Development of a Reading Comprehension Test for Elementary level Hearing Impaired Students

Abstract

Reading comprehension has an important place in lifelong learning. It is an interactive process between the reader and the text. Students with hearing impairment need reading comprehension skills at all educational levels and for all school subjects. Determining the level of hearing impaired students’ reading comprehension skills is the subject of testing. Tests used to measure students’ success are expected to provide accurate and reliable information. Therefore, the aim of this study is to develop a valid and reliable reading comprehension test appropriate for elementary level hearing impaired students reading comprehension learning outcomes. The participants in the study were 15 sixth graders from a school of special education, indicating that this multiple choice reading comprehension test is valid and reliable. The value of Content validity ratio of each item was greater than 0.50, which indicates that each item was statistically significant and usable in practical context. Estimated values of item difficulty ranged from 3.00 to 7.00 which indicate that items were neither too easy nor too difficult and fulfill the criteria of item standardization. Discrimination index of items ranged from 0.20 to 0.1 that indicates that items were good and excellent by the aspect of item discrimination. The reliability value was up to the standard which indicates that the English Reading Comprehension test was reliable.