Assessment, Testing, ???

Gayle Denny, ELEA Executive Director

As I asked Lutheran educational professionals to write commentaries on their views of standardized assessments and testing at the early childhood and elementary levels for this publication, I’m not sure what I expected, but what I received was something interesting—something very unified.

All of the directors and principals who have provided wonderful contributions on this topic seem to provide a different slant of the value and methodology of assessment, but they all seem to agree that it is important—it is of value—it is one piece of the puzzle. And it seems to be particularly of value when viewed not as a means of “grading”, “testing”, or “comparing” children’s abilities and outcomes, but rather as a basis for future planning in meeting the needs of all children in the school or center and in our daily and yearly planning as we strive to become the best educational institutions we can.

ELEA, for many years, has provided access to standardized testing as a group process through Harcourt Educational Measurement (http://www.hemweb.com). Each spring, dozens of ELEA member schools test students utilizing the Stanford 9, OLSAT 7, and Metropolitan Readiness Test (MRT 5). We will be moving as a group to the Stanford 10 and OLSAT 8 in 2004. Also available this year are Lexile Roster Reports, Keylinks, and Early Reading Diagnostic Assessment. Please call the ELEA National Office at 800-500-7644 or visit Harcourt’s web site for additional information on these programs.

Testing and assessment provide many useful tools, as you will see from the articles in this issue. I hope you will seek ways to derive the most benefit from assessment for your program. Its greatest value may be in affirming what our wonderful teachers are already doing for God’s children.

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