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Open Access Thesis

Keywords

Preschool tests; Readiness for school--Testing;

Abstract

The specific purposes of this study were (1) to determine the concurrent validity of the Concepts about Print Tests, Sand, and Stones, with the Metropolitan Readiness Test, and (2) to determine the concurrent validity of the Sand and Stones. The following problematic questions were addressed: (1) What relationship exists between the readiness aspects assessed by the Metropolitan Readiness Test and the Concepts about Print Test, Sand? (2) What relationship exists between the readiness aspects assessed by the Metropolitan Readiness Test and the Concepts about Print Test, Stones? (3) What relationship exists between the Concepts about Print Test, Sand, and the Concepts about Print Test, Stones? (4) What readiness skills do children possess near the end of their kindergarten year? (5) Are there differences in the reading abilities of those children perceived as receiving high language stimulation in the home as compared to those in which it is perceived there is low language stimulation? Thirty kindergarten children from a rural school district in Northeast Iowa participated in the study. All subjects were given the Metropolitan Readiness Test. The Sand and Stones were then administered to each child in a counter-balanced design. A teacher rating scale, designed specifically for this study, was used to determine if the amount of language stimulation in the home was related to reading readiness abilities of the children. Those students perceived by their teachers as receiving either high or low language stimulation in the home were placed into high and low groups if they ranked in the top or bottom quartile on the rating scale. Results indicated that the Metropolitan Readiness Test and the Concepts about Print Test, Sand, are significantly related, thus suggesting that they are measuring some common characteristics relating to reading readiness. The Metropolitan Readiness Test and the Concepts about Print Test, Stones, also have considerable common variance. The Sand and the Metropolitan Readiness Test tended to have a slightly higher correlation than the Stones with the Metropolitan Readiness Test. Alternate forms of the Concepts about Print Test, Sand, and Stones, are significantly related. Reliability estimates for alternate forms on the Metropolitan Readiness Test, however, appear to be stronger. Subjects in the sample possessed a high-average amount of readiness abilities with regard to the skills measured by the Metropolitan Readiness Test. Results of the Sand and Stones indicated that the subjects have an average amount of knowledge relating to print concepts. The amount of language stimulation in the home as perceived by the kindergarten teachers had a significant effect on readiness test scores as demonstrated by mean scores on the Metropolitan Readiness Test, Sand, and Stones for the low and high groups. Specifically, students perceived as receiving a high amount of language stimulation in the home obtained significantly higher mean test scores than those perceived as receiving a low amount of language stimulation.

Year of Submission

1984

Degree Name

Master of Arts in Education

Department

Department of Curriculum and Instruction

First Advisor

Sharon Arthur Moore

Second Advisor

Catherine Hatcher

Third Advisor

Marlene Strathe

Comments

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Date Original

1984

Object Description

1 PDF file (65 leaves)

Language

en

File Format

application/pdf

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