Guidelines for the Assessment and Educational Evaluation of Students Who are Deaf or Hard of Hearing
Evaluation Domain Considerations and Tools
According to Ohio Operating Standards for Students With Disabilities, 3301-51-06(E)(3)(a-f), students are evaluated in all areas related to the suspected disability. In order to determine if a student’s language and communication skills are commensurate with his or her cognitive abilities, especially for students identified early, information regarding cognitive potential is important. Because of the particularly high incidence of accompanying exceptionalities in this population, it is especially important that attention be given to these areas.
While some areas of assessment assist in identification for all students, for students who are deaf or hard of hearing, additional areas need to be considered during evaluations, such as:
- Communication (receptive/expressive),
- Assistive technology,
- Vision,
- Audiological,
- Language (signed/spoken),
- Social/emotional,
- Speech, and
- Additional factors/co-occurring disabilities.
These areas constitute a large part of the focus of these guidelines with attention also being given to how the general areas of assessment are administered and interpreted with respect to a student’s access to language to truly reflect the student’s academic abilities.
