Literacy+Assessments

toc Dr. McKool Literary Assessments

=Spelling Inventory Assessment=

A spelling assessment is important to give your children because it allows the teacher to see the stage that each student is in. This is important information for the teacher because they can gage their classroom instruction after the patterned weakness. Or the can reinforce concepts that maybe only one or two children need help with, but the others will still benefit from the reiteration. This assessment allows us to look at student’s thought process when spelling, how they chose to spell what sounds they hear, and which letters they associate with specific sounds. This can lead to invented spelling, which represents attempts to use writing as a way to transcribe sounds that students hear. Children often use strategies from earlier stages of development to try and figure out how to spell unfamiliar words and the features of those words (44, Shagoury). This also allows the teacher to observe what kind of strategies the student uses to figure out unfamiliar words or sounds in the particular word. There are four types of vocabulary that your students are exposed to, unfortunately writing vocabulary is the smallest category, and right before that is reading vocabulary. The two that are the top are listening and speaking vocabulary, and unfortunately these words are used orally and not written down (115, Reutzel & Cooter). So although the student can recognize the word, they might not be able to correctly spell it. Teachers can tailor this test to fit their needs to see whether they need to work on speaking and listening word’s spelling more.

The child in question for this test was a female, third grader at Wicoff Elementary School in the West Windsor-Plainsboro School District. She is here by referred to as “Jane” for privacy reasons. This student enjoys reading and reads for twenty minutes every night as assigned in her homework, however she would like more time to read in school. She classifies herself as a good reader, and thinks that to be a good reader you need to practice. The student often reads a lot in school as well, because she does not have many friends. When other kids are talking with everyone and having fun, eight times of ten you can find her nose in a book. She tends to bond with the teachers in her room more. You see it with me, she would rather have a conversation with me then risk trying to talk to a classmate. For this reason she always comes up to me, and we have bonded. These qualities help shape her level in this spelling inventory assessment and should help her be more proficient in this assessment because the chances are she has been exposed to these words more often from reading them, and reading a lot. This particular student mostly likely has a higher number of reading vocabulary words which is to her benefit. She can use the higher level of reading vocabulary to apply concepts of letters and words she read with unfamiliar words that she problem solves how to spell.

For this assessment, the student was pulled aside and was ask to help out the Rider student with something for school. The student was under the impression that she was doing me a favor. I thanked her for her time and assured her that no one would see the exercise except me. And that it was in no way a test or anything graded. I gave her a pencil and a piece of paper. I read off the first word, then read the sentence and then spoke the word again. The words used in this assessment were: monster, united, dress, bottom, hiked, human, eagle, closed, bumped, and type. I did this for each of those words on the given list. This particular assessment had words already chosen, and had a chart of the broken down stages that a student could fall under. Those stages were: precommunicative, semiphonetic, transitional and conventional. At the end of the assessment, I thanked her again and told her that her answers were valuable to me and helped me learn how she learns. I also let her see the correct spelling of each word and she was excited that she got everyone correct expect one, in which she just put an extra letter. I only did this because as the test was going on, I noticed that all the spelling was correct except that one word and thought that it would be great reinforcement for her since she was a shy girl. She got really excited that she had done so well and walked back in the classroom with a huge smile on her face.

As stated above, Jane got every word correct except for the word human. She spelled the word with and extra “u” like this: “humman.” At first I thought maybe she didn’t know the word because she said it out loud and took an extra second or two to figure it out before righting the word down. Upon reflection of this assessment, the mistake could have come from the pronunciation of the assessment giver. If I over exaggerated by accident then she may have written what I said instead of what she knew was correct. This could explain why she took an extra second to answer, because she was unsure what I wanted. Taking into consideration that there was only one word wrong, and that her spelling was not on the chart for stages, I think this was most likely the case, however more additional questioning might be needed for that to be determined correctly. I found that Jane fell under the Conventional Stage of spelling, which is the highest level for this particular assessment. Another finding in this study that was not related to spelling was her use of the paper. Although it is not related I think that it gives good insight into her thinking and worth mentioning. I noticed that she went across the top of the page with each word. I had just assumed that she would go down the page with one right under the other. This was interesting to me and showed me that it was just my expectation but not a direction for her to go down the page. Upon reflection I decided next time if I chose to have the words going down the page, I need to put this in the directions to assure this happens because the students can not read my mind.

