Assessment drives Instruction: Reflection at the end
29 04 2008The course description says, in part.”Explores literacy assessments and materials and uses this knowledge to apply instruction.” Almost all the the entries have been about your student. In this one, reflect upon YOU and your exploration. What did you bring with you that helped, what did you find along the way, what are you like at the end. The last means that every course changes one, how are you as an instructor different than you were at the start?
I think I came into this class a little unprepared, as this was one of my first classes in working with an older student, rather than a younger student. However, I was able to bring in my knowledge of basic assessments in literacy curriculum and how these assessments have driven, and continue to drive, instruction.
Along the way, I discovered a lot, about myself and about assessment and instruction. Most importantly, I think, I learned, more than ever, that motivation truly does drive achievement and success. Will told me from the first day that I brought poetry in that he despised it; although I really wanted to use poetry to build on his weak fluency, I knew that if he really hated it that much, he would not only resent me, but start to resent reading. I knew that I had to find other ways to work on his fluency, and so I did.
At the end of this, I am proud that I was able to help a student achieve some of his goals. I am also happy that I was introduced to the Flynt/Cooter assessment, because I know now that I don’t ever want to use.. I think it is too complext and inaccurate in some ways and I thikn running records tell us a lot more. The difficulties that would come in using an assessment program like this are great; it is a lot easier to stick to one that a majority of a school is using, like running records.
In the beginning of this course, I have to be honest, I felt as though I was out of my element. As a special education major everything that was initially being discussed was complete jargon to me. However, throughout the course of the semeter I believe that I am now able to walk away with a clearer picture of how I can incorporate what I have learned into my field. As a special education teacher I do have to administer the Baseline running records, analyze the data, and then forward my learned information onto the reading teacher. I now know of ways that I can assist this child while they are in my classroom.
While I was holding my tutoriing sessions with Logan, I brought a lot of my special education knowledge with me in the very beginning. I soon found out that this was not sufficent with the goal that I was striving to complete. Towards the middle of the semester I then had to refocus my direction and ask myself, how would I handle this if I were his reading teacher? I now believe that my end result is something that I can now walk away from and say that I did learn something
When I started working with D I was a bit nervous because although I had tutored before, I had not been responsible for literacy alone. I came armed with many classroom strategies that had worked for other students, but I didn’t know if any of that would be applicable to my time with D.
Along the way I learned that I am a resourceful teacher. I use what is interesting to my student in order to help her grasp ideas that will stay with her forever. I used her responses and strengths to build on what she already knew, and even though her life was in turmoil, she always looked forward to coming to our sessions and sharing her stories.
In the end I feel like I have a stronger grasp on what works and doesn’t work when assessing a student’s needs. I found other assessments on my own that targeted Dezsirae’s needs and showed me where she truly needed help. With some more practice and research on my part, I feel that I will become a confident literacy specialist.
When I first walked into our LIT 680 class, I didn’t have much experience with literacy assessment. I was just a certified teacher that knew many strategies to teach reading and the curriculum. I also didn’t think of reading instruction as broken up into sections such as phonemic awareness, phonics, vocabulary, comprehension and fluency.
During the time in this class and experience tutoring a student in reading, I have learned how to assess students in reading, how to understand and interpret the data from these literacy assessments, and teach based on these assessments. I have also learned many new strategies to teach based on the five aspects of reading. This experience hasn’t only helped me become a better tutor with Ethan but a better teacher in the classroom. I have already integrated many of the stratgies that I learned into my Language Arts time in my classroom and instruct my students based on their abilities and needs.
Completing this case study was very time consuming and confusing at times. This process has taught me how to do it and I know that this will make it much easier the next time. I am very satisfied with the progress that my student has made and what I have learned in this college course.
When I first started this course, I was unaware of how to assess a student with reading/writing problems and how to implement instruction for those students. This course has taught me how to do both of those things. I have used various forms of assessment with Savanna and then targeted my instruction towards her needs based on her strengths. The books that we used in this course (each one for the fab 5) really helped my instruction. I loved the way they were set up and the information they gave me. They listed many strategies I was able to use with my student. Through the completion of this case study, I was able to track my progress and understanding as I tracked Savanna’s progress and understanding. This was a meaningful project not only for the student but for me as well. I feel confident now assessing a students needs and targeting instruction for that student.
Each of your entries show movement…from a classroom teacher to a teacher who has specialized knowledge in literacy. Running records is a classroom assesment tool that every classroom teacher should use with every child many times during the year in order to plan appropriate literacy instruction. An instrument like the Flint is reserved for literacy specialists to use on students who are struggling in order to provide specialized instruction. It is not designed to be used by classroom teachers to provide daily literacy instruction.
Do you all see the difference? Stacy?
