Overview
AVEL is a three-year study funded by a grant from the Institute of Education Sciences (IES). The study has two primary aims:
- To better understand the factors that affect performance of English language learners (ELs) on assessments of academic vocabulary.
- To use this knowledge to refine an existing assessment of academic vocabulary so that it is psychometrically and theoretically sound for ELs.
The study will be completed in three phases:
- Archival data analysis using explanatory item response models (eIRT)
- Creating and piloting new items based on information from Phase 1
- Collecting additional data to validate the improved and piloted assessment.
Phase 2 is currently underway.
Research Team
AVEL is a collaboration between researchers at TIMES at the University of Houston, and the University of Oslo.
Primary Investigator: David Francis, Ph.D., University of Houston
Co-Investigator: Joshua Lawrence, Ph.D., University of Oslo
Co-Investigator: Paulina Kulesz, Ph.D., University of Houston
Post-doctoral researcher: Autumn McIlraith, Ph.D., University of Houston
Doctoral student: Rebecca Knoph, M.S., University of Oslo
Research assistant: Martin Walczak
2019-07-01