Developing the IRIS: Toward Situated and Valid Assessment Measures in Collaborative Professional Development and School Reform in Literacy

Abstract

This article illustrates the development and use of a situated assessment tool in the context of a collaborative (university–school district) literacy reform effort in British Columbia, Canada. The three‐year project was focused on improving literacy, including reading comprehension strategy use, among students in grades 4 through 8. It began in the 2002–2003 school year, with approximately 100 teachers and 2,500 students participating. The authors describe development of the Informal Reading Inventory of Strategies (IRIS) to assess students' use of comprehension strategies, including making connections, engaging with the text, active meaning construction, monitoring understanding, analysis and synthesis, and critical reading. They then explain the implementation of the IRIS to support and enhance project goals, including informing teachers' instructional decision making. Based on what they call “on‐the‐ground, collaborative theorizing,” the authors argue that measures of projects such as the IRIS need to be valid not only in terms of content but also in terms of their consequences and uses in particular settings. Such approaches have the potential to respond to the growing demand for assessment approaches that are sensitive to contexts in which they are used and that support teachers and school administrators as they set their own goals for accountability and improvement in literacy.

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