Literacy Assessment
Katrina Spencer
Director of Literacy and Site Improvement
Purpose for today
• Agreements across the region about
common, valid and valued reading
assessment tools.
• Consistency / congruence between
these assessments and our Limestone
Coast Literacy Position Paper and
Reading Standard AND Literacy
Secretariat policy / position.
Why are we here?
• What do you want to get out of today?
– For yourself
– For your teachers
– For your students
– For your school
– For your region?
So why do we measure?
Research shows that…
Teachers want…
• assessment to inform instruction
• to incorporate student self-assessment
• a continuum of year-level expectations
• consistency within year-levels
• assessment data that can be effectively
shared with parents
• to assess how students use literacy outside
of school
One teacher’s thoughts
“I want assessment to be a part of what happens
all the time in my classroom. It shouldn’t be an
event; the NAPLAN is an event. Assessment
should not be an event. What I would like to see
is for it to be so much a part of what happens
that we do not think about assessment any more
than we think about turning on the lights in the
morning.”
Taking the temperature
In a whole school approach to assessment we
need to be clear about:
– Who we assess
– What we assessed
– How we assess it
– When we assess it
And then
• How we use this assessment data
• Whom we share it with- and how
Assessment as, for & of learning
AS
Setting goals and targets along
the learning journey
CURRICULUM
PEDAGOGY
OF
FOR
Staff talk and work together to
share standards.
Determining prior knowledge and
giving feedback about expectations
on the quality of work.
Staff use assessment
information to plan for
improvement.
ASSESSMENT
Classroom assessment involves high
quality interactions, based on
thoughtful questions, careful
listening, and reflective responses
Adapted AQTP 2007
Students and teachers share all steps
of the assessment for learning
process
Which Tool
should we
use???
Which specific assessment
tools should we use?
If you only have a hammer
you tend to treat everything like a nail!
There are many tools and many
purposes for using them
Which specific assessment
tools should we use?
Ones that can:
• reliably and validly identify students who are at
risk early, before a problem is established
• inform decisions about what to teach, how to
teach, and establish clear standards for learners
• support regular monitoring of progress toward
meaningful goals and ambitious standards
• enable us to reflect on and review outcomes of
our teaching to continually improve learning
outcomes
Cautions
Assessments can do more harm than good if they:
• Require students to work on tasks that are not in the
best interests of their literacy development
• Force teachers to teach to standards that are not at
the core of literacy development
• Provide us with a false sense of progress on tasks that
don’t really matter
• don’t assess what has been explicitly taught and if
students don’t know the assessment criteria
• If you don’t use it to improve
learning then DON’T collect it!
Appropriate purposes
•
•
•
•
To assist teaching and learning
To measure individual achievement
To evaluate programs
To monitor progress towards and achievement of
agreed standards
Appropriate Use
Questions to ask




Does it yield new information?
Is it instructionally useful to teachers?
Is it appropriate for classroom use?
Is it congruent with my beliefs, teaching practices
and the resources I use?
 Does it align with whole school practice?”
Increasingly Targeted
• Assessments need to happen often and
as unobtrusively and naturally as
possible
• It is only when the temperature is raised
we should go on to the next level
Informal
Progressively More Targeted
Types of Assessment
• Universal Screening:
Identify students abilities and those “at
risk” or in need of more diagnostic
information
• Progress Monitoring:
Determine if students are learning
critical skills at an adequate rate
FEW
SOME
• Diagnostic or Targeted:
Identify specific skills that will be
targeted with intervention
• Outcome:
Evaluate the effectiveness of the
actions taken to achieve identified goals
ALL
Assessment for ???
• Is this information we NEED and/or WANT
for ALL / SOME / FEW? Why?
• How much data is enough?
• Is the assessment an
end in itself or does
it provide insight and
value for the teacher
as it is conducted?
– If so then why are so many assessments conducted by SSOs???
• Key in decisions- PURPOSE, NEED and TARGET
Getting down to the tin tacks!
Before you start deciding WHICH assessments• What standards will you assess against?
• What commitment do teachers have to these standards?
• What cultural norms/practices do you need to confront?
Name the elephants in the room!
• What knowledge and skills do staff need to conduct
these effectively and consistently?
• What systems and structures do we need
in place to support staff?
