The Future of Education
First Evidence of Reliability and Validity of SARD: An Exploratory Pilot Study in UAE Primary-Grade Native Arabic Readers
Ahmad Nazzal, ZAI Arabic Language Research Center, Zayed University, Dubai (United Arab Emirates)
Hanada Taha Thomure, ZAI Arabic Language Research Center, Zayed University, Dubai (United Arab Emirates)
Haitham Taha, ZAI Arabic Language Research Center, Zayed University, Dubai (United Arab Emirates)
Rana Nazzal, The Sharjah Private Education Authority (SPEA), Sharjah (United Arab Emirates)
Rabab Saleh, ZAI Arabic Language Research Center, Zayed University, Dubai (United Arab Emirates)
Abstract
Early identification of students at risk for reading difficulties is essential for successful and effective intervention, yet validated, reliable screening tools for Arabic reading assessment are scarce. Therefore, we developed the Smart Arabic Reading Diagnostic (SARD) tool. SARD is a web-based assessment of 16 tasks measuring multiple components of phonics skills, with automated administration and machine-learning–enabled scoring for selected tasks. This exploratory initial pilot study aims to investigate SARD’s reliability, content validity, and construct validity. We administered SARD to 354 native Arabic-speaking students in Grades 2–6 from schools in the United Arab Emirates. We computed grade-specific means and standard deviations, reliability indices, partial correlations, and principal component analysis. Cronbach’s α for the seven decoding tasks was 0.91, and item–total correlations ranged from 0.62 to 0.84. Principal component analysis showed a dominant factor accounting for 67% of the variance, and hierarchical clustering separated letter-level from word-level tasks. We demonstrate first evidence that SARD is a reliable and valid tool for assessing Arabic phonics skills. Future studies will explore SARD’s test–retest reliability and criterion validity and expand the population to include different countries.
Keywords: Assessment, Early Reading, Arabic language
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