Objectives Baseline Study Papua Rural Remote Education Final Report
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cannot ascertain what they did know often because they scored so poorly that the test could not distinguish whether the child did not know the content or simply could not read
the test.
On the other hand, EGRA is designed to orally assess the most basic foundation skills for literacy acquisition in early grades, including pre-reading skills such as listening
comprehension. The test components are based on recommendations made by an international panel of reading and testing experts and include timed, 1-minute assessments
of letter naming, nonsense and familiar words, and paragraph reading. Additional untimed segments include comprehension, relationship to print, and dictation. In each of the language
pilots conducted to date, EGRA met psychometric standards as a reliable and valid measure of early reading skills.
Based on the EGRA applications in more than forty countries, RTI International reported the results thus far indicated generally low levels of student acquisition of foundation literacy
skills. To provide an overall sense of the reading levels in the countries where EGRA has been applied, RTI International provided summary averages for oral reading fluency in terms
of correct words per minute as shown in Table 1.1. Country names have been excluded to avoid comparisons as cross-language comparisons are not encouraged due to differences in
language structure.
Table 1.1: Oral Reading Fluency Levels Correct Words per Minute in EGRA
In Indonesia, a 2014 National EGRA survey revealed that the national average of correct words per minute for second grade students was 52.1. However, this result was not
consistent across regions. Second grade students in the Jawa-Bali region significantly outperformed all other regions, even outscoring the national average by more than 7 words
1 2
3 French
2.9 17.4
32.4 English 1
2.2 4.0
9.2 English 2
11.4 English
59.0 73.1
Spanish 1 9.2
29.3 Spanish 2
32.0 59.6
78.8 Grade
Africa Low Income
Latin America Lower Middle
Income
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per minute. Maluku, Nusa Tenggara, and Papua, on the other hand, showed the lowest correct words per minute at only 29.7, as shown in Table 1.2. The table may indicate the existence of
reading problems in the eastern part of Indonesia.
Table 1.2: Oral Reading Fluency Level Correct Words Per Minute in Indonesia EGRA
The EGRA results can be used by policy makers to identify schools with particular needs and develop instructional approaches for improving foundation skills, for example: poor letter
naming results may indicate the need for additional alphabet exercises. In addition, based on the EGRA results, teachers may be taught to monitor students’ oral reading fluency and
practice decoding strategies. In some African countries, such as Mali and Niger, EGRA results were used to convey the development of materials and sequenced, as well as scripted teaching.
The continuous assessment strategies have demonstrated very promising results. As a result, EGRA data is used for planning, monitoring, and evaluating education policies and programs.
RTI International 2014, however, acknowledged the limitations of EGRA and its results. Firstly, EGRA measures a specific set of critical early grade reading skills, not necessarily all
important literacy skills. Secondly, the individual nature of assessment administration and the size of a typical sample mean that it is usually used to report results at the district, regional,
national, or program level, not at the school or student level. Thirdly, EGRA is not a high- stake accountability tool. Finally, the assessment is not suited for direct cross-language
comparisons, but could be used to report on the percentage of children meeting grade-level expectations. Despite the limitations, EGRA has been applied to assess early grade reading
ability in many countries, including Indonesia, as there is no clear benchmark for reading ability in the national curriculum.