A Study of the Correlation between 8th Grade Students’ Self-Concept toward English-Language Arts Skills and their Performance on a Standardized Test

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to determine if there is a statistically significant correlation between academic self-concept and performance in the subset areas of reading and language on a standardized test. More specifically, is there a statistically significant relationship between student performance and their self-reported perceptions to English-Language Arts assessment criteria from a standardized test. The subjects consisted of 108 eighth grade students. Out of the total number of students, 87 were considered regular education students and 21 were classified with a learning disability. All subjects took the Terra Nova assessment in May of 2001 and were given the researcher designed English-Language Arts survey in November of 2001. The subjects involved in the study were students of the researcher. The Pearson product moment coefficient of correlation was used to analyze the data. The results demonstrated that there was a statistically significant relation between actual performance and perceptual performance on the Terra Nova test.