2026 is a NAEP year, with 4th and 8th grade assessments given between now and the end of the school year. In addition to the usual assessments in reading and math, 8th graders will also be tested in civics and U.S. History. You can find the NAEP calendar of upcoming assessments here.
This year marks the debut of a new framework for the reading assessment, replacing the main NAEP’s 2004 and 2009 framework updates.
Six Major Changes
1. Currently, two types of reading are assessed: reading for literary experience and reading for information They will be replaced by three categories, called Disciplinary Contexts:
A. Reading to Engage in Literature
B. Reading to Engage in Science
C. Reading to Engage in Social Studies
2. Disaggregation of non-socioeconomic status subgroups (particularly, race and ethnicity) by socioeconomic status (SES). Researchers have known for decades that racial differences in test scores appear across levels of socioeconomic status (see discussions in Jencks and Phillips, The Black-White Test Score Gap, 1998). Users of the NAEP Data Explorer who know how to create crosstabs are currently able to explore these data, but now the statistics will be explicitly disaggregated in reporting results.
3. Expanded Categories for English Language Learners (ELL). Two categories, ELL and non-ELL, will expand to three:
A. Current English Learners
B. Former English Learners (exited ELL status in the last 2 years)
C. Non-ELL students (never in program or exited more than 2 years ago).
4. Additional Questionnaire Items to Provide Context for Reading Performance. Questionnaires are given to students, teachers, and administrators. The danger is that NAEP data, which have a limited causal warrant, will be used spuriously to support causal claims. This happens frequently with NAEP data.
5. Process Data. This is new. Because the NAEP will be 100% digital, how students answer questions (for example, the amount of time to respond to particular items, evidence of off-task behavior, or use of lookbacks and other design features) can be tracked and made into variables in their own right. This kind of navigational data has been available on international assessments for a few years. PISA went predominantly digital in 2015, eTIMSS began in 2019, and PIRLS offered a digital option in 2021 (and will be all digital in 2026.)
6. Assessing students’ ability to “apply and use” what they’ve read, bringing NAEP a step closer to PISA in assessing practical applications of academic learning.
Controversy
NAEP is governed by the National Assessment Governing Board (NAGB). Adopting the new reading framework provoked controversy. “The board nearly came to blows over its recently-concluded new reading framework,” observed Chester E. (Checker) Finn, Jr, a former chair of NAGB, on the Fordham Institute website in 2022.
What was the controversy about? The main disagreement involved the role of prior knowledge on reading assessments. Students who already know something about electricity or World War I will perform better on questions posed after reading short passages on those topics, especially if words used in the passages are part of their existing vocabulary. These banks of prior knowledge often correlate with student SES, an association that the framework development committee characterized as sociocultural. In the interest of equity, the first draft of the framework, written by a committee of reading scholars, recommended supplying students with reading-independent background knowledge (via what are called Universal Design Elements or UDEs, for example, with helpful avatars or video clips) that would reduce the effects of a reader’s sociocultural background and level the playing field. Several members of NAGB objected, noting that such assistance is rarely available in the real worlds of work or college. They also expressed concern that NAEP’s trendline could be jeopardized if the test changed so much that past scores became incomparable to future ones.
ED. Hirsch, Jr, who in his 1987 book, Cultural Literacy, launched a multi-decade campaign highlighting the importance of building knowledge as a goal of reading curricula, weighed in with an open letter to NAGB. He urged the board to reject the proposed framework, arguing, “By adding these special background clues, the tests fail to sample what they implicitly claim to be sampling. They will become less, not more, predictive of real-world reading-comprehension abilities.”
A subcommittee of NAGB forged a compromise, allowing for some UDEs, but not with the emphasis of the framework development committee’s original draft. Will the compromise hold? It depends on how the contractors developing NAEP items interpret the wording of the compromise.
Let’s give the last word to Checker Finn, who, when interviewed by Rick Hess in 2021, hinted at the possibility that the debate could arise again.
From interview with Rick Hess, 10/21/21, Education Week, Schooling Is in Tempestuous Times. Troublemaker Checker Finn Weighs In
“Rick: Can you say a bit more about the reading-framework controversy. What was the issue exactly and how did it turn out?
Checker: It came out more or less OK thanks to valiant efforts by a handful of NAGB members to bridge wide differences within the board. The controversy had multiple parts and changed some over time, but essentially it was about how radically to alter NAEP’s longtime approach to reading and the threat that major alterations would kill a multi-decade trend line. Perhaps the stickiest wicket is the extent to which the actual NAEP testing instrument should supply various assists to kids who may not possess certain vocabulary or background knowledge needed for comprehension. My own contention is that the “real world” doesn’t provide this kind of help, and if NAEP does so, it’s apt to result in generally misleading cheery data, maybe masking bona fide issues that educators should be obliged to confront. In the end, the new framework will almost certainly enable the trend line to endure. As for the assists to test-takers, there will be some. We’re told they’ll be few and won’t alter outcomes—but I continue to fret that cracking this door open invites much future mischief to enter.”
Sources
2026 NAEP Reading Framework
NAEP Reading Framework Press Release
NAEP Reading Framework Updates for the 2026 Assessment Frequently Asked Questions
Similarities and differences between the current NAEP Reading assessment and the updated framework.
More information from the NAEP Reading Framework Homepage
“Nation’s Report Card’ Has a New Reading Framework, After a Drawn-Out Battle Over Equity” By Sarah Schwartz, Education Week, August 13, 2021