ALEXANDRIA, VA — December 6, 2012 — Department of Defense Education Activity (DoDEA) fourth and eighth grade students performed above their national counterparts on the latest National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) Report: Vocabulary Results from the 2009 and 2011 NAEP Reading Assessments.

This report focuses on how well students are able to use words to gain meaning from the passages they read. The NAEP vocabulary questions assess whether readers know a word well enough to use it to comprehend the sentence or paragraph in which the word occurs.

Although previous NAEP reading assessments included vocabulary questions, the 2009 assessment was redesigned to provide a new, systematic way of more fully measuring and reporting how students’ understanding of word meanings in the context of the passage impacts reading comprehension. The report, Vocabulary Results from the 2009 and 2011 NAEP Reading Assessments releases new state-and national-level vocabulary results from 2009 and 2011 for 4th and 8th graders and data from 2009 for 12th graders. DoDEA 12th grade students are not included in the NAEP Reading assessments because of the small sample size.

DoDEA Performance: Vocabulary Test of the National Assessment of Educational Progress for 2009 and 2011

• 4th Grade
• • With a score of 229 in both 2009 and 2011 on a scale of 0-500, DoDEA 4th graders outperformed the national average of 217 in both of those years by 12 points.

• 8th Grade
  • With a score of 275 in both 2009 and 2011 on a scale of 0-500, DoDEA 8th graders outperformed the national average of 263 by 12 points.

DoDEA Deputy Director, Adrian B. Talley noted that while DoDEA’s results continue to be above the national average, more emphasis will be placed on instructional practice within the educational program.

"As a system, we are pleased that DoDEA’s results continue to be above the national average," said Mr. Talley. "Our staff will continue to work hard to ensure that our children have a solid educational program. DoDEA’s results are in a steady state and we will examine our instructional practices and other aspects of our work to determine what changes can be made to continue to raise the academic bar for all students. We are always striving for continuous improvement in student achievement," he said.

Vocabulary results from the 2009 reading assessment are based on nationally representative samples of 116,600 4th graders, 103,400 8th graders, and 44, 500 12th graders. Results from the 2011 assessment are based on samples of 213,100 students at grade 4 and 168,200 students at grade 8. Both NAEP reading comprehension and vocabulary questions are reported on a 0-500 point scales developed independently so that vocabulary performance could be reported separately and compared across student groups and states. Vocabulary results cannot be directly compared to reading comprehension, nor can vocabulary results be reported in terms of the NAEP achievement levels.

The National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) is the only nationally representative and continuing assessment of what America’s students know and can do in various subject areas. Assessments are conducted periodically in mathematics, reading, science, writing, the arts, civics, economics, geography, and U.S. history. NAEP does not provide scores for individual students or schools; instead, it offers results regarding subject-matter achievement, instructional experiences, and school environment for populations of students (e.g., fourth-graders) and groups within those populations (e.g., female students, Hispanic students). NAEP results are based on a sample of student populations of interest.

Additional Information
"Vocabulary Results from the 2009 and 2011 NAEP Reading Assessments" is available at www.nationsreportcard.gov. Visit www.nagb.org/vocabulary-2009-2011for more information and materials on recent results.