New enhancements to the tool include the use of pictures and figures in eight of the nine subtests at the primary level, rather than words and phrases that may be unfamiliar to non-native speakers. Teachers and administrators can be certain that these provisions allow for an equitable test for all students. The primary purpose of CogAT is to assess students’ verbal, quantitative, and nonverbal reasoning abilities, thus guiding instruction for all students and providing reliable data in determining eligibility for enrichment programs.
“Our assessments help to provide a true measure of student abilities, while providing educators with greater and more flexible tools to inform decision-making,” said Jim Nicholson, President, HMH-Riverside. “The reduced language emphasis on CogAT increases access to enrichment programs for students from a variety of backgrounds.”
In addition, new scoring facilitates direct and accurate comparisons between students—regardless of their dominant, or native, language. This enables customers to exclude selected content from verbal portions of the assessment. For example, the sentence completion subtest at the primary levels may be excluded for certain children, such as ELL students, for whom English or Spanish is not their dominant language. Those students instead would receive a verbal composite score comprised of two subtests—picture analogies and picture classification.
Another enhancement allows teachers to use a shortened version of the assessment to quickly gauge students’ abilities. The CogAT Screening Form enables educators to administer three subtests—one from each of the measured cognitive domains of verbal, nonverbal, and quantitative—in a single class period.
For more information on CogAT, please click here.
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Houghton Mifflin Harcourt is a global learning company with the mission of changing people’s lives by fostering passionate, curious learners. Among the world’s largest providers of pre-K–12 education solutions and one of its longest-established publishing houses, HMH combines cutting-edge research, editorial excellence and technological innovation to improve teaching and learning environments and solve complex literacy and education challenges. HMH’s interactive, results-driven education solutions are utilized by 60 million students in 120 countries, and its renowned and awarded novels, non-fiction, children's books and reference works are enjoyed by readers throughout the world. For more information, visit www.hmhco.com.