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Description:
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The exponential growth of the Hispanic student population and the controversial educational issue surrounding the assessment of English language learners are the two fundamental topics of this study . Due to the uncertainty and ambiguity surrounding the assessment of the escalating Hispanic student population , the underrepresentation of Hispanics in gifted and talented (GT ) programs has developed into a critical educational concern (Bernal , 2002 ; Irby & Lara -Alecio , 1996 ; Ortiz & Gonzalez , 1998 ) . The research questions that guided this study focused on finding validated assessments for early identification of the gifted Hispanic English language learners (ELLs ) in kindergarten . The first research question aimed to determine the concurrent validity of the Hispanic Bilingual Gifted Screening Instrument (HBGSI ) using the Naglieri Nonverbal Abilities Test (NNAT ) and Wookcock Language Proficient Battery -Revised (WLPB -R ) selected three subtests , administered in English and Spanish . This study found a positive statistically significant correlation between the HBGSI , the NNAT , and WLPB -R subtests . The second question focused on the correlation between language proficiency as measured by the WLPB -R subtests and nonverbal intelligence measured using the NNAT . This analysis found that there was a statistically significant correlation between the NNAT and the WLPB -R subtests . The third question concentrated on the difference in performance on the NNAT and WLPB -R subtests by two student groups , those identified and those not identified GT using the HBGSI . The study determined that the students identified GT performed statistically significantly different on the NNAT than those not identified GT . The fourth question centered on the difference in performance on the HBGSI of students enrolled in a transitional bilingual education (TBE ) and those enrolled in an English as a second language (ESL ) classroom . The results of my study showed that students in a TBE classroom performed statistically significantly different on five HBGSI clusters (Social & Academic Language , Familial , Collaboration , Imagery , and Creative Performance ) than students in ESL classroom . The study s results were analyzed , interpreted and discussed in this dissertation . |