• How will you monitor, analyse, record
and use assessment information?
• How will you share this information?
With students? With families?
What do we mean by an
assessment system
A system is a deliberate,
negotiated, articulated
group of assessments
identified to support
both teaching and
learning- a known and
agreed whole site
approach
Systems of Assessment include:
• Classroom assessments to monitor progress
and inform instruction.
• School assessments to evaluate student
achievement and program effectiveness.
• External assessments to validate and
compare achievement to region, state or
national standards.
A successful assessment
system requires
• Multiple Assessments
– Assessments of broad, holistic applications AND
– Assessments of discrete skills
– Use of ongoing tools eg NAPLaN, ESL Scales, Australian
Curriculum literacy continuum, progress against achievement
standards
• Connection to School Culture
–
–
–
–
Prepare teachers to administer assessments
Build knowledge base and access- PD, PM, documentation
Support teachers to make informed instructional decisions
Systems (and times) to conduct, share and analyse
• Connection to School Improvement
– Used to make program and strategy decisions
– Used to communicate achievements/needs to the community
– Used for continuous improvement
Big Ideas in Beginning Reading
Phonemic
Awareness
Fluency
Accuracy and
Fluency with
Connected Text
Vocabulary
Comprehension
Alphabetic
Principle
Reading in an
Alphabetic
Writing
Kame’enui, Simmons, Coyne, & Harn, 2003
Assessing Reading’s Big 6
•
•
•
•
•
•
Oral Language
Phonological Awareness
Phonics and letter-sound knowledge
Vocabulary
Fluency (and prosody)
Comprehension
START with regular teacher observations and
judgements to informally monitor learners
use of language skills and reading abilities.
Assessment System
Broad Universal Screening Tools
•
Broad Diagnostic Inventory
•
Targeted Diagnostic Tools
•
Assessing Reading’s Big 6
• Oral Language
–
–
–
–
–
–
Observation Survey and Concepts about Print Test (Clay)
Teacher Rating of Oral Language and Literacy (TROLL)
Oral Language Assessment (Crevola & Vineis)
Screen of Communication Skills (SOCS)
Receptive and expressive language checklists
Clay's Record of Oral Language
• Phonological Awareness
–
–
–
–
Astronaut Invented Spelling Test (AIST)
Screening of Phonological Awareness (SPA) DECS
Sutherland Phonological Awareness Test – Revised (SPAT-R)
Regular teacher observations and moving more able learners
on to phonics
Assessing Reading’s Big 6
• Phonics and Letter-sound Knowledge
–
–
–
–
Educheck
Words Their Way
Informal assessment
Oxford Word List - High Frequency Word Assessment
• Vocabulary
– Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test (PPVT)
– Teacher developed vocabulary assessment
– PAT R
Assessing Reading’s Big 6
• Fluency
– Expected Fluency rates
• By the end of Year 1- 60 words per minute
• By the end of Year 2- 90-100 word per minute
• In Years 3-6 100-120 word per minute with < 3 errors and the material
becoming increasingly more difficult
– Prosody Checklist and rubrics
• Comprehension
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
Informal- oral reading, Cloze, 5 Finger Method
Neale Analysis of Reading Ability
TORCH
Progressive Achievement Tests of Reading
PROBE (developed in New Zealand)
Informal Prose Inventory (New Zealand)
PM Benchmark Readers
PAT R - vocabulary & comprehension
Assessing Reading’s
REALLY BIG 1!
Love and enjoyment of reading
• Attitudes to and motivation about reading
– levels of enjoyment,
– scope of reading outside of classroom,
– how learners see themselves as readers
•
•
•
•
•
Strongly correlates with reading proficiency
Teacher observation
Student self assessment
Oral reading observations
Reading inventories etc
Start from what you have
• What is the current data you have available?
– What is it telling you?
• about individual, cohort, class, year level or whole site issues?
– How can you investigate these issues further?
• What are teachers using to make judgements and
assessments in their teaching programs?
– How widespread, ‘rigorous’ and diagnostic are these?
• How are students able to judge their own progress?
– Checklists and rubrics
– Assessment criteria to support tasks.
• What’s missing?
• What more do you need? For who?
What to start with
• School Entry Assessment
teachers’ observations in the first term of Reception.
