CAL is proud to partner with the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction on a project to develop a Multilingual Multimodal Science Inventory (M2-Si).

Our development work draws upon theory and practices from formative assessment to construct activities which support learning for multilingual students in upper elementary science classes.

In 2022-23, of the over 1.4 million (1,442,736) students in North Carolina, a little over 140,00 (146,141) or 9%, were identified as English learners. Numbers of multilingual students in the state continue to increase, and NC typically ransk 8th or 9th in the country for the number of identified ELs.

Initial grant activities include working with critical stakeholders, including educators, families, and students to understand the kinds of information that stakeholders need to inform instructional and other decisions that emerge from formative assessments. A key feature of the approach is that the inventory instrument will be responsive to and accommodate the full linguistic repertoire of grades 3-5 multilingual learners.

This project funded by a U.S. Department of Education 2022 Competitive Grant for State Assessments awarded to the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction.

Read the press release.