Effects of an Oral Testing Accommodation on the Mathematics Performance of Secondary Students With and Without Learning Disabilities

One of the most important accomplishments of recent U.S. federal education legislation has been to promote the full participation of students with disabilities in state educational accountability systems. The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) Amendments of 1990, the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001, and the most recent reauthorization of IDEA as the Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act (IDEIA; 2004) have affirmed the principle of including students with disabilities in statewide assessments, as well as the need to offer appropriate accommodations or alternate testing procedures, as necessary, to support students’ participation. Over the past 15 years, the National Center on Educational Outcomes (NCEO) has been documenting states’ policies and practices regarding the participation of students with disabilities on statewide assessments. In its latest report, Thompson, Johnstone, Thurlow, and Altman (2005) stated that one of the six key factors cited by states as contributing to positive trends in the participation and performance of students with disabilities has been the development and provision of accommodation guidelines and training. In addition, recent studies have catalogued the rapidly evolving use of accommodations on statewide tests (e.g., Johnson, Kimball, Brown, & Anderson, 2001; Thurlow, House, Scott, & Ysseldyke, 2000). Given the serious consequences of test outcomes for states, districts, schools, and individual students, the validity Effects of an Oral Testing Accommodation on the Mathematics Performance of Secondary Students With and Without Learning Disabilities