These findings are useful for teachers because it gives them guidelines for their instruction. They can decide whether or not they want to give students harder words in Word Study. They can also take the great results as a positive that Word Study is working and the students are at an appropriate level of thinking in spelling. Teachers can use this test to help create a personalize Word Study center in their classroom (32, Owocki and Goodman). Making each student their own set of words based on their level of spelling. This type of differentiated instruction could really benefit the students in your classroom. I would use these findings and introduce harder vocabulary words to Jane because I am confident she would be able to handle the difficulty. I feel this would also make Jane feel better about herself because she is at the appropriate level of thinking. Depending on whether the rest of the class follows suit with Jane, which could be determined by giving each of them the assessment, could shape the entire class dynamic and the planned instruction. This test is very valuable to a teacher and would a great tool to use to assess the children, especially because there is a corresponding chart that accompanies this assessment which easily allows the teacher to see what stage her students are categorized as. Many teachers and students think that spelling needs to be rote memorization, and that growth depends solely on the memorization and correctness. However recent research shows that like learning how to talk, learning to spell is a language function and can be treated similarly, with imitation, interaction and risk-taking (53, Shagoury) You can also look at this assessment to evaluate your teaching because words learned out of context have little carry over into children’s lives. Dictionary work and direct instruction alone are not enough to teach students words and have them stick in their minds (165, Chen). If the teacher assesses with words she has taught this way, then you may need to reevaluate how you chose to teach words to children. The majority of words are learned through engagement, exposure, talk and practice (165, Chen). So although practice and just plain exposure does work, it is not enough. Teachers may need to offer students more opportunities to talk and use their new words in context so that they can understand them, as well as in context in their writing so it does not just become a speaking vocabulary word but a solid word that span’s across all categories. If a teacher decides to tailor this assessment to words they would like to use, they need to systematically decide what spelling goes under different stages, and which one has a higher thinking. The teacher needs to be able to pick apart the words they use to understand why some students spelt the word the way they did. The need to have strategies they can offer students to help them problem solve to get to the correct spelling of the word.

Teachers can use the new research dicussed to help shape their lessons so that students can more effectively learn how to spell. Teachers need to acknowledge that although students misspell, it is not accidental but it reflects their thinking and system of knowledge (53, Shagoury). Using this information, teachers can create ways for students to learn that will be extremely beneficial and rocket their students in to the exceptional speller category.

Chen, Linda & Mora-Flores, Eugenia. Balanced Literacy. New Hampshire: Heinemann. 2006. Owocki, Gretchen & Goodman, Yetta. Kid Watching. New Hampshire: Heinemann. 2002. Reutzel, D. Ray & Cooter Jr., Robert B. The Essentials of teaching Children to Read. Pearson Education, Inc. 2009. Shagoury, Ruth E. Raising Writers. New York: Pearson. 2009.

=Oral Language Assessment= March 2, 2011

The purpose of an oral language assessment is to evaluate the child’s listening and talking skills. The purpose of this assessment was to see how well the child listened to the questions, how well they understood them and answered the asked questions. This type of assessment provides information about the student’s strengths and weaknesses in what a student is able to listen to and understand about the structure of English that is used everyday. Oral language is essential for learning and for some teaching assessments. And in a more obvious area, oral language is needed to communicate on an every day basis. This assessment also gives insight into the child’s life so teachers can offer more effective lessons that cater to the missing elements in their home life.

This student lives in the Huntersland development in West-Windsor Plainsboro. She was a female student, and for privacy purposes is referred as Jane from here on. She is a third grader in the Wicoff Elementary School. She is in a semi-inclusion classroom with two students who have Asperger’s, but other students leave for help in reading and math. There are always two teachers in the classroom at all times, and the aid does not make it known that she is there specifically for a student with Asperger’s. This allows all the students to get a little extra help throughout the day from the aid if needed.

