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Using Assessment as an Instructional Tool 

It is important to identify students showing difficulties with phonics learning as soon as possible. Mastering early literacy skills is essential to later academic success, and children who fall behind in reading rarely catch up with typical instruction  (Francis et al., 1996). Students who are not making adequate progress with core reading instruction can still learn to read with personalized support guided by assessment data. In this section, you will learn more about how to use assessment as an instructional tool for readers who are at risk for reading failure. Before you read on, take some time to think about how assessment supports the teaching of learners at your school.

Course Contents

  • The Simple View of Reading
    • Pre-Assessment
    • 1. Introduction
    • 2. What is the Simple View of Reading?
    • 3. The Simple View of Reading in the Classroom
    • 4. It’s Simple and Complex
    • 5. The Changing Emphasis
    • 6. Developing Word Recognition Skills
    • 7. Developing Language Comprehension Skills
    • 8. Implications for Educational Practice
    • 9. Summing It Up
    • Post-Assessment: simple

Course Menu

About 70-80 percent of all struggling readers have trouble with accurate and fluent word recognition (Moats & Tolman, 2009). Difficulties with fluent reading commonly stem from poor phoneme awareness and lack of phonics knowledge, resulting in poor decoding. Sometimes, it is relatively easy to identify students with phonics and decoding difficulties in your classroom. They may have noticeable trouble learning sound-symbol correspondence, sounding out words, and spelling.

Scroll over the pictures below to see how phonics and decoding difficulties commonly present in the classroom:

Difficulty segmenting words and syllables into phonemes

Difficulty matching letters and sounds.

Trouble sounding out words.

Poor comprehension due to tremendous effort needed to decode words.

Slow and laborious reading.

Difficulty learning and remembering high frequency words.

Guessing words based on context or the first letter or two of the word.

Poor spelling.

Reflection:

Think about the readers who struggle in your school. Approximately what percentage of these students embody at least 1-2 of the characteristics above? How do you know? Is the support offered to these students focused on improving phonics and the fluent application of decoding skills, either through enhanced core instruction or targeted to intensive interventions?

Take NotesOn the lower right-hand corner of this page, you will find a Take Notes button. Click on the button to record your response. The button looks like this → 

Preventing Reading Failure

Some students struggle to learn to read for a variety of environmental and biological reasons. For example:

  • They speak a dialect of English that differs substantially from the one used at school
  • They have limited English proficiency
  • They reside in economically disadvantaged homes and neighborhoods
  • They have a specific language or hearing impairment
  • They show weaknesses in the phonological area of language development
  • They are the child of parents with histories of reading difficulty
  • They have gaps in attendance
  • They attend schools with ineffective reading instruction.

Audio?: Despite whatever adverse conditions are affecting students, we now know that almost all students can be taught to read with the right type and quality of instruction. Phonics instruction is one powerful lever to improving literacy skills in all children, and studies find that students at-risk for reading challenges benefit from explicit teaching of phonics to learn to read. In fact, researchers estimate that 95-99% of all students can be effectively taught to read on or approaching grade level with core instruction that includes explicit teaching of phonics, fluency, and comprehension with differentiated support to learners identified as at-risk. 

Educators must be aware that students who have difficulty learning phonological awareness, sound-symbol correspondence, decoding, and spelling need more support targeting foundational literacy skills.  Students who are not on track in reading will not develop missing skills without such support. By providing increased instruction and effective intervention at the first sign of risk, educators can prevent reading failure (Denton, 2012; Torgesen, 1998).

Reflection:

Is your assessment system designed to identify students who are behind in their phonics learning and decoding? How is this reflected in your early screening assessments? What subskills of reading do they measure?

Take NotesOn the lower right-hand corner of this page, you will find a Take Notes button. Click on the button to record your response. The button looks like this → 

Knowing Who's At Risk

The earliest signs of reading difficulty can be detected by universal screening assessments. Universal screening assessments, like DIBELS, Acadience, and Aimsweb, are brief, repeatable measures administered three times a year. Information provided by universal screening assessments can efficiently tell you which students are at risk for reading failure, and who may need differentiated core instruction or intervention to build word reading skills to a level of automaticity that supports reading comprehension. 

