Standardised Testing among Children learning English as an Additional Language (EAL) in Ireland: Normative and exclusionary practices

Abstract

Standardised testing has become an increasingly prominent feature in education policy. In Ireland, standardised tests in literacy and numeracy are compulsory for all pupils, with few exceptions, in second, fourth and sixth classes and results of the tests are employed in increasingly powerful ways by the Department of Education. In addition to deleterious effects such as narrowing the curriculum and teaching to the test, there is an increasing body of literature concerned with the impact of standardised tests on pupils. This is particularly acute for children from minoritised ethnic backgrounds and those learning English as an Additional Language. This critical quantitative inquiry examined the standardised testing of five cohorts of children learning English as an Additional Language (EAL) as they progressed through a junior and senior primary school in Ireland. Data are drawn from standardised tests scores of literacy, numeracy, verbal and non-verbal intelligence. Findings include that the performance of the EAL children was lower on all tests of verbal intelligence compared to the non-EAL groups. This difference remained consistent as they progressed from junior to senior primary school. No pattern of difference was identifiable between the groups on ‘non-verbal’ reasoning tests. These findings have important implications for educational professionals and policy makers including that these tests may be inappropriate for EAL children and that the interpretation and reporting of results needs to be qualified to avoid disporportionate representation of children learning EAL in SEN.