The methodology that was used for this particular oral language assessment was informal. The female was brought aside by the cooperating teacher and asked if she would not mind helping out the Rider student with a project. She was told that I had specifically asked for her, and that I would really appreciate her help. There was a desk and two chairs in the hallway right out side the classroom set up for us to interview. When I sat down, I told her that I would just need to ask her some questions. She was informed that no one else would know that she was the girl I interviewed, that this was not graded and the her teacher would never read it. I then told her if she did not know what to say she could say I don’t know so there was no pressure for her. The last thing I did before starting the questions was thanked her for her time and that I really appreciated her help.

In the first part of the interview I asked her some questions about her home life. In my interview I found that Jane could not tell me her exact address just the neighborhood and the number of her house. This was the only information I got out of her after she asked several questions about what part of her address I wanted to know. Then she admitted she did not know her street name. Both her parents and her sister live in the apartment together. She also has pet fish, three birds and two bunnies. She has some chores like putting her coat where it belong and simple tasks like that so her dad does not have to worry about it when he comes home from work. He sister however, who is younger, does not have to do any chores. Jane enjoys playing with her sister when she is home. She does not remember the last book she read, but she normally reads after school. This could be because the class is required to read twenty minutes a day for homework. She normally does her homework at the kitchen table or in the dinning room. Jane’s grandmother reads to her when she visits, but that is not often. She had a lot of trouble with these questions, again asking multiple questions to see what it was that I wanted to know. It was like she wanted simple to the point questions and she did not want to over think that answer or give the wrong one. She spent sometime trying to remember what the last book she read was, and said she had finished it yesterday. I think putting her on the spot and being nervous caused her to no be able to recall the book, not the fact that she didn’t know. Jane’s bedtime on school nights is between six and seven. She also likes to watch television and admitted to watching a lot, some of her favorite shows are Cyberchase and Spongebob. When she plays with her friends she likes to play tag and swing on the swings. If Jane were to make a new friend she thought it was important that they know her name and how old she was. Jane was also asked about her school life in the second part of the interview. Her favorite part of school minus recess and lunch is the teachers. This really gives insight to her thinking about school. When she was asked if she got to read a lot in school, she said “sorta, there are lots of things we have to do,” this could tell a teacher that maybe there is too much of a burden on the students to get a lot of work done. And she also wishes there was no homework. Jane thinks that she is a pretty good reader, and you get to be a good reader with practice. If she had her choice of any book it would be __Little Red Riding Hood.__ Jane also likes to write a lot and in school she got the chance to write realistic fiction, but did not know her favorite thing that she wrote about was. Maybe she was self conscious about sharing her writing with me and just was not comfortable yet. She thinks that the teachers helped her the most in school and one thing that she remembers the most is them helping her learn how to read. Jane’s parents help her with her homework when she is at home. If she had to help someone learn to read she said that she would teach him or her how to sound out the words.

I would use these findings as an insight for several things. The first is this gives a great insight to the life at home. It was obvious to me that she had a few chores so that one of her parents did not get annoyed when they came home, but she did not know how to express it. It also showed that Jane feels a lot of pressure from the work in school. She made a point that she does not get to read a lot in school because there is a lot of work. This could signal to a teacher that they need to set aside more time in school to let students just read. She also believes that practice makes a good reader, so maybe when she is struggling she attributes it to the lack of time she has for reading. I also notice she made no mention of friends specifically through out the entire interview, usually students her age love to talk about their friends. This could signal to a teacher to assign more group work so that Jane has more opportunities to interact with students and create relationships.

This type of assessment requires a conversation setting. This assessment is an oral language assessment so the most important information you take out of it should be related to that. You can easily see flaws in spoken elements of the language. It will allow the teacher to see that there needs to be more times where students can talk and express themselves for practice. It was clear that Jane was shy and unsure in her answers even though she was aware that it was just two people talking. It could be she was put off by the fact that I was writing as she spoke, maybe on the next assessment just using a recorder would be easier so the student was not distracted. It is easy to see where students need more help with expressing themselves for example vocabulary, or whether or not the student had a hard time putting their thoughts into words. This type of assessment can also be used to judge a child’s thinking skills. How a child answers a question can reveal a lot about what they heard and what they thought the corrected answer was. Or if a student asks questions back to see what type of specific question you are trying to get at reveals what level of critical thinking they might be at. Overall, the assessment is an oral language assessment but can reveal a lot about the child in many areas that a teacher can address and nurture in the classroom.