Can be used several times across the R-2 year and
entered into EDSAS
• Screening of Phonological Awareness
(SPA) can be used with children aged 4-6 yrs.
Administered 1 to 1 (takes about 15 minutes) and
data can be entered into EDSAS. It can be used to
monitor progress.
• Running Records
Ideally at least twice a year to monitor progress in
Years 1 and 2. (and more frequently for diagnostic purposes,
for those children you have concerns about) Can be used R7- to understand miscues and plan teaching- need to
be at an instructional level to inform teaching.
Most importantly
• Start with your staff
– Build their understandings of assessment
AS, OF and FOR learning
– Engage them in decisions about tools
– Build their skills in INFORMAL
observations, assessments and tools
– Encourage sharing and moderation
– Support regular student self assessment
Therefore
as a site
leader I
will…
Therefore
as a
teacher I
will…
Therefore
as a
student I
will…
Program and practice
assessments
The Golden Rule of Assessment
The best designed assessment with the
most reliable and valid measures
administered by the best trained examiner
won’t change a child’s reading trajectory .
. . unless someone in the child’s life does
something different!
Other stuff!
Lit Sec Tool Box 1
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•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
The Screen of Phonological Awareness (SPA) a South Australian screening tool
of phonemic knowledge for 5 year olds
The Sutherland Phonological Awareness Test (SPAT-R) a diagnostic
assessment for students who have difficulties with phonological awareness in
the first four years of schooling
The Astronaut Invented Spelling Test an assessment of children's phonological
awareness through their writing
An Observation Survey of Early Literacy Achievement - a text containing a
range of early literacy assessments including the Concept of Print Test
developed by Dame Marie Clay
Tests of Reading Comprehension (TORCH and TORCH Plus) tests of reading
comprehension
The Probe Reading Assessment
Spelling: What Teachers need to know - author Peter Westwood
Reading and Writing Difficulties: What Teachers need to know - author Peter
Westwood
The MultiLit (Making up for Lost Time in Literacy) kit an evidenced based
program developed in Australia by Macquarie University suitable as a one to
one intervention program for students in primary and middle years of
schooling.
Lit Sec Tool Box 2
• Probe 2 an assessment of reading comprehension
• Progressive Achievement Tests Written Spelling,
Punctuation and grammar (PAT WS,P,G)
• Effective Spelling- a whole school approach to
spelling
• Spell, Record, Respond
• Read, Record, Respond
• Strategies that Work: Teaching Comprehension for
Understanding and Engagement
• Working Together
• News Talk for Teachers
Text Level Guide for Reading SEEN Texts
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26
End of
Reception
End of Year 1
End of Year 2
Remember: Use SEEN text, and analyse the processing
NOT merely the percentage score
Blue Broadband
(Levels 9 – 11)
Turquoise & Purple
Broadbands
Gold & Silver
Broadbands
(Levels 17–20)
(Levels 21 – 24)
For literacy characteristics at each broadband level, see handout
Consultative Draft February 2011
Student Self Assessment
• Self–assess accurately and successfully
against the success criteria to self-determine
their steps in learning
• Peer assess accurately and successfully,
giving feedback and against the success
criteria
• Set their own SMART goals in learning, then
self-monitor and evaluate their progress
towards and achievement against them
The Reading Process
Oral language
Fluency
Meaning
(semantics)
Vocabulary
Oral language
Fluency
Constructing
meaning
Structure
(syntax)
COMPREHENSION
Phonological Visual
Phonics
Awareness
information
(grapho-phonic
information)
Literacy Secretariat
Literacy is everyone’s business
A model of the reading process, which fits with the interactive
theory and with observed classroom behaviour.
Meaning Cues
Structural Cues
Visual Cues
Predicting
Checking
Confirming
Continuing Reading
Literacy Secretariat
Literacy is everyone’s business
Rejecting
R
E
A
D
I
N
G
How do the Sources of
Information interact?
Confirm
If confirmed, read on,
if not confirmed reread and self correct
Predict
Using meaning, structure
and visual information
Read and check
Using meaning, structure
and visual information
Reading is a meaning making
process
Reading programs
• must develop children’s ability to use
meaning, structure and visual sources
of information in an integrated way
• and also help children learn how to
sample information, predict, check,
confirm and/or self correct
Putting it all together