Week 5: QRI-5 Practice

Assignment #1

            Mary scored at the independent level on this word list. She answered 18 out of 20 correctly with 2 of those 18 being identified.

Assignment #2

            Mary read 80% of the words right on this list, placing her at an instructional level. Of the 16 words she identified correctly, 3 of them were identified.

Assignment #3

            Mary quickly became frustrated with this list of word. She only read a few before beginning to struggle and eventually stopping. It is clear that this word list is not appropriate for her level. The second grade word list should be used. 

Assignment #4

            Mary’s prior knowledge of the story was very minimal. She scored a 1 out of 9, only knowing that a baby animal may get killed if it is on its own. Because Mary was unfamiliar with the topic, it is very likely that she will struggle with the comprehension questions after reading the passage.

            Mary read the passage at an instructional level. She only made 7 errors and read with 96% accuracy. Her words per minute were 45 and her correct words per minute were 44. Although she read at a slow pace, Mary did not have much difficulty getting through the text and only paused for a few moments.

            Out of 49 main ideas, Mary recalled 17 of them. On the comprehension questions she scored a 5 out of 8. She lands between the frustration and instructional level as some of her questions cold have been scored correctly or incorrectly depending on the assessor. It is clear that Mary grasped the main ideas of the passage on her first read. However, she struggled with the details of the passage and often repeated the same responses multiple times rather than elaborating with additional details from the passage.

Reading Intervention Programs

Reading Intervention Programs

Response to Intervention Tiers

Response to Intervention (RTI) is a 3 tiered intervention system to help provide all students with the support they need to succeed in the classroom. The interventions in RTI are not uniform. Rather, they different from student to student based on need. For example, a reader struggling with comprehension may not need an intervention focused on pronunciation. The base of RTI is Tier 1. All students are delivered Tier 1 instruction. These interventions are the typical differentiated instruction that is administered by the classroom teacher during regular instruction.

Tier 2 comes into play when a student does not respond to Tier 1 interventions. Only about 15% of students will receive Tier 2 interventions.  Tier 2 interventions are administered by either the teacher or another team member in the classroom to a small group of students. Tier 2 interventions are meant to be a supplement to Tier 1 interventions, rather than a replacement. For example, a student receiving Tier 2 interventions will take part in the regular Tier 1 instruction with the rest of the class. However, the student receiving Tier 2 interventions may have an extra period of instruction where he/she receives Tier 2 instruction in addition to the Tier 1 instruction the entire class received.

                Tier 3 interventions are the most intensive and targeted of the interventions in RTI. Roughly 5% of the student population will require Tier 3 interventions. Tier 3 interventions are administered to very small groups of students or on an individual basis. Intervention specialists or special education teachers may administer Tier 3 interventions. It is worth noting, however, that not all students receiving Tier 3 interventions will require special education, nor is it required that the students receiving these interventions are labeled as disabled. As with Tier 2 interventions, Tier 3 interventions are a supplement to prior interventions, not a replacement. Students receiving Tier 3 interventions will continue receiving Tier 1 instruction with the rest of the class and will receive Tier 2 and 3 instruction at a different time.

Qualitative Reading Inventory

    What is QRI5?

·         The QRI5 is an informal reading inventory that looks to show the conditions when a student can recognize words and comprehend a passage properly as well as the conditions when students cannot recognize words and comprehend a passage properly. 

    What is the purpose of using QRI5?

·         The purpose of the QRI5 is to determine the exact areas that a student is struggling with in order to address those areas. For example, the QRI5 reading passages for 3^rd through 5^th grade are biographies of familiar and unfamiliar people. If a student has more success reading the familiar biographies, it is possible that the student struggles reading when they are unfamiliar with the background of a passage. 

    Have you seen similar assessment activities like QRI5? What are they?

·         I do not believe I have seen a QRI 5 being administered, however I have seen a teacher administering a word list and a running record to a student. 

    What is your impression of QRI5?

·         I like the fact that the QRI 5 is not a norm-referenced assessment and only looks to compare students to themselves. Students, just like all humans, have specific strengths and weaknesses. If a 4^th grade student is struggling on the 2^nd grade word list, intervention should focus on improving his/her ability with the 2^nd grade word list before worrying about what words the average 4^th grader is struggling with.  

P21 Common Core Toolkit

            The sample lesson plans given in the article offer a lot of opportunity for informal assessment. For example, the second lesson has students developing presentations to persuade the class to support a micro-financing proposal that they believe in. At the end of all of the presentations, the class would vote on the proposal that they liked the best. The presentation itself is a great opportunity for the teacher to assess how well the students researched and understand the proposal, and how well they can put into words their understanding of the proposal. A question and answer segment at the end of each presentation would be a great way for the teacher to see if the students actually understand the ideas of the proposal or have just memorized facts.

A successful presentation such as this would require students to have a solid understanding of socioeconomic-specific concepts and terms. As such, formal assessments, in particular tests could easily be built into this lesson. Students could be tested on their understanding of the financial terms that they came across in their research. Short answer questions could have students demonstrating their critical thinking skills by explaining the economic and social effects a certain proposal may have. Lastly, students could be asked to draft their own proposal as an assessment of their overall understanding of the lesson as a whole.

As the difficulty of the three assessments I just presented vary, it would be up the teacher to determine what type of assessment is appropriate for the students in his/her class. With a class of struggling readers, it would be unproductive to ask them to find the social and economic effects of a new proposal because they would spend a large portion of time just attempting to read and understand the new proposal. Instead, a class like this could be tested on and asked to explain the social and economic effects of the winning proposal because they are already familiar with that proposal. Contrary to popular belief, the CCLS does not require a one size fits all curriculums, but rather, it encourage teachers to understand his/her classroom and find the best way to address the standards for that particular group.

Reading 101 Summary

            After watching the Reading 101 clips, I realized that a good reader must have a solid foundation that can begin early in one’s life. Children who are read to as toddlers will be able to recognize that print is connected with language, rather than just some squiggly lines on paper. Next, is sound recognition. Babies are born with the ability to recognize even the slightest of differences in sounds; however, by 12 months most children have become so in tune with their native language that they only recognize the sounds associated with that language. Recognizing different sounds is fundamental to being able to understand and create language.

When children begin reading, one of the goals is fluency. The importance of fluency lies in its connection to comprehension. A child who stumbles over words will often times forget what the book they are reading is about because they are so focused on decoding the words. Spelling and vocabulary are two factors that go a long way towards improving fluency. With spelling comes recognizing the patterns of our language. While English has exceptions, the majority of the language falls into a rule set as far as spelling. Students subconsciously lay the groundwork for spelling when they are exposed to rhyming words when they read or listen to music. A strong vocabulary also contributes to fluency as it is much easier to read when you are familiar with most of the words at the onset. A strong vocabulary can begin long before a student ever enters a school. One of the clips showed a mother reading her grocery list to her child as they shopped. When you combine the words on the grocery list to the words in the books that are read to the child, there is a strong set of everyday vocabulary words that the child is exposed to at a very young age. At the core of the videos, I believe the message was that the foundations for reading begin at a young age and without a strong foundation including an understanding of print, sounds, vocabulary, and spelling, a child may struggle when they begin to learn how to read.