=Running Record Assessment=

An oral language assessment can be very useful for teachers. The student being able to decode words in print is has been viewed as essential. And the running record is an informal assessment with a high reliability rate (p.42, Reutzel and Cooter). This informal assessment allows you to analyze and interpret what primary cueing systems that the student uses while reading (p.43, Reutzel and Cooter).. Decoding with most of your students uses as a cueing strategy allows you to teach students the other cueing systems so they have more tools to use when they read. We use this type of miscue analyses because we can not crawl into our students minds and pick their system apart as they read silently, so we need to hear them read aloud in order to have an opportunity for some insight (p. 73, Goodman). We are essentially identifying the student’s problem solving strategy for reading (p. 148, Chen).

The student used for this assessment was a third grader in Wicoff Elementary School, in the West Windsor Plainsboro school district. She will be referred to as Jane in this assessment to protect her privacy. I have observed this student over the past few weeks to gain more information on the way she interacts with others students and her teachers. Jane has many friends in her third grade classroom and is often found talking. She has a very controlling personality; she likes to be in charge of the conversation when she is talking to her friends. I think that this is a compensation technique for her, because when it comes to doing work she is very self-conscious. My teacher had shared with my that she had her brother in previous years and that he was exceptionally smart. This has been something that Jane feels like she has to live up to and it is very obvious she feels the pressure. Because of this Jane often seeks the help of the teacher immediately after being assigned independent practice because of her insecurities. Her teacher has admitted that she does not always need the help and that Jane is very bright but she has a learned helplessness because she does not want to fail. I have noticed this even before my teacher had expressed this problem, but it became more clearly defined when I understood her situation.

In this particular assessment, the cooperating teacher and I spoke about which student we thought would be a great candidate for me to do a running record on. Once we decide on which child would be best for this assessment we chose a time to complete the task, which was during writing workshop. At that time the student chosen was called up to the cooperating teachers desk and asked to read to the Rider student for a little while. She was happy to and grabbed her independent reading book from her desk which was __Happy Birthday Mallory__ by Laurie Friedman and asked me where I would like to sit. I told her that we are going out into the hallway where there were less distractions. We went outside the classroom with two chairs, the book and the clipboard borrowed from the student with paper and a pencil. We sat down and I thanked her for letting me listen to her read her book today. Jane then asked me where I would like her to start reading, and I told her where ever she wanted. She got excited and told me that she would like to start from her favorite part of the book. She then opened __Happy Birthday Mallory__ to the chapter titled //Surprises// on page 134. She read about halfway thru the chapter and asked me if I would like her to read more. I replied with no you have read enough, you may go back into the classroom. She promptly responded with no I want to keep reading. I obliged so I could continue observing her reading. After she finished the chapter she smiled and said that’s it, I thanked Jane again and we headed back in the classroom with about ten minutes left for her to start writing a story that the rest of the class was writing.

The method used for this assessment was a Running Record, which was created by Marie Clay (p.38, Reutzel and Cooter). In this assessment you have one child at a time and you have them read between one hundred and two hundred words to you aloud (p.42, Reutzel and Cooter). While the children are reading you need to acknowledge every word that is being read by the student and record it. If the student reads the word correctly you denote this with a check and if a student miscues then you would mark it with the respective markings designed by Marie Clay (p.39, Reutzel and Cooter). It is important to acknowledge when the student self corrects the word they miscues or skips over it. These are two examples of miscues that a teacher can look for while taking running records (p.44, Reutzel and Cooter). After recording the running record of a child’s reading it is important to analyze the information you have gathered. You will need to decide what type of miscue the student is using. There are three types of miscues; they are semantic, structure and visual.