Reflection:

When a student scores below benchmark on a universal screener, what additional assessments do you follow-up with? How is this data used?

Take NotesOn the lower right-hand corner of this page, you will find a Take Notes button. Click on the button to record your response. The button looks like this → 

Intervention Based Diagnostic Assessments

Students scoring below the benchmark on universal screening measures need  further assessment. Additional assessments can determine why a student is not at benchmark and what can be done instructionally to facilitate their reading development. An immediate instructional response guided by data can potentially reduce a student’s risk for reading failure.

Administering an intervention-based diagnostic assessment can help determine where exactly instruction needs to begin. Intervention-based diagnostics drill down to the specific skill level, identify where a student is on an instructional continuum, and help specify next steps for instruction (Ohio Department of Education, 2021).  Phonics and phonemic awareness each contain subskills that can be measured by an intervention-based diagnostic.

Assessing Phonics Intervention-based diagnostic assessments for phonics learning present lists of letters and words for a student to identify or decode. Phonics diagnostics assess along the continuum to observe mastery until the student cannot demonstrate mastery on a given skill in the phonics learning progression.
Assessing Phoneme Awareness Intervention-based diagnostic assessments for phoneme awareness provide precise information about level of performance on predictors of reading success, such as phoneme blending and segmentation. Most phoneme awareness diagnostics also assess awareness of larger phonological units. Elementary students do not need to show mastery of lower-level phonological awareness skills before introducing phoneme-level tasks. It is important to begin at the phoneme-level every-day. You can go back to lower levels if a student is not able to phoneme-level tasks.

It is best to use intervention-based assessments that clearly align with your school’s scope and sequence. If your curriculum and intervention program do not offer this type of assessment, look for published or freely-accessible intervention-based diagnostic assessments.

The following table provides free resources for intervention-based diagnostic assessments of phonics and phonological awareness.

Foundational Skill Area Resources for Intervention-Based Diagnostics
Phonics LETRS Phonics and Word Reading Survey (pages B20-B27) CORE Phonics Survey Really Great Reading Diagnostic Decoding Assessments Cox Campus Instructional Phonics Inventory
Phonological Awareness Phonological Assessment Screening Test (PAST) COOL TOOLS - Informal Reading Assessments Access to Literacy Assessment System Cox Campus Phonological Awareness Assessment

Learning Check

Drag and drop the correct terms in the banks to check your learning about assessment so far.

Using Assessment Data to Determine Next Steps for Instruction

After completing an early literacy skills screening, you will want to review screening data and determine assessment and instructional needs across the word reading skill progression.

Use the chart below as a guide. Follow the steps to help you identify areas of strengths and needs for students identified as “at-risk” on the universal screener. This step-by-step process will help you line up your instructional minutes to the needs of your students.

Step 1: Find Screening Measure

If a student scores below the benchmark on a universal screening assessment, find the measure you administered.

Step 2: Keep Drilling Back

Identify which foundational skills the student has or has not mastered. Administer an intervention-based diagnostic to gather specific information on the student's phonics and phonics-related skills.

Step 3: Identify a Starting Point for Instruction

Use screening and diagnostic data to determine a focus for learning along an instructional sequence (you will want to initially focus instruction on the skill that is first in the instructional sequence and progress logically to more complex skills).

Step 4: Respond to Instructional Needs
Step 4: Respond to Instructional Needs

Provide instruction individually or use skill-based small groups. Be sure to group students with similar reading skill needs together for small group lessons. Lessons should target important learning objectives, contain explicit instruction elements, and include engaged practice in reading connected text. Continue to provide full access to high-quality core reading instruction.

Reflection:

Do you follow a similar process of using assessment to drill down to the possible reasons why a student may be struggling to make reading progress? If so, how do you use that information to adjust instruction? What changes to your practice are you now considering?

