Unquestionably, academic study is one of the most effective tools in every individual’s life. Academic studies help people advance their knowledge in specific fields. Unlike blogs and most journalistic stories, academic studies require months or years of work. Naturally, these studies involve lots of studying, include carefully conducting experiments or analyzing large data sets, among others. As a result, an academic study is a demanding program that offers an opportunity for individuals to develop themselves and their careers. It is essential to conduct a regular assessment test to measure the skills attained to enhance academic studies’ effectiveness. The Wide Range Achievement Test 4 (WRAT-4) is one of the effective academic skills assessment tools.
The test in question is ideal for individuals from 5 to 94 years and can be individually administered or in groups for particular subsets. This test takes 15-25 minutes for younger kids and 35-45 minutes for people aged eight years and above (Watson & Flamez, 2014). The Wide Range Achievement Test 4 measures basic academic skills in math computation, spelling, sentence comprehension, and word reading. These four subsets are used to derive scores when using this tool for academic skills assessment. The test can also assist in assessing learning abilities, designing remedial plans, and comparing two or more individual achievements (Watson & Flamez, 2014). Besides, WRAT-4 is crucial in assessing potential learning disabilities.
Delegate your assignment to our experts and they will do the rest.
Among the four WRAT-4 subtests, word reading is vital in measuring word and letter decoding through word recognition and letter identification. When the students cannot remember the sounds and names of letter clusters rapidly or lack the phonemic and phonological knowledge to analyze the letter data, they have difficulty reading words. However, it is challenging for a teacher to identify every student’s reading challenges. The use of the test in question helps assess the nature of students’ word reading difficulty (Veizel & Zibulsky, 2014). As a result, it becomes easier to enhance reading skills, enabling the learners to process the text and derive the meaning.
The assessment is essential since it helps the tutor assist the learner in developing both the language comprehension and word reading skills, which are crucial for learning to read. Excellent reading skills enable individuals to gain automatic word recognition, making reading expressive, accurate, and fluent. Consequently, excellent word reading skills will enable the learner to enjoy the benefits of reading. Some of these benefits include brain strengthening, increasing the individual’s ability to build vocabularies, and gain more knowledge (Veizel & Zibulsky, 2014). Therefore, measuring the learner’s word reading skills is an important exercise.
The second Wide Range Achievement Test 4 subset, sentence comprehension measures, helps identify individuals’ ability to understand meaning from words. Such understanding is vital in vocabulary development. Arguably, strong vocabulary enhances all areas of communication, including writing, reading, speaking, and listening. The learner’s comprehension also improves when they know the meaning of the word. Improved vocabulary helps incompetence, social confidence, and academic improvement. Besides, the sentence comprehension measure is essential for comprehending the information and ideas contained in sentences. The WRAT-4 uses an untimed modified cloze technique to attain these results (Caplan, 2018). In this technique, every item requires the learner to read, either silently or aloud, a sentence with a missing word. The examinee is then required to identify the best word to complete the sentence. Depending on the examinee’s word choice, it becomes easier to identify their sentence comprehension skills.
Excellent word spelling is another vital skill in academic studies. As a result, the teachers should regularly examine the learner’s spelling skills. It measures the examinee’s ability to convert sounds into written form. The technique used to assess this WRAT-4 subset is dictating a spelling format containing words and letters. Excellent spelling skills facilitate communication since it enables the readers to understand the text. Additionally, good spelling avoids confusion as proper and intent spelling enables the text readers to understand (Veizel & Zibulsky, 2014). It is challenging to read a text comprehension full of spelling errors. Furthermore, a text with excellent spelling gives a good impression. Consequently, it is crucial to measure an individual’s ability to write words and letters from dictation.
Lastly, math computation is another crucial subset for WRAT-4. It is used to measure individuals’ ability to execute basic mathematics computations by calculating written mathematics problems, solving simple oral problems, identifying numbers, and counting. However, this test is conducted within a specific time limit, depending on the examinee’s age. The problems issued in this subset are presented in a range of domains, including advanced operations, geometry, algebra, and arithmetic (Caplan, 2018). The study of mathematics helps in building problem-solving skills. All learners should be able to reason and think analytically through a problem. Excellent mathematics skills train the learner’s brains to find solutions logically. To create a composite reading score, one should combine the sentence comprehension standard and word reading scores.
Conclusion
In conclusion, Wide Range Achievement Test 4 is an essential tool for measuring academic skills. The test helps identify learners’ score rate in four subsets, including math computation, spelling, sentence comprehension, and word reading skills. However, for effective results, the test should be administered to individuals aged 5 to 94 years. Also, it should take 15 to 25 minutes for children and 35 to 45 minutes for individuals aged eight years and above. Excellent word reading skills help in measuring word and letter decoding through word recognition and letter identification. Sentence comprehension assists in identifying personal ability to understand words meaning, while spelling skills help the learner convert sounds into written form. Similarly, math computation skills assist individuals in mathematics calculations, counting, identifying numbers, and solving oral problems. Therefore, Wide Range Achievement Test 4 is an essential tool useful for measuring academic skills.
References
Caplan, B. (2018). Wide range achievement test-4. Encyclopedia of Clinical Neuropsychology , 1-3. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-56782-2_3000-2
Veizel, K., & Zibulsky, J. (2014). Wide range achievement test-fourth edition. Encyclopedia of Special Education . https://doi.org/10.1002/9781118660584.ese2537
Watson, J. C., & Flamez, B. (2014). Counseling assessment and evaluation: Fundamentals of applied practice . SAGE Publications.