For Jane, I found that her biggest problem was repeating one or two words. She did this about once on every page that she read. This was a big problem for me because I could not understand why she would have this problem. I at first thought it was because she was reading so fast. It made me question whether she understood what she was reading, or if she was just reading off the words. I pondered upon it for a while. I thought if I was here teacher and I asked her to slow down, she would make fewer mistakes but that would defeat the purpose of this assignment. For the most of her mistakes, I concluded that she was using semantic cueing and visual cueing. She was rereading do make sure that what she just read made sense, causing her to repeat the words allowed to be sure. In addition she was returning to the text in the book, causing her to make sure that what she just said looked the same, essentially if it look right. After she checked both of these cueing systems in her head and confirming it was correct she continued with her reading. Jane also asked for assistance once for the word bandanna and after a second review of the text, she did not have any context clues to help her, but I also took note that she was quick to ask for help. This can contribute to her learned helplessness, where she always must seek the teacher’s approval. The last major observation I took from this assessment and Jane’s reading is that she miscued a word three times but did not self-correct and just kept reading. I would believe that she did not use any cueing system because she did not think she got anything wrong. Had se recognized the miscue I think she would have used Semantic cueing and ask herself if it sounded right, because it did not flow well with the sentence, nor did a few of them make any sense. On two occasions she substituted words for a different word but it had the same meaning. For example instead of saying “focus” she used the word, “concentrate.” Obviously these two words do not look the same at all, but they can be used interchangeably. For this reason I can conclude that she used Semantic cueing because the words made sense. Although she substituted the word, the sentence still had the same meaning. After coming to this conclusion I feel that Jane relies a lot on semantic cueing and that is her go to problem solving strategy for reading.

After reflection on this assessment, I had a discussion with my cooperating teacher and see told me that she had done an assessment to calculate the words per minute for each child. This immediately explained to my why Jane was reading so fast. I feel that she was under the impression that I was calculating words per minute for her reading. If this is the problem, then I tend to believe that she was stumbling on her words and repeating because she was so focus on reading fast. This could mean that although her miscues were higher in numbers because of repeating, she may actually make fewer mistakes on a daily basis. This made me realize that I probably should have clarified that it was not based on words per minute, however I was not aware of this until after I had already done the assessment. This is something as a future teacher you need to take into account when conducting an assessment.

I could use these finding to set up possibly a lesson so I could teach students other cueing systems that may prove helpful to the student while reading. This system will also allow me to identify what level of reading each student is at. If the student has less than ninety four percent correct, they maybe at the instructional level or frustration level of reading (p.42, Reutzel and Cooter). Teachers may need to choose easier level books for those students for book club or a different bin of leveled books for independent reading. Teachers may chose to level books in bins and put names on bins to assign them to grouped levels of students. Once teachers have given this assessment to all their students they will have a broad over view where they class stands as a whole, and she can tailor all her lesson plans to these results. It will give the teacher great insight to where her students stand and where she needs to start her teaching or what she needs to reinforce. Because this assessment is .90 reliable and informal, it will be easier for the teacher to gage the student individually and allow them to take into consideration all of the circumstances during the test and the child’s specific issues. This is not possible with standardized tests.

=Writing Assessment= April 19, 2011

Writing is communicating through written form. They can vary from scribbles to symbols, to complete sentences (Chen pg. 115). Writing is a way of expressing meaning that children learn similarly to reading (Chen pg 116). The purpose of a writing assessment is to allow the teacher insight to the intentions of the writer. The purpose is to allow the teacher the opportunity to study a student’s writing and question them on their reasons for why they wrote what they wrote, basically identifying their intentions. It also allows the teacher the opportunity to teach the student strategies while conferring with them individually. It helps the teacher identify was the students are struggling with and what things need to be addresses as a whole class or on an individual basis. The written language system includes rules to make communication easier. The rules such as punctuation and capitalization are tools that make written thought more understandable; these rules are socially agreed upon and are things we look for in our student’s writing (Shagoury, p. 60). Knowing that we are looking for specific conventions and rules in our writing allows the teacher the opportunity to use this assessment to understand which of these are lacking knowledge in her classroom. She can then use this information to change the dynamic of her classroom or address the deficiency. Caulkins is very big on the idea that the purpose of assessing the children’s writing during a conference is to set goals and give the children the strategies it takes to reach those goals (Caulkins p. 63). I agree with this strongly, how can we know what we need to fix in a student’s writing if we do not research it and find out the intention of the child and how the wanted to write something. And how can we ever expect the child to success and improve if we do not offer them the tools to do so. This writing assessment allows the teacher to gage all these things into one to better the student.

