Testing and
 assessment

  Dyslexia Parents Resource

Exemption from school tests
In many US states, students participate in educational testing every spring. In some states, children who do not pass these tests are forced to attend summer school.
At the end of third grade and eighth grade, failure means mandatory retention.
Most children with dyslexia suffer from extreme anxiety during formal tests, and they do not perform well.
In many states, children are not allowed any accommodations while taking these tests -- even if they have an IEP or a 504 plan that allows accommodations during classroom tests.
If you feel that your child would suffer unnecessary stress from this testing, or would not test well, in most states you can exempt your child from participating by writing a letter to the principal. Send a copy to his teacher and any involved resource specialist. In the letter, just state that you do not want your child to participate in the state standardized testing program. It is not necessary to give a reason. Tell the principal that you will either pick up your child from school during the testing times, or that you'll keep your child usuefully occupied in the library.

There are two types of tests for dyslexia: screening tests and comprehensive tests.

Screening tests
These tests are designed to be used on large numbers of children, to narrow down the group of children who might need a more thorough test for possible dyslexia. They are not tests for dyslexia, but are designed to help researchers focus on children who appear to be having difficulties with their language learning, and who might be dyslexic.

Typically, these tests consist of a short list of questions, such as:

• Do you have difficulties with spelling?
• Do you find directions confusing?
• Are you reluctant to go to school?
• Do you have problems with math/s?

Children selected by this method could be having problems with their learning for any number of reasons - emotional problems, confusion caused by a change of school, Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), delayed learning, autism, dyspraxia, and possible dyslexia. Screening tests like these cannot be seen as valid tests for dyslexia, but they are very helpful for researchers.

Comprehensive tests
Comprehensive tests for Dyslexia look at the whole child and examine the root cause of any learning difficulties in the light of research into dyslexia and its causes. The word 'comprehensive' means 'thorough', and these tests examine which brain functions are interfering with the child's acquisition of normal school learning. Tests of reading, spelling, drawing, math/s and intelligence are given, as well as visual tests, laterality tests, visual scanning tests, sequencing and other tests.
The results are assembled into a complete report on the child, which outlines the evidence for the conclusions reached about the child.

Comprehensive testing by a psychologist
Chartered psychologists operate either through schools or privately in a consulting room.
You may see a psychologist in your child's school if the principal/head-teacher recommends it. The psychologist has to be paid by the school authority, and there are constrains on the amount of money that is available for psychological testing. Many parents have written to us about the difficulties they have experienced trying to get the school to have their child assessed for possible dyslexia, and parents in some areas may find that it is necessary to put quite a lot of pressure on the school before a psychological assessment is forthcoming.
Assessment by the school psychologist seems to be the method that works for the majority of children, though we do receive a lot of e-mails from parents who are dissatisfied with the process. More than one parent has reported that their school denied that dyslexia existed!
Some parents seek a private assessment by a psychologist. Although expensive, this is more straightforward. A lot of parents report having paid over $1,000 US (over £600 UK ) and upwards for a private assessment, but the costs seem to vary from one country to another. The assessment takes a few hours, and you should expect to receive a detailed report which you can show to the principal/head-teacher when asking for extra help for your child. Although assessments are thorough, few psychologists provide detailed recommendations for improving the child's learning skills.

Comprehensive testing at a distance
An alternative is comprehensive dyslexia testing at a distance. This has the advantage of improved objectivity: the psychologist remains completely objective about the child's performance in all the tests, as he/she never meets the child, parent or principal/head-teacher, but bases the assessment purely on the child's test results.
The tests used are the same as, or very similar to, those used by psychologists in schools or privately, but have been adapted so that they can be given by parents to their child at home. This type of test produces a far more detailed assessment report than a psychologist normally provides, and contains detailed recommendations for learning techniques that will help the child raise their achievement into the broad average level. Typically, a test like this costs only a fraction of the cost of an assessment by a psychologist.

Whatever method you decide upon, all the recent research indicates that the younger your child is tested the better: the sooner the diagnosis of dyslexia is made, the sooner the child starts to develop the appropriate learning strategies and raise their level of achievement in school.

John Bradford
Direct Learning

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• The Discrepancy in Discrepancies! - article by Kathleen Ross-Kidder about the difficulties involved in using a discrepancy between a child's ability and their actual achievement in order to assess a learning difficulty (LD).

• Free Screeening Tests for Dyslexia - a list of well-researched questions from Direct Learning for children and adults for use as a screening test for possible dyslexia.