Student Assessment and Placement

Continued from Part 4. . . . . this is Part 5

Assessment and Placement Summary Project

It is important for ESOL educators to understand how students are placed into their classrooms. Conduct an analysis of the placement scores of your ESOL students. To do this, choose one of your own classes or a class or group of students in the district or institution in which you work.

First determine which placement instrument is used in your district and how it is used to place students in your ESOL program. For example, in many districts CASAS is the instrument used with students being placed according to the lower of the 2 scores. Then list the students' CASAS test scores (or reading score if only the reading is administered). Finally, list the Adult ESOL Level in which the student should be placed.

Placement of students in classes varies by district, also. Some large districts or institutions have a separate class for each ESOL level. Others have multilevel classes, where one instructor might have students in Levels Foundations and Low Beginning, another with High Beginning and Low Intermediate, etc.   See Adult ESOL Program Matrix for a review of placement levels according to test scores.

Summary Assignment

After you have determined your district or institution's Adult ESOL student assessment instrument, find out the placement scores for each of your students. Finally, determine the ESOL Level of each student and post a summary of the placement scores for your students on the Bulletin Board.

Because of confidentiality, please label students as "Student 1, 2, 3, etc." Your summary should look something like this:

Example - Assessment and Placement Summary

Summary of Placement Data - Indian River Community College ESOL Combined Low and High Intermediate class.
Student 1, CASAS Reading 222, CASAS Listening 215, High Intermediate Level
Student 2, CASAS Reading 206, CASAS Listening 201, Low Intermediate
Student 3, CASAS Reading 211, CASAS Listening 203, Low Intermediate
Student 4, CASAS Reading 215, CASAS Listening 212, High Intermediate
Student 5, CASAS Reading 203, CASAS Listening 201, Low Intermediate

And so forth until all students have been placed.

(In this example, Student 1's listening score was 215; his reading score was 225. Because the lower of the 2 scores is used for placement, his placement level is still only High Intermediate although his reading level is Advanced. only the lower score is used in the summary.)

Post your Assessment & Placement Summary Project to the:

Bulletin Board

A general word of caution: Because of the possibility of power failure or other technical difficulties during a posting, it is recommended that you create your summary projects and save them in Word (or any other word processor), then cut and paste your assignment onto the bulletin board.

Return to Previous (Part 4) Student Assessment

Continue on to (Part 1) Curriculum Guidelines

This web-based training program was developed through an Adult Education State Leadership Grant from the Florida Department of Education, Division of Community Colleges and Workforce Education.

Disclaimer: While every effort has been made to ensure the accuracy of this web-based training component, it is not an official publication of the Florida Department of Education.