28
Portrait of the Reader
EDTL 628-Practicum in Literacy Intervention
May 3, 2010
Christina Nishiki
Section 1: Description of the Student
The student chosen for this particular study is six-year-old white student who we will call Karri*. At the time of initial assessment Karri* was a five-year-old student. The name of the real student for this study will be kept confidential. Karri* is the older of two siblings. She has one three-year-old sister. Karri* is currently attending a half-day Kindergarten program in the Gunning School District. Karri’s* mother chose to have her enrolled in a half-day program versus the full day program.
Karri* was signed up to participate in the tutoring session offered through Bowling Green State University in conjunction with the Gunning School District. Karri* was assigned to this evaluator based on the teaching assignment of the evaluator. On the first meeting with evaluator Karri* appeared to be a shy individual and somewhat hesitant about engaging in activities. After introductions and getting to know each other activities, Karri* became very comfortable talking to the evaluator and her willingness to participate in the assessments and lesson plans increased. Karri’s* mother made a comment on the first meeting that she was surprised how talkative and her willingness to do the activities was unusual for Karri*. Upon further discussions with Karri’s* mother, the evaluator learned that Karri* is very excited about her tutoring sessions and looks forward to Mondays each week.
Based on Karri’s* Student Priorities and Interests section of the BADER Informal Reading Inventory Karri* has stated that she needs help with the following areas: meanings of words, reading street signs, using the telephone book, reading directions, reading words on food packages, and reading the TV Guide. She also stated that long words and sounds of each letter give her some difficulty. Karri* stated in the interests section that she would like to receive help in reading books on sports, animals, and science even though these are not areas of interest for Karri*. On an interest survey created by the evaluator Karri* stated that she was interested in reading only fiction books that focused primarily on princess stories, fairy tales, and Hannah Montana themed books.
The evaluator asked additional questions to Karri* from the evaluator created Interest/Attitude survey. Karri* stated that she is willing to participate in class discussions and stated that she does get bored at times in the classroom. She does not go to other teachers for classes nor does she have any tutors during the day. She does not find it difficult to follow along in the classroom and she understands what she reads. She occasionally will answer questions in class about the reading selections. Karri* also stated that she gets very excited when reading time is over. Karri* enjoys reading outside of school and reads at home frequently with her parents.
The evaluator has found through the interactions with Karri* that she is very excited to be at the tutoring sessions and gets very involved in the activities planned by the evaluator. The evaluator has also noticed the excitement level in Karri* has increased as well as her willingness to be at the tutoring session. Karri* is enjoying her tutoring sessions and through her willingness to participate in activities has allowed her to make successful gains and achievements in her tutoring sessions.
Section 2: Description of the Assessments
The assessments for Karri* included both formal and informal assessments. The BADER Reader Inventory Assessment and The BADER Reader Inventory Assessment-Preliteracy and Emerging Literacy Assessment were used in the pre-assessment observations. The BADER Emerging Literacy Assessment is designed to be used to help students who are unable to read the graded word lists or graded reader’s passages. Included in the test are “metalingusitic skills of literacy awareness, letter and phonemic knowledge and manipulation, and the student’s ability to understanding concepts related to reading while manipulation refers to abilities such as isolating and blending segments of language” (Bader &Pearce, 2009, p.116).
The Preliteracy and Emerging Literacy focuses on literacy concepts such as: The proper direction to hold a book and turn the pages in the correct order, the child’s ability to describe events occurring in the book, the child’s ability to draw a picture based on the readings and if he/she is able to point out a word from the book, the child’s ability to use directional words for understanding, and the child’s ability to identify meanings of words. The second part of the Preliteracy assessment focuses on the child’s ability to apply appropriate syntactic knowledge when speaking. For example, the examiner will be listening carefully if the child can isolate a word within a sentence. Letter identification, recognition, and writing are other skills assessed. Semantic and Syntactic Evaluations will also be assessed. Karri’s* mother has also provided me with a copy of her DIBELS scores that were taken mid-year at her elementary school. These scores will aid the instructor when developing weekly lessons. She will also use results from an informal interest survey that was created to support the BADER Reader Inventory Assessment Interest Survey.
The BADER Reader Inventory contains three main sections student priorities and interests, graded word passages, and graded reading passages. The Student Priorities and Interests are a series of checklists for the instructor to gain a better understanding of the student. The instructor will ask a series of questions to the student in which the student will respond by saying they need help or this is an area of strength for the student. For example the instructor may ask the following: Do you need help with letters of the alphabet, sounds the letters make, meanings of words, reading fasters, using the telephone book, spelling, handwriting, and reading directions. This allows the examiner to gauge what level of instruction is necessary for the student as well as finding out the genres of literature that the student finds appealing including: adventures, mysteries, crafts, sports, comics, cooking, and animals. The survey also contains a section on unfinished sentences. In this particular section this allows the instructor to get a more personal feel for who their student is, what bothers them, what is important to them, how he/she perceive themselves, and what he/she enjoys doing.
The Graded Word Passages offer the instructor a “starting point in administering the Graded Reading Passages, as a quick estimate of level, or to gain additional insight into the types of word recognition errors made” (Bader & Pearce, 2009, p. 21). The word passages also for the examiner to see if the student is having difficulties reading words in isolation or to identify any miscuing the student may have when approaching a word that he/she has difficulty with. The words are divided into eleven different lists containing ten words in each list. The words are divided into groups based on grade level, which also contains a pre-primer, and primer (Kindergarten) list for the instructor to use. Based on the results from the Graded Word Lists the instructor then uses the instructional level the student achieved to start the Graded Reading Passages.
