한국 영어학습자의 초기 읽기능력 평가도구, K-디벨 개발

Development of K-DIBELS items for the assessment of English early literacy skills

The purpose of this study is to develop an evaluation instrument named K-DIBELS (Korean Dynamic Indicator of Basic English Literacy Skills) items, revising DIBELS, to assess early literacy skills of young English learners in Korea. To develop K-DIBELS, first, this study analyzed DIBELS and borrowed elements which are necessary to develop K-DIBELS items. Second, 798 words recommended for elementary school students among the basic vocabulary words of the 2009 revised national curriculum are classified into grades according to the content of the textbooks. Through this process, K-DIBELS assessment items are developed. Third, through the experiment, the reliability and the validity of the newly developed tests are verified, and K-DIBELS items are established to be appropriate for the assessment of English early literacy skills. In conclusion, considering non-existent of the early literacy measurement appropriate for the English learners as a foreign language, the validity of K-DIBELS is found to be fairly high as an assessment of English early literacy skills. However, the samples are rather limited so that further research needs to be done in this field since it has been a relatively unexplored field despite the importance of early literacy skills to the later development of reading proficiency.