Take NotesOn the lower right-hand corner of this page, you will find a Take Notes button. Click on the button to record your response. The button looks like this → 

Progress Monitoring

Progress monitoring done with indicators of early literacy skills can assess the growth of the essential skills you are purposely targeting through instruction/intervention. You will want to monitor progress in the areas in which universal screening identified the student as being at-risk (e.g., fluency, word recognition, phonics/decoding, phonemic awareness).

Progress monitoring data points can help you compare a student’s expected learning rate with their actual learning rate when collected at repeated intervals over time. Knowing a student’s learning rate allows you to make informed and timely changes to the instructional approach (where appropriate). You will want to intensify instructional support for students whose learning rate is not adequately closing the gap between actual and expected performance. You can scale-back instructional supports for those students who have responded to instruction and are now meeting expected benchmark goals.

There are a variety of intervention changes that you can make to intensify or scale-back supports for at-risk learners. Examples of adaptations are defined below.

 Increase or decrease the number of lessons, the length of each lesson, or the group size.

Increase or decrease the number of practice opportunities (guided or independent) where students are required to respond and demonstrate their learning. Provide more or less immediate and individualized feedback.

Adjust the content focus of the intervention instruction to target the student’s strengths and needs along the learning progression.

For example, a student shows a primary need in reading rate/fluency; however, the student’s oral reading accuracy scores have plateaued. Although she met the benchmark for oral reading accuracy in the fall, she is no longer projected to meet the midyear benchmark for accuracy based on her progress monitoring data. The teacher adapts the intervention, so it includes a greater focus on building reading accuracy in connected text.

For more ideas about designing evidence-based intervention adaptations, please read Practice 4 in the document Intensifying Literacy Instruction: Essential Practices.

Click the right arrow on the slide below to read about  Danny and how his teacher used assessment data to match instruction to his needs. 

Danny
1st Grade
Danny is an inquisitive student in Mrs. Odio’s first-grade classroom. Danny enjoys being outside and is interested in learning about outer space, trains, and bugs. Danny always participates in class, although sometimes Danny needs to be redirected during whole group instruction.
At the beginning-of-year universal screening, Mrs. Odio was surprised to see that Danny scored below the benchmark on reading nonsense words. Danny had previously met reading goals in kindergarten.
Mrs. Odio wonders where the breakdown is and how she can help Danny. She gathers more information to help her determine Danny's skill mastery along the word reading skill progression. She administers and scores two intervention-based diagnostics: the CORE phonics survey and the Phonological Awareness Screening Test (PAST).
Danny’s scores on the intervention-based diagnostics show that he needs instruction to improve his beginning decoding skills. Although Danny can identify all consonant and vowel sounds, he has difficulty fluently blending sounds in order to read CVC words accurately. Danny's phonemic awareness is appropriate for his grade level. Based on this information, Mrs. Odio groups Danny with two other students showing similar strengths, learning needs, and starting points for instruction.
Mrs. Odio meets with Danny’s group 3-4 times a week to deliver a Tier 2 intervention. They work on CVC words, blending routines, dictation, and practicing decoding skills in phonetically-controlled texts.
Mrs. Odio uses a general outcome measure tied to the universal screener to track Danny’s progress. Danny's nonsense word fluency is assessed weekly and graphed on a chart. Mrs. Odio also notes his ease of learning and mastery of new skills taught during the intervention lessons. Mrs. Odio's uses both forms of data to make instructional adaptations to improve target reading skills.
After 8 weeks of intervention, Danny's nonsense word fluency scores begin to plateau. Mrs. Odio adjusts the intervention to include more opportunities for Danny to practice spelling and reading words in context and isolation. She continues to gives immediate affirmative and corrective feedback.
At the middle-of-year universal screening, Danny obtained scores above the benchmark! These scores are consistent with his performance and rate of improvement on recent progress monitoring measures.
Danny's universal screening scores show that he is no longer at risk for reading failure. Mrs. Odio places Danny in a new instructional group with other students at benchmark for reading but who benefit from additional practice and reinforcement of the skills taught through the core phonics curriculum. This group meets with Mrs. Odio once a week.

