the given time. The government and school authorities allow more time in exam for disabled children

12. ADAPTATION

13. Curriculum Adaptation is an ongoing process that changes the regular prescribed curriculum by modifying or adapting it in terms of the content or delivery of instruction to meet the learning requirements of students with learning difficulties including children with disabilities. The content, the teaching process, assessment and evaluation, and the physical environment may be modified or adapted and activities should be flexible in order that the students benefit and achieve success in the classroom. Teachers ought to adapt the curriculum to provide equity and meet the needs of diverse learners in order that all learners benefit and can fully participate in the classroom activities.

14. Create a plan for adapting materials. Effective adaptations require sustained development and support. They must be made under the framework of a larger plan that include consideration of basic and strategic skills, instruction and the role of people involved in the adaptation process. In some cases, it is important to involve your administrator and curriculum or programme coordinators from the beginning and identify exactly who will be responsible for making implementing.

15. Develop Goals For Teacher Strategies And Making Adaptations

16. Some problem can be solved by adaptations, other problems may signal the need for intensive instruction in skills or strategies of teachers. Teachers may need to provide adaptations while simultaneously teaching the students the learning strategies he/she needs in order to perform the work. All adaptations lead to become dependent on the person who needs them. Before an adaptation is made for the individual student, educators must carefully consider the best approach to address the student’s difficulty and promoting success.

17. Adaptation should be approached as short-term solutions with-in a long-term plan for teaching skills and strategies that will promote the student’s independence as a learner and ultimately reduce the need for adaptation. Content adaptation must also meet local and state education standards. In some cases, the IEP may address the degree to which the requirements associated with meeting state standards and taking assessment may be modified. The teacher must decide, which parts of the curriculum the student will be required to learn and will constitute mastery of the course content.

18. When the curriculum is considered appropriate for the student, adaptation may force on format rather than content

19. The design of materials may present many different types of problems for students, who struggle. Teacher adapting materials should examine each curricular unit for features that might cause a learning problem. For example, the content may be very abstract, complex or poorly originated or it might present for much information. It may not be flexible options through which students can demonstrate competence. Guidelines for identifying these and other problems in the design of instructional materials may be found in resource life, those listed at the end of the article. Determine the type of adaptations that will enable the students to meet the demands. Once the materials have been evaluated and the possible problems have been identified, the type of format adaptation musty be selected. Format adaptation can be made by:

20. Altering existing materials : re-write, re-organize, add to, so that the student can assess the regular curriculum material independently. E.g. Prepare a study guide and audio tape. Mediating existing materials : provide additional instruction support guidance and direction in the use of the materials. Alter your instruction to mediate the basics presented by the materials in different ways. For example, have students survey the reading materials, collaborating preview the text and create an outline of the materials to use as a study guide.

21. Selecting alternative methods : select new materials that are more sensitive to the needs of the students with disability or inherently designed to compensate for learning problems. For example, use an interactive computer program that gives critical ideas, reads texts, insert graphic organizers, defines and illustrates words, presents and reinforces learning in smaller increments and provides more opportunities for practice and curriculum review. As the adaptation is implemented, the teacher should evaluate its effects to determine whether the desired outcomes are being achieved. If not, adjustments will need to be made either in the adaptation or in the instruction to the student in its use adaptation should significantly reduce failure and learner difficulties.

22. Fading the adaptation when possible. Adaptations usually are short term solutions to allow classroom learning and participation until the needed skills and strategies can be taught. Once the adaptation is in place, the teacher should begin to plan with other teacher, how to teach the needed skills and strategies. The adaptation should not be removed, until the students possess the skills and strategies to learn and complete the tasks independently, for some students, an adaptation may be required for several months, while for others, time be maintained for years.

23. Accommodation

24. The term "accommodation" may be used to describe an alteration of environment, curriculum format, or equipment that allows an individual with a disability to gain access to content and/or complete assigned tasks. They allow students with disabilities to pursue a regular course of study. Since accommodations do not alter what is being taught, instructors should be able to implement the same grading scale for students with disabilities as they do for students without disabilities. Examples of accommodations include:

25. Sing language interpreters for students who are deaf. Computer text-to-speech computer-based systems for students with visual impairments or Dyslexia. Extended time for students with fine motor limitations, visual impairments, or learning disabilities.

26. Large-print books and worksheets for student with visual impairments and Trackballs and alternative keyboards for students who operate standard mice and keyboard.

27. Who deserves accommodation?

28. All accommodations are not just for students who are struggling, where accommodations are made and all students benefit from it. Accommodations don’t fundamentally go after all lower expectations or standards in instructional level (conceptual difficulty), content or performance criteria, instead changes are made in the instructional delivery method, assessment method or both to enable the student to have access to the same learning and equal opportunity to demonstrate learning. Teachers need to communicate with families, counselors and other professionals within the school teachers and other teachers, with whom the students have had success in communication.

29. Accommodations fall under four major categories:

30. Content: What the student needs to learn. The instructional concepts should be broad based, and all students should be given access to the same core content. However, the content’s complexity should be adapted to students’ learner profiles. Teachers can vary the presentation of content, (e.g., textbooks, lecture, demonstrations, taped texts) to best meet students’ needs. Process: Activities in which the student engages to make sense of or master the content. Examples of differentiating process activities include scaffolding, flexible grouping, interest centers, manipulative, varying the length of time for a student to master content, and encouraging an advanced learner to pursue a topic in greater depth.

31. Products: The culminating projects that ask students to apply and extend what they have learned. Products should provide students with different ways to demonstrate their knowledge as well as various levels of difficulty, group or individual work, and various means of scoring. Learning Environment: The way the classroom works and feels. The differentiated classroom should include areas in which students can work quietly as well as collaborate with others, materials that reflect diverse cultures, and routines that allow students to get help when the teacher isn’t available (Tomlinson, 1995, 1999; Winebrenner, 1992, 1996).

32. It is important to note that teachers should pair instruction along with the use of adaptations or accommodations in two areas. First, sometimes students need instruction in how to use and apply the adaptation or accommodation to their learning. The teacher should not assume that the student will be able to benefit from the adaptation or accommodation without this instruction. Second, as mentioned previously, adaptations or accommodations increase dependence in the student. Instruction in the learning deficit ensures that the student builds his or her abilities while being supported, and then the support is reduced or removed as the student’s skills improve. While the specific instruction will vary depending on individual student needs, all instruction for struggling students should be explicit (directly taught), systematic (sequenced so that skills build on one another, not left to incidental learning), scaffolded (supported instruction that is gradually withdrawn as students become more proficient) and modeled (teacher models both the task/skill and the thought processes to complete the task/skill).

33. Conclusion Assessment involves the use of empirical data of student learning to refine programs and improve student learning. Assessment is used in many ways in education. The good deal of attention is given to the use in helping and learning. Assessment consist of the diverse learners needs the learner’s assessment assess the certain level of individual that include concepts of exemptions, concession, adaptation and accommodation. All are perfectly helpful for the assessment of diverse learners.