The child used for this assessment is a male third grader in Wicoff Elementary School. He is a very bubbly kid. On Thursday, it is his share day and he never forgets to bring something to school. This first lead me to the fact that he was very dependable, and he has proved this true even more the more I observe him. He always shows something that is sports related or something related to his after school activities. This alludes me to believe that he does not spend large amounts of time watching television or playing video games like some of his classmates. This student is a big sports fan and just about everything he does in the class is related to sports. He is shy and quiet in class, but raises his hand every so often. He is very smart and is always well behaved. The student has several male friends in the class and can be observed working well with any student. He is an overall well-rounded student.

The setting for this assessment was in the classroom. The methodology behind this assessment was very important. I had gone through several students’ work until I came across one that I was interested in learning more about. I found this male student’s and was curious about several things. I got his writing folder and made copies of the assignment from the beginning to the end, where they made a little book out of their story. I looked over all the items that I had photocopied and noted where I had questions. I then met with the student to have him explain to me his intentions for this writing assignment and how he went about choosing his topic. I asked him what events happened from day to day that influenced how his story progressed. I asked him his intentions at certain points and I addressed the questions that I had written down. I also made a point to ask questions that were less demanding and more about the fun he had while creating his piece of work. These questions got him smiling and you could really tell that he had enjoyed writing this piece of work because he was allowed to write about something that interested him. Also I took some cues directly from his writing and did not follow them up with questions because it was simple grammar mistakes.

In my questioning I found that this male student really enjoyed writing. He was rally excited that he was able to write about anything that he wanted. He also mentioned that he really liked that his teacher split their writing up into scenes not just continuing to write everyday where they left off. He wanted to use this strategy again because it was easy for him to get his ideas on the paper without them being confused with other ones. Another strategy he really tried to use was the “show not tell” one, he tried to use very descriptive words in his writing so the reader could imagine what he was imaging. This statement was supported by this student’s writing with the use of words such as fidgeting, miracle and groaned.

There are some of the basic things that are present in the writing such as he writes left to right and uses quotation marks eighty five percent of the time, and he only forgot ending punctuation a few times. This one however could be blamed on the copier or if it was the end of the scene and he did not push down hard enough with his pencil. The quotations that were missing were quite a shock to me, because I had already taught a mini lesson to the class addressing when it is appropriate to use quotes in a piece of writing. It is very obvious that this student wanted to use more creative words in his work but he ended up spelling some simple words wrong in the process for example he spelt friend, “freind” and break as the car “brake.” He also spelt the word announced and practice two different ways in the piece of work within a few pages of each other. Another grammar mistake that is consistent throughout the piece of writing is the apostrophe for the possessive noun. He did not use an apostrophe to show possession of something at all throughout the paper. Overall though the piece of work was a great one with a creative story line that interested the writer, it just had mistakes where the mastery comes with exposure and time. The big thing to take away from this piece of writing was that the mistakes were very minor and they do not hold the piece back, an average third grader might not even notice it is a mistake.

Students learn the fine-tuning of writing through exposure, they read books and see the correct formats modeled for them. This is very important for student’s to gain knowledge from. In a situation like the one this student has, I feel it is just fine-tuning until his work becomes perfect. Since he had some spelling issues I would start using a word wallet or word walls more. I would pick out words from student’s works that were misspelled and then everyday explore the words to add to the student’s vocabulary. I would also be able to make these words the spelling words for the week if I thought that was needed. With the lack of an apostrophe, I think that a mini lesson in that area of grammar would help to correct that situation, and after the lesson I could monitor the student’s writing to see if it was successful, if I think I was not I could revisit the subject in a second attempt at conveying the convention. For the dialogue and the quotes that were missing every so often, I could be sure to put this on an editing check sheet and make sure for a while I stress the importance of checking every item on that this to ensure it gets checked. In an effort one step further, I could put that item as one of the first few things to check because by the end of the sheet students are no longer being as through as they were at the beginning. One great idea is to have a bulletin board dedicated to these mistakes that have reminders on the board or “how tos” for certain elements in writing that students can refer to while editing. Offering a dictionary at every group of tables will also allow the children the opportunity to self correct those big words that they are eager to use to create a more descriptive story.

Taking a look at the writing of students allows you to ask questions when needed about the intentions of the student’s writing. It also allows you to take in the mistakes that are being made so that you can direct your instruction to correct these problems. Doing a little research into the work of each student will give you a better understanding and allow you to more effectively help the student.