18 Years of EI Experience: Boston Advocates Call for Multilingual Tests
A veteran worker in the Massachusetts program argues that current standardized tools mislabel bilingual toddlers as delayed because they are designed for monolingual English speakers.
By Layla Fontaine ·
Edna De Pina, a doctoral student at the University of Massachusetts Boston and a lifelong Dorchester resident, has identified a critical gap in the state's Early Intervention program. She argues that the standardized tests used to evaluate toddlers for developmental delays are not suited for multilingual children. De Pina, who has worked in the Early Intervention sector for more than 18 years, states that these tools were created decades ago specifically for English-speaking, monolingual children. As a result, they often fail to accurately measure the abilities of children who speak languages such as Cape Verdean Creole, Spanish, Haitian Creole, Portuguese, and Vietnamese at home.
The core issue is that current assessments do not account for the linguistic environment of the child. A two-year-old in Hyde Park who speaks only Spanish at home may be asked to follow directions in English during an evaluation. Similarly, a child in Roxbury might be labeled as delayed because the test does not recognize the specific ways children in their community play or solve problems. De Pina notes that when a child can count in Portuguese but not yet in English, the test scores may not reflect that the child is still developing normally. The evaluator, who often speaks only English, administers questions that do not match the child's daily experience.
Research cited by De Pina supports the claim that these tools introduce bias. Studies by Barrueco et al. (2012) and Bedore & Peña (2008) found that assessments designed for English-only speakers can misrepresent the true abilities of bilingual children. These errors can lead to two outcomes: labeling a child as behind when they are not, or missing real developmental needs. De Pina describes this as a false story that blocks multilingual children from receiving the services they deserve. When children are mislabeled, families lose trust in the system, and providers lose time trying to interpret incorrect data.
Massachusetts has made progress in multilingual education for school-aged children, but De Pina argues that Early Intervention has not kept pace. She points out that the state program is where support matters most for the youngest learners. The current system relies on a single cultural and linguistic lens, which she says is not neutral. She proposes three specific actions to fix the system: investing in bilingual and culturally responsive assessment tools, training providers to interpret results with cultural awareness, and including multilingual parents in the development of new tests.
De Pina, a first-generation Cape Verdean American, emphasizes that families know their children best and must have a voice in the testing process. She acknowledges that some argue standardized tests are fair because they are uniform, or that changing them is too costly. She counters that the real cost comes later when children who were incorrectly denied early help struggle in school and require more intensive services. The goal, she says, is to ensure that a child is seen for who they are, rather than being limited by what a test can measure.
De Pina urges families in neighborhoods from Dorchester to Hyde Park to talk to their local Early Intervention programs. She asks them to inquire about how multilingual children are assessed and to share their own experiences. She maintains that the status quo, where standard means English-only, needs to change so that all children can be evaluated accurately from the very start.
