Haley Burns

Hannah Greub
Alexandra Carley

Lab 3: Scoring and Interpreting Percentile

Introduction

The child we assessed is named Alex and she is a 26 month old female. In doing this

assessment, we were hoping to follow up with the parents concern with the childs language

skills based on the development of other female children at 26 months old. Through the

MacArthur-Bates CDI: Words and Sentences, we were able to assess the language/

communication domain. The assessment gave us the opportunity to find percentiles, [which] are

useful in determining if a childs performance is on age or grade level, (Mindes and Jung, 2015,

p. 81). From these percentiles, we were able to look at the words Alex used and how she used

them, as well as her word endings, morpheme use, and sentence complexity.

Data Summary

Alexs Data in Number and Percentile

Alexs Data Percentile

Vocabulary Checklist 313 of 680 words produced 30th

Word Forms 6 of 25 produced 40th

Mean Length of Sentences 3.67 morphemes used 26th

How Alex Uses Words

Percentage of affirmative Is Alex among this

answers at this childs age percentage of children?

Past 82% Yes

Future 85% Yes

Plural (-s) 78% Yes

Possessive (-s) 79% Yes

Progressive (-ing) 64% No

Past Tense (-ed) 48% Yes

Interpretation

Alex produced 313 out of the 680 vocabulary words, which puts her in the 30th percentile

of children also at 26 months old. This means that 30 percent or less of female 26 month old

children also know 313 vocabulary words. This may be concerning to some parents because this

also means that 70 percent of children her age know more vocab words than she does. Alex

produced 6 out of 25 word forms (ex., feet vs. foot), which puts her in the 40th percentile of

female children also at 26 months old. This means that 40 percent or less of female 26 month old

children also produce 6 word forms. In contrast, 60 percent of 26 month old female children

produce more than 6 word forms. This may be of slightly less concern due to the proximity of

this score to the average. Alex produced on average 3.67 morphemes in examples of her longest

sentences. This tells us that she is at the 26th percentile for mean length of sentences for females

her age. This means that 26 percent or less of females her age produced on average 3.67

morphemes, while 74 percent of 26 month old female children produce sentences with a greater

number of morphemes, which is of some concern. Alex is among 82 percent of children that talk

about past events of people who are not present, among 85 percent of children who talk about

something that will happen in the future, among 78 percent of children who add -s to words

when talking about more than one thing, among 79 percent of children who add an -s when

talking about ownership, among 48 percent of children who add -ed when talking about things

that happened in the past. These areas are not of concern because she is included in the

percentage of children that exhibit these skills. However, it is of concern that she is not included
in the 64 percent of children who add ing to their verbs to indicate the use of the progressive

forms.

Recommendation

From this assessment, there are no areas of high enough concern to seek an outside

specialist. However, there are a few categories that could use improvement through

environmental enrichment both at home and at school. To start, Alex scored in the 30th

percentile of the vocabulary checklist. To improve this, we recommend exposing Alex to new

vocabulary through reading material with a wider range of words. We suggest reading the same

book more than once a week, as well as using the vocabulary from the books in day-to-day

conversations with her. Next, Alex scored in the 26th percentile for mean length of sentences. To

improve this, we would suggest asking her open-ended questions and using reflective language

to encourage her to use longer sentence lengths. Some examples of this include asking tell me

more or What else would you like to say about that? Lastly, Alex is not among the 64 percent

of children who use the progressive -ing. To help her with this, we would suggest intentionally

scaffolding through recasting, which means to correct Alex when she using the incorrect verb

form. For example, if Alex said I am run!, you could say to her, Yes, you are running!.

While saying this you can emphasize the -ing for maximum exposure to the concept.

Reflection

Throughout the completion of this lab, our group worked together to score and interpret

scores from a standardized early childhood assessment called the MacArthur Communicative

Development Inventory: Words and Sentences (CDI). This lab allowed us to familiarize

ourselves with the variety of standardized instruments. There are many different ways to assess
children, so we found it very beneficial to learn more about this way of assessing children, and

learning how to interpret childrens reports from formal assessments. Knowing how to complete

this lab will help us in the future when describing children's assessment scores to parents, as it is

laid out through charts, making it easy to communicate and understand. Our group got together

on different occasions to work on this lab together. We worked on our lab through a google doc,

allowing each group member to see the lab report, and add to it. We each calculated the initial

scores and percentiles on our own so we could compare our calculations to make sure we all got

the same answers. Once we settled on our data, we worked together to design our data tables, and

complete our introduction, interpretation and recommendation.

Appendix
 References

Fenson, L. (2007). MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventories: users

guide and technical manual. Baltimore, MD: Paul H. Brookes Pub. Co.
 th
Mindes, G., & Jung, L. A. (2015). Assessing Young Children, 5 Edition. Boston, MA: Pearson.