A grade equivalent score provides an estimate of test performance based on grade level and months of the school year (Popham, 2005, p. 288). A grade equivalent score of 3.7 means the performance is at that expected of a third grade student in the seventh month of the school year. Grade equivalents provide a continuing range of grade levels and so can be considered developmental scores. Grade equivalent scores are popular and seem easy to understand however they are typically misunderstood. If, James, a fourth grade student, takes a reading test and the grade equivalent score is 6.0; this does not mean that James can do sixth grade work. It means that James performed on the fourthgrade test as a sixth grade student is expected to perform. Testing companies calculate grade equivalents by giving one test to several grade levels. For example a test designed for fourth graders would also be given to third and fifth graders. The raw scores are plotted and a trend line is established and this is used to establish the grade equivalents. Note that in Error: Reference source not found the trend line extends beyond the grades levels actually tested so a grade equivalent above 5.0 or below 3.0 is based solely on the estimated trend lines.
Grade equivalent scores also assume that the subject matter that is being tested is emphasized at each grade level to the same amount and that mastery of the content accumulates at a mostly constant rate (Popham, 2005). Many testing experts warn that grade equivalent scores should be interpreted with considerable skepticism and that parents often have serious misconceptions about grade equivalent scores. Parents of high achieving students may have an inflated sense of what their child's levels of achievement.
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