Kindergarten Language Benchmark Assessment {Product Review}

Back in November at the ASHA conference, I was able to meet so many sweet people and talented vendors.  One of these talented ladies gave me a copy of a brand new assessment to review.  It's called the Kindergarten Language Benchmark Assessment (KLBA).  After reading up on it and trying it out, I am SO excited to tell you about this one.

The KLBA was created by Naomi R Konikoff, MS CCC-SLP and Jennifer Preschern, MA CCC-SLP.  It is "a universal screening and progress monitoring tool for early language skills."  It consists of three assessments for students enrolled in kindergarten and geared for fall, winter, and spring.  For me, this is perfect for the Response to Intervention (RtI) process especially since I have to include specific RtI data in every evaluation (state requirement).

One thing that I love about it is that each assessment only takes about 3-4 minutes to administer or maybe a little longer at first.  This  works out great if you're on a tight schedule like me (and probably every other school-based SLP out there).

The skill areas included are: auditory comprehension, following directions, categories receptive, categories expressive, and narrative language.  The test gives you a raw score for each skill as well as a total score.

To administer the KLBA you use the picture prompts and record form booklet.  The instructions are straightforward and the pictures are colorful and easy to identify.  A couple of the pictures could have a little better quality; however, they were still clear enough for the students to easily understand.

I like that the verbal prompts are included inside the picture book to allow for quick delivery.  Most of the subtests include a training item and specific directions on what to say if the answer that's given is correct or incorrect.

Inside the test manual are specific scoring guides for each skill area as well as an answer key and scoring practice items.

There isn't any standardized data included, but you can still measure progress made throughout the year using the 3 assessments.  I will probably use 2 of the assessments as a pre- and post- measure for my RtI kindergarten students.  Check out this post on how you can use the KLBA more specifically in the RtI process.

The manual does give you the data from a recent pilot study, which allows you to compare your students' scores to the averages of the participants given in a table form.  You can find more info on the research involved in the KLBA here.  And this post explains how you can even use this test to differentiate SLI from ELL difficulties.

Overall, I thought this was a great tool to gather lots of language rich data from kindergarteners.  It can definitely be a go-to for progress monitoring, IEP goals, interventions, ELL concerns, and more.

 What do you think?  Is this something that you could use in your speech room?

Preschool Quick Probes FREEBIE

Do you ever just need to gather some quick data?  Usually around progress report time or when I go to write a new IEP, I want to make sure and probe my kiddos to get the most current data on them.  

Soooo I developed these quick probes to help me with my little ones.  They have been a big help, especially since I have so many kindergarteners on my caseload this year!  Check out Preschool Quick Probes.

This packet comes with 6 slides that address functions, categories, basic concepts (levels 1 and 2), associations, and prepositions.

You can either use this by printing out the slides as cards or by pulling up the file on your iPad and using it that way.  :)

There are specific directions and how-to prompts for each task.  Since most of my little ones have similar goals, these were perfect!

Grab this pack at my TPT store for FREE!!  Yay!  I love feedback, so be sure and let me know what you think.  :)

Enjoy!

App Review: Bilingual Articulation & Phonology Assessment (BAPA)

I'm super excited to review another awesome Smarty Ears app today!  This one is for your bilingual students.  It's actually the Spanish/English bilingual version of Sunny Articulation Phonology Test.  You can read a review of that app HERE.

The Bilingual Articulation Phonology Assessment (BAPA) is great for assessing the articulation and phonology skills of kids that speak Spanish-only or both English and Spanish.

When you enter the app, the "home" screen lists the students and assessment summaries.  I like to start by tapping the info button on the top left corner and watching the video tutorial.  These are a great overview.

Click the "add student" at the bottom of the screen to get started and enter the student's information.

Choose what type of Spanish is spoken by choosing the correct dialectical influence of the student.  You can also tap languages to choose between English, Spanish, or both.

Tap "New Assessment" to begin.  If you chose both as their language, it will prompt you to decide on which language you'd like tested first.  

After 8 slides, the app will ask you if the child is performing well enough in the chosen language to continue with the test.  If not, it will switch the targets to the other language.

During the assessment, students are prompted to name various pictures that contain specific phonemes.  The targeted phonemes are highlighted in green (see below).  If the child makes an error, just click the phoneme where the mistake occurred.  

You can then choose the type of error that was made.  Once the error is recorded, the phoneme is highlighted red to indicate an error (see below).

The gray arrows at the top right corner allow you to flip the phonetic word at the top upside down.  This is great for if you are sitting across from the child and need the word to face you.

The page icon on the right side of the screen opens up a note page, in case you need to add specific notes on the different words.

Toward the end of the assessment, there are multi-syllable probes that allow for you to see if their errors or intelligibility breaks down once the number of syllables are increased.

The English target words are recorded the exact same way as the Spanish.  If you clicked both under "Languages," the test will deliver probes in both English and Spanish.

After finishing the slides, tap on an estimated level of intelligibility to add to the assessment.  Then click the "Results" orange button at the bottom right corner of the screen.  The results will yield a raw score.

The results can be viewed in a breakdown of position, manner, voicing, words, multi-syllabic words, and error.  Just click the tabs to switch through the different results.

Tap "share" to review, print, or email the assessment to yourself.

The "setting" button at the top right corner will give you the option of turning off transition sounds (like "muy bien") between slides.  You can also turn on/off recording single sounds and indicate whether to display the written words.

When you email the results, everything is written up in a long detailed report.  This is all ready to go and be added to your eval.

Though the test is not normed, it can give you some great information on the specific articulation and phonology difficulties a child has.  I really like it for comparing Spanish vs English artic skills.

What I dig about this app:

• It's easy and straightforward to navigate.
• It yields lots of great data about both Spanish and English articulation skills.
• It's a much needed tool, since there isn't many bilingual or Spanish articulation assessments out there.
• I love having an assessment on an iPad, making it super portable.  This is really good for me since I travel to test my bilingual kids.
• I also like the detailed results broken down in different ways, allowing for easy comparison between languages.

What could make it better:

• I'd love to see this app normed/standardized one day.  This would make it easier to explain results to parents and justify qualifying a child into therapy.

Overall, this is another high-quality app from Smarty Ears!  You can grab it at iTunes HERE for $49.99.