The Graded Reading Passages are used to determine the student’s instructional reading level. “The instructional reading level is defined as the level on which a learner is challenged but not frustrated” (Bader & Pearce, 2009, p. 30). The Graded Reading Passages test both word recognition and comprehension skills. Comprehension skills are based on student memories from the story, answering questions from the selection, and prior knowledge/association to the story. The instructor has the option of allowing the student to read the passages prepared (meaning they have looked over the selection and practiced it several times before the actual “test”) or unprepared meaning they have had no prior familiarization with the story and this is their first look at the reading selection. Based on the results from the Graded
The informal assessments will be collected through a variety of methods. The instructor will keep an oral reading record from various mini-books that we read together. The instructor will mark the words Karri* reads correctly and which words she are read incorrectly. A checklist is also used to document Karri’s* sight word knowledge. A chart will be provided displaying her progress. Observational notes, pictures drawn by the student, and completed activities developed in the lesson plans will also be used as informal assessments.
Section 3: Pre-Test Assessment Results and Data Analysis
The pre-test assessments for Karri* used The Bader Informal Reading Inventory and Interests and Attitude Survey created by the teacher.
The first section in The Bader Informal Reading Inventory was the Student Priorities and Interests. Karri stated that she did not need any help with letters of the alphabet, sounds for letters of the alphabet, remembering and understanding what she heard, writing her name (however it was discovered that she had difficulty in writing her last name without looking at the name). She did however state that she has difficulty with meanings of words, reading street signs, using the telephone book, reading directions, reading words on food packages, reading menus and reading the TV Guide. Karri also stated that she has difficulty with long words as well as sounds that letters will make. Karri* has the basic sound identification however; she has some difficulty with blending.
In the Student Reading Interests Section, Karri* stated that she would like help reading sports, animals, and science related books. In the Interest/Attitude Survey created by the teacher, Karri* stated that she was predominately interested in fiction books with an emphasis on Princess, Fairy Tales, and Hannah Montana themed oriented books. Overall, Karri* enjoys reading but does find it to be boring at times and will participate in classroom discussions.
The Unfinished Sentences portion in The Bader Informal Reading Inventory did not pose a problem for Karri* to finish. A few of the Unfinished Sentences include the following: The person I like best is my mom.; The best thing about school is paperwork.; I have fun when my friends come over. and; I would like to be able to read with my teachers. I did find several repeated words to finish a sentence and a couple that did not make sense for example: When I read I book.
The next section of The Bader Informal Reading Inventory contained the Graded Word Lists. The evaluator was unsure of Karri’s reading abilities and administered the PP(A) word lists. Karri* answered four out of ten correctly. To verify the graded word lists were above her level the P(B) word list was administered. Karri* only correctly identified one word from that list. It was then determined that Karri* should be given the Preliteracy and Emerging Literacy Assessment rather than the Graded Word Passages.
The Preliteracy/Emerging Literacy contains several parts. The first part is Literacy Concepts-Interview. Karri* demonstrated that she could correctly identify the sections of the books as well as know if the book was turned upside down on backwards. The book used for the demonstration was How Dinosaurs say Good night by Jane Yolen and Mark Teague. Karri* was very willing to read the book and was familiar with this particular book. Instead of reading the title Karri* stated,” it was how do dinosaurs go to sleep”. Karri* was also successful in identifying a word out of the text. Karri* is also able to distinguish between text and drawing.
The second section of the Literacy Concepts –Interview II Karri* was correctly able to identify all but one elements of the test. She was able to identify the following concepts: paper, letter, word, line, first/last/middle, top/bottom, above, and sentence. She was unable to identify before/after. She was able to identify the concept of “after” but struggled with the idea of “before”.
Syntax(Word) Matching was a difficult area for Karri*. She was only able to correctly identify two out of the six sentences. When asked to point to the word, Karri* circled next to the end of the sentence but would not correctly identify the word that was to be pointed out. One of the sentences she got correct dealt with identifying the word at the beginning of the sentence. The other sentence she got correct happened to be a sight word/familiar word to Karri*.
In the Phonemic Awareness, section that dealt with Letter Recognition, Letter Identification, and Letter Writing. Karri* scored perfectly in all sections. She exhibited no difficulty in any section. No other testing was completed in Phonemic Awareness section.
Several sections were not included in the preliminary assessments including: visual/auditory discrimination, oral language, phonics (being practiced in tutoring sessions), hearing letter names in words (this is being practiced in tutoring sessions), and spelling. The Cloze Procedure was not included in the initial testing but will be conducted during tutoring sessions.
Based on the Pre-Literacy testing Karri’s greatest strength is in Letter Knowledge. She can correctly identify and write all letters. Though phonics was not tested in the pre-literacy evaluation, Karri* has demonstrated methods that she has learned in school to help her sound out words. She has demonstrated tapping her hand down her arm to sound out words as a mechanism for learning new words. Karri’s* auditory/listening skills not formally tested but observed through her syntax test demonstrated that she hears sentences and can repeat sentences but has difficulty identifying words. A method to increase her syntax is working on sight words that have been a constant presence in her tutoring sessions.