Informal Assessment:
Informing Instruction
C&I 222
Monday, October 12, 2011
Today’s Class
• Phonics/Phonemic Awareness
Presentations
• Define Progress Monitoring
• Describe Informal Reading
Inventories
• Examine Assessments in common
IRIs using the Keys to Quality
Assessment
Progress Monitoring
Routine assessment of a student’s
progress on certain key indicators,
which may be compared to the
typical progress of the students in
the same grade. (Bell and McCallum,
2005)
Why do we do it?
• Accountability
• To measure growth individuals and
groups
• Collect data for support personnel
(school psychologist, special educators,
reading specialists) to determine if a
student needs support services
• Accountability
What can be used for Progress
Monitoring?
In reading, we mainly progress monitor using DIBELS. At the
fourth grade level, we only use the Oral Reading Fluency, not
the comprehension piece. As far as intervention is concerned,
we also are to use "research-based programs delivered with
integrity." This comes in the forms of Great Leaps, Six-Minute
Solution, Soliloquy, Lexia, etc. We are also told that our
Houghton-Mifflin reading series is a "research-based"
program, but I guess that means one must deliver it exactly as
stated in the teacher's edition for it to be delivered with
"integrity.” The homegrown variety of progress monitoring and
intervention still exists. Problem is, if you have a child for
whom you want a school intervention, the school psychologists
are basing their decisions on these monitoring and intervention
programs. They do not seem to be putting much stock in other
observations/data collection.- JoLynn, 4th grade, Bloomington,
IL
How do schools do it?
I have been teaching first grade for the past 11
years.
For monitoring reading progress in Austin we use
the DRA, (Developmental Reading Assessment)
and TPRI (Texas Primary Reading Inventory)
three times a year. I keep running records on my
kids until they are a year above grade level. At
that point I am more interested in
comprehension and real life connections than I
am decoding. For that I like the kids to create
products to share their ideas. – Jeanette, 1st
grade, Austin, Texas
Another….
This may not be what you're looking for,
but I often ask the students how they're
doing. Given the right climate, the
students themselves are the best source
of information. I think teaching them to
monitor their own progress is far more
beneficial than any external test could
be. Unscientific? Sure. Important skill?
Absolutely.- Ben, middle school, Morton,
IL
And a Whole District:
We are still in the process of figuring this all out. But here is what we
have for now. Unit * uses DIBELS (K-2) for the universal screener
for literacy three times per year and MAP (6-8) twice per year.
Some schools are starting to use Fountas and Pinnell Benchmark
Assessment to monitor progress of reading levels. Other schools
are using Harcourt or A-Z materials to monitor progress. I am
confident that Special Ed would have specific measures to monitor
progress as part of the students' IEP.
Are teachers required to use assessments selected by the district?
The answer to this question is yes for K-2 and 6-8 universal
screening, and Tier II intervention for literacy uses Fountas and
Pinnell Benchmark assessment to analyze reading behaviors and
monitor progress, to date. Additional plans will be developed this
year.
Do they get to use the assessments they want to use? Are they
able to use their own classroom assessments? The answer to this
question is yes. Teachers use informal assessments to align with
curriculum and monitor progress. Kurt, Ass’t Supt. Curriculum
Informal Reading Inventories
Shout Out! What do you know about
Informal Reading Inventory?
• Provides specific and comprehensive
information
• Must be administered one on one
• Administered at the beginning of the
year and periodically throughout
• Used for determining Reading Level
– Independent
– Instructional
– Frustration
What’s Out There?
• Fountas and Pinnell
• Qualitative Reading Inventory
• Observation Survey (Reading
Recovery)
• DIBELS
• Basic Reading Inventory
• Kidwatching
What’s Included?
•
•
•
•
•
•
Graded word lists
Reading passages to assess fluency
Passages to assess Listening
Miscue Analysis
Comprehension through Retell
F&P includes a written section
where students make a connection
or explain something in the reading
Keys To Quality Assessment
Accurate Assessment
1. Why Assess?
What’s the purpose?
Who will use the results?
2. Assess What?
What are the learning targets?
Are they clear?
Are they good?
3. Assess How?
Design
What method?
Sampled how?
Avoid bias how?
Students are users, too.
Be sure students understand
targets.
4. Communicate How?
Students track progress
and communicate.
How to manage information?
How to report?
Students can participate in
the assessment process
12
Effectively Used
Discuss the Assessment
With a group, review the IRI. Answer
the following questions:
– What are the learning targets being
assessed?
– What are some sources of bias to consider
when administering the assessment?
– What would you do with the data? What
instructional strategies would you use to
teach students the expected learning target?
Purpose (Users and Uses)
• Teachers determine Instructional and
Independent reading levels
• Helps teachers make grouping decisions
• Helps teachers determine instructional
needs of individuals or the class
• Students can self-select books
• Librarians and School Media Specialists
can use information to direct students to
“just right” reading material
Targets Assessed through IRIs
• Decode new words in age-appropriate material.
• Use a variety of decoding strategies (e.g., phonics, word
patterns, structural analysis, context clues) to recognize
new words when reading age-appropriate material.
•
Use letter-sound knowledge and sight vocabulary to read orally and
silently/whisper read age-appropriate material
• Self-monitor reading and use decoding strategies to selfcorrect miscues.
• Identify high frequency words
• Identify explicit main ideas.
• Summarize or retell information from a text.
• Synthesize key points and supporting details to form
conclusion and to apply text information to personal
experience.
• Identify story elements, major and secondary themes in
text.
Sources of Bias to Consider
• Time consuming and difficult for
teachers to get to all students
• Use of other school personnel to
administer
• Language considerations
• Familiarity with “testing” behavior
• Unfamiliar with process of
“summarizing”
Graded Word Lists vs. High
Frequency Word Lists
Graded Word Lists- Words are
categorized by “grade level” (preprimer-grade 12) Used to help
determine reading level
High Frequency Word Lists- Words
used most often in reading and
writing (Fry, Dolch, Nifty Thrifty
Fifty)
How can this be done with
authentic texts?
• Get a ballpark estimate of student’s
reading level
• Select a text using readability formula
• Conduct a MA/RR with the student
• Analyze the data
• Determine strengths and areas for
growth
• Select strategies
Next Time
• Read Reading Diagnosis, Ch 3 and
Kidwatching, Ch. 6
• Complete a Venn Diagram comparing the 2
readings, (Miscue Analysis vs. Running
Records)
Coming Up: Inquiry Groups:
– AIMS web
– DIBELS: Dynamic Indicator of Basic Early
Literacy Skills
– AR: Accelerated Reader
– Reading A-Z
– Fountas and Pinnell