Assessment of children in Jamaica

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Assessment of children in Jamaica

• Presentation by
• Shauna Miller, MA/CAGS
• School Psychologist, Mico CARE

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Child Assessment Research in Education

• Established in 1981 to address special education
• 3 centres that serve the island
• Main role of assessment
• Also do intervention, training, research and
  public education

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What is Assessment?

• Testing
• Weighing, judging
• Appraisal, Evaluation
• Finding out what a child knows in a subject

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What is Assessment

• Its like detective work.. searching for clues.

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What is Assessment

• Or like being a scientist coming up with various
  hypotheses to be tested

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What is Assessment

• Answering the Referral Question
• The reason the child has been referred.
• What the parent or teacher wants to know.

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Examples

• He cant read
• Is restless and cant sit still
• Wonders if she needs a special school
• Is not talking and does not answer the teacher

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How we do Assessment

• Create a whole picture of the child
• Look at various area of development

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Social Development

• Environmental background
• History of guardianship
• Neighborhood
• Significant/traumatic incidents
• Exposure and stimulation

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Social Development

• Interactions with others
• Peer relationships
• Social skills
• Responsiveness

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Social Development

• Adaptive Behavior
• Communication
• Daily Living Skills
• Socialization

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Emotional Behavioral Development

• Moods and Attitudes
• Activity Level
• Odd or harmful behaviours
• Personality Traits

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Intellectual Development

• Ability to learn new information
• Ability to reason using language or visually
• Short term and long term memory

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Physical Development

• Developmental Milestones
• Childhood illnesses
• Current physical diagnosis
• Hearing, Vision screens

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Speech and Language Development

• Articulation, Fluency
• Ability to understand language
• Ability to express thoughts

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Motor Development

• Gross Motor skills
• Fine Motor skills
• Writing ability
• Visual motor

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Academic Development

• Decoding skills
• Reading Comprehension
• Spelling
• Math

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The Whole Picture
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Learning Disability

• Intellectually
• Average
• Academically
• Weak, particularly in one area
• Emotional/Behavioural
• Often deteriorates as child gets older and does
  not succeed in school

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Autism

• Socially
• Well below average in interactions
• Speech
• Limited development
• Emotional/Behavioural
• Repetitive behaviours, restricted interests
• Intellectually
• Frequently (but not always) far below average

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Attention Deficit Disorder

• Emotional/Behavioural
• Impulsive, inattentive, disorganized,
  distractible, often loses things
• Motor
• often poor writing skills
• Socially
• some difficulty with peers

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Teaching ADD children

• Incorporate movement and exercise into the class.
  
• Use positive attention.
• Keep the child near the front of the class, away
  from windows and check in frequently.
• Use a reward system
• Timeouts
• Keep all material in a predictable location and
  label the classroom materials
• Break large tasks into smaller ones and teach the
  use of outlines
• Make sure anything written on the board is very
  clear and organized. Use lists.
• Encourage the child to keep a homework book
• Use pictures and charts as much as possible when
  teaching.
• Distractible children respond well to time
  limits.

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Slow Learner

• Intellectually
• Below Average / Borderline
• Academically
• Low achievement equal to intellectual ability
• Socially
• Immature relationships

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Developmentally Delayed - Mildly Impaired

• Intellectually
• further below Average
• Academically
• Low achievement, but can learn up to the sixth
  grade by late teens
• Socially
• delayed but can learn appropriate social skills

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Developmentally Delayed -Moderately Impaired

• Often delayed in many areas of development
• Intellectually Very Low
• Socially Poor Adaptive skills
• Speech delayed, poor use of language
• Motor Poor writing development
• Physical May have some history of seizures,
  meningitis, head trauma

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Teaching Slow Learners

• Encourage that the child be assessed
• Advocate for a resource room in the school
• Group the children in the class according to
  ability
• Use very practical, concrete teaching
• Use other childrens strengths to help teach e.g.
  group activities and peer tutors