Reflection:

What data and criteria do you or your school use to decide when instruction should be changed? What do those changes tend to look like?

Take NotesOn the lower right-hand corner of this page, you will find a Take Notes button. Click on the button to record your response. The button looks like this → 

Assessment FAQs

Click the arrows below for answers to frequently asked questions.

Ideally, the Universal Screener has a built-in progress monitoring component that would allow you to track progress with specific indicators of risk. If not, there are free alternatives. Acadience Reading is one alternative that offers freely downloadable progress monitoring measures for at-risk students.

  • Click here to download progress monitoring materials from Acadience.

Running Records are a diagnostic assessment and progress monitoring tool commonly associated with the leveled reading system or workshop model of reading instruction. Running Records are based on short read alouds and designed to check students' comprehension, oral reading accuracy, and types of "miscues" (word omissions, additions, substitutions). They revolve around three components: Meaning (M), Syntax (S), and Vision (V), also known as the three-cueing system.

 

The problem with traditional Running Records is that this assessment promotes attention to the three-cueing method. Three-cueing is based on a flawed understanding of how reading works. In the last module, you learned that some of the cues associated with MSV could undermine phonics learning and skilled decoding. Effective screening and diagnostics systems cannot include discredited approaches. We now have over 50 years of consensus research showing how good readers process text automatically by focusing on each letter, in each word, in sequence (Seidenberg, 2017; Stanovich, 2000). Skilled readers do not guess words based on context or only look at the first letter. Reading is not guessing, and proficient decoding involves subconsciously processing every letter in the text, not integrating multiple cues. Our assessments need to align with the basic premises of how skilled word identification works. 

 

Further, the text levels Running Records determine are based on subjective judgment and are somewhat arbitrary considering the limited research on the utility of instructional level text placements. Even if there was merit in teaching students at their "reading levels," research questions how reliably and accurately Running Records match students to appropriately challenging reading materials (Burns et al., 2015). 

 

A final criticism of Running Records is their imprecision in estimating the specific subskills of reading that are weak in struggling readers. A low reading level cannot precisely tell you what a student needs to improve in order to become a better reader. 

If a significant number of young readers are identified as at-risk on universal screening assessments, this is an indication that the tier 1 foundational skills curriculum is not matching the needs of your students. In the following lesson, we offer resources to help you and leadership teams analyze how well your core curriculum and intervention materials explicitly teach the elements of word recognition and other important areas of literacy learning.

As your district or building leadership teams take time to conduct an analysis of core instruction, you can still take action to meet the needs of at-risk learners. One suggestion is to administer a brief skills check to the entire class at periodic points during the year to check the efficacy of phonics instruction and to gain an idea of phonics-instruction needs class-wide. 

The Cox Campus offers a Decoding Skills Quick Check. This assessment tool can help gauge student performance on important subskills in reading. You can use data from a quick check to make adjustments to core instruction and fill missing gaps in phonic knowledge (for example, reteaching long vowel spellings to the whole class or in a small group of students who share similar gaps in phonic knowledge and decoding skills). 

Students who do not respond to intensified and adjusted instruction at the core will require more individualized assessment and instruction. It is important not to wait to provide the most intensive supports to students who need them. Continuous, formal and informal data collection can help you determine student mastery with instruction delivered in the classroom, and know which students require extended, individualized intervention and/or a referral for diagnostic evaluation. 

 

  • You can use this daily observation checklist to monitor students during small group instruction.
  • Follow your grade level team's progress monitoring schedule to monitor the growth of students receiving supplemental instruction/intervention.
  • Be wise in what assessments you administer (or choose not to administer) and make appropriate instructional changes based on the data. Remember, the assessment does not change outcomes; instruction does. 

Trying it Out

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