Reading for Ethiopia’s Achievement Developed Monitoring and Evaluation (READ M&E)

The assessment was conducted in 45 schools, with 15 schools from each language group, and involved a total of 1,719 students. The sample was evenly distributed between girls and boys. The EGRA tool consists of timed subtasks, including letter name knowledge, familiar words reading, invented words reading, and passage reading. The assessment was conducted using Nexus Tablets with Tangerine Software, allowing for electronic data collection. The Mini EGRA was conducted in parallel with a pilot study, which aimed to field test e-data collection. The assessment results show a discontinuity rate, which refers to the proportion of students who failed to complete a task or showed a significant drop in performance. The discontinuity rate varied across languages, with Aff Somali showing a higher rate compared to Sidamu Affo and Tigrigna. The proportions of students meeting benchmarks, which indicate reading proficiency levels, also varied across languages and grades. Mean fluency scores, which measure reading speed and accuracy, were calculated for each language and grade. The results show that students in Aff Somali and Sidamu Affo performed better in terms of mean fluency scores compared to Tigrigna. Mean fluency scores also varied by gender, with girls performing better in Aff Somali and Sidamu Affo, while boys performed better in Tigrigna. The assessment results also show that students in all three languages performed better in untimed tasks, which measure reading comprehension, compared to timed tasks. The mean scores of untimed tasks varied across languages and grades, with Aff Somali and Sidamu Affo showing higher scores compared to Tigrigna. Comparisons between reading comprehension (RC) and listening comprehension (LC) scores showed that students in all three languages performed better in RC tasks compared to LC tasks. The results also showed that students in Aff Somali and Sidamu Affo performed better in RC tasks compared to Tigrigna. The assessment results provide valuable insights into the reading fluency and comprehension levels of Grade 2 and 3 students in Ethiopia. The findings can inform educational policies and interventions aimed at improving reading outcomes in the country.