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Stephanie Cawthon

Students with disabilities, even those in mainstreamed classrooms, have historically received lower quality instruction and have often been excluded from the required curriculum.

Many classrooms now do include students (including deaf students) who traditionally would have been placed in special classes. At the same time as deaf students are increasingly integrated into diverse educational settings, national and state agencies are calling for higher standards of student achievement. Inclusion policies, such as the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), require educators to evaluate deaf students’ participation in curricular content and assessment. However, it is not clear whether inclusive placement results in equitable exposure to curricular content—that is, equitable opportunity to learn (OTL).

UW-Madison graduate student and WCER research assistant Stephanie Cawthon just completed a study of the access hearing-impaired students have to the standards-based reading curriculum. Her study adapted methods pioneered by WCER Director Andrew C. Porter and his colleagues to study the “enacted curriculum” (i.e., what is taught and how). The measure of the enacted curriculum developed by Porter and his colleagues evaluates the relationship or alignment between content standards and classroom practices in core content areas. It provides information on content coverage in both time (number of classes) and depth (level of cognitive work asked of students).

Cawthon investigated in particular how the Wisconsin state standards for reading are covered in classrooms with deaf and hearing students. Cawthon’s study was unique in a couple of ways: First, by addressing standards for reading in the early elementary grades, it expanded the study of alignment to a new subject area. Second, it focused on a special education population and educational equity across classroom settings.

Cawthon asked teachers to complete a reading curriculum survey describing their instruction during the spring 2001 semester. Teachers were asked to indicate how much time they allocated to specific reading curriculum topics (i.e., plot, character, spelling, application of information from world events) and what types of learning goals they had for their students (e.g., to memorize, understand, apply, and analyze material).

Teachers in deaf-only, mixed, and hearing-only classrooms reported equitable exposure to standards-based curriculum. This is a promising result in the context of inclusive placement and standards-based reform. The IDEA emphasizes the need for a continuum of services based on the needs of deaf students. Cawthon’s results indicate there is less need for concern over possible differences in OTL standards in different educational settings for deaf students.

However, notwithstanding Cawthon’s finding of equitable OTL, it is still likely that teachers have different reading instruction strategies for different students. In other words, a standards-based analysis may not capture what are real differences in the instructional experiences of different participant groups. One way to graphically depict how instruction time is used is by constructing content maps (See Fig. XX). These figures are topographical maps that show relative “highs” and “lows” of instructional time, similar to the “mountains” and “valleys” over rough terrain. They demonstrate differences in how teachers implement standards-based curricula, and show levels of alignment with standards. Diversity in instruction from one teacher to the next is not only to be expected, but hoped for, given the range of communicative and educational needs of deaf and hearing students. Thus, differences in how teachers implement standards is a rich area for further research.

Cawthon’s study has implications for the emerging field of alignment analysis in standards-based reform. Educators assume that higher levels of alignment to standards will result in higher levels of academic achievement on assessments tied to those standards. Yet achieving better results involves a substantial number of other variables—for example, school resources, class size, teacher characteristics, student characteristics, assessment validity, and professional development. The strength of the relationship between degree of alignment and student achievement thus is modified by these additional factors and needs to be verified by current and future research.

Alignment between components of accountability measures is one proposed method of documenting the success of Standards-based reform. This study proposed a language for evaluating alignment between Standards and classroom instruction. Developing a useful vocabulary will include identifying what factors tend to increase or decrease alignment measures.

Cawthon says that this area of research must also identify the educational significance of alignment between Standards, curriculum, and assessments. In the Hearing Only, Mixed, and Deaf Only classrooms investigated in this study, teachers report their reading instruction to be Moderately aligned to the Standards. Perhaps Moderate alignment to Standards produces "good enough" results in terms of student achievement. Studies of simultaneous alignment with Standards and related assessments will be needed to clarify the educational significance of these findings.

For more information, contact Cawthon at stephanie_cawthon@hotmail.com.