I do see the difference now, Dr. Summers. I probably would have felt more comfortable then, using it, if maybe we had talked about the Flynt a little bit more in class. I know that we went over how to actually use it, but its purposes were not gone over maybe as explicitly as I would have liked, although it might very well have been enough for others! It is something I will keep in mind if I do end up becoming a literacy specialist. I guess since my mindframe is initially set on becoming a classroom teacher and NOT a literacy specialist, at least for the near future, my expectations are probably a little different.
When I began this class, literacy assessment was a huge concern of mine. With my prior education only being in childhood education and not specifically literacy, I did not know about many of the assessments and which assessments were appropriate to use. Since then I feel I have come a long way. I am more comfortable using the assessments and figuring out the data that has come from them. Also I was able to find other assessments that worked for my student.
I have to say that at the beginning of the class I was a little nervous when we started talking about the ‘fab 5’ because as a special educator I have not had much background in literacy strategies in the past. However, once we started implementing each of the components of literacy into class and began learning how one component impacts or effects another I felt much more confident to go forward in my tutoring experience and assess my student. I have had some experience with an alternative assessment tool (the DRA) earlier in the year, and I think this knowledge of how a reading assessment should be conducted also helped me throughout this semester. I enjoyed using the Flynt and Cooter assessment but I wish I was able to use other assessments that were geared more towards my students’ weaknesses (such as fluency) so that I could have gotten better insight into her difficulties. Overall, as an instructor I am more tuned in to the specific literacy components (phonemic awareness, fluency, etc.) and feel as though I will be better able to identify them with a student who experiences literacy difficulties.
Before this class started I had little experience with literacy assessment. For one of my undergraduate courses I had to work with a student and conduct a miscue analysis by doing a few running records. When I saw this was a part of the Flynt-Cooter Reading Assessment I felt a little relieved that not everything was new to me. With this course I learned how to develop instruction based on assessment results and I have to say in the beginning I was a little hesistant about it. I didn’t know many instructional strategies to help students who are struggling readers succeed. As an instructor I feel more confident about identifying what component of literacy a student is struggling with (decoding, comprehension, fluency, etc.) and build appropriate lessons based on assessment results.
As I said earlier, I am not a literacy major, so I am feeling very different now than I did at the start of this class. I was a little intimidated by all of the literacy “jargon” I was hearing at the beginning of the course. I will even admit that I had never heard of the Fab Five nor did I know what they were. Now I feel confident assessing my students and preparing instructional strategies for all of the Fab Five categories. I have become very interested in literacy and kind of wish now that I had gone the literacy route rather than special ed. This was the perfect time for me to take this class, as I am specifically working with students with special needs in an inclusion classroom. What did I bring with me that helped? A good attitude and a keen interest in learning how to help students experiencing literacy difficulties. What did I find along the way – The Fab Five!!! What am I like at the end (besides very tired…). I am a good reading teacher as well as a classroom teacher and a special education teacher. Seriously, I learned what I need to be effectively teach my students to read and write. Thank you!
At the beginning of this class I had high expectations of learning about a variety of assessments and what specifically would help a struggling reader. I had a few literacy courses under my belt and was looking to learn more about assessment. I was very nervous about tutoring because I have never been a tutor before. Once I begin, I realized it wasn’t that bad, and really although I hadn’t been in the exact situation I had skills that applied.
Jessica was willing to participate in anything that I suggested. I discovered that I know a lot more about comprehension strategies that I originally thought. I discovered a variety of texts that Jessica would enjoy and hoped my strategy instruction was benefiting her. I learned it is difficult to get reactions out of 9th grade girls, positive or negative, towards books. I would have liked to have had a great knowledge of assessments because I feel it was biased to use basically only one assessment to pin a grade to her skills.
I struggled with the fact that comprehension problems in ninth grade is not something that I can find a quick fix for. I tried to cram as many activities into the sessions as possible and looking back I should have focused more specifically on a few strategies. It is hard to know if I made a difference. It was such a short period of time and I know it was unrealistic to believe I could change her world with tutoring. I would have liked to leave her with more of a feeling like oh I get it now, I can do this. It will take more time for my students to increase her confidence to that level.
I hope that the strategies I taught her are something that she finds useful in the future. As a tutor I learned a lot about scheduling and prioritizing what needs to be done. I am now proficient at administering the Flynt reading inventory and much better at informal observations. At the end of the tutoring I am better equipped to help students increase their comprehension skills through direct instruction and not as intimidated by assessments.
I think I came into this class knowing that I needed to learn a lot if I was going to assess a student reliably and validly and be able to base my instruction around her needs. I learned that I need to understand how assessments are administered before I try to give them and how they are scored. I think the easiest part is adminstering them and then analyzing them is the most difficult piece. I knew that multiple assessments are a must, but it was hard since the sessions were so short to try to get in multiple assessments before diving into instruction. I have learned that even just a little extra help on one piece is the first step to achieving success in other areas. As with other members of the class, I felt that motivation was the key ingredient in all of this because if we did not motivate these students to want to read and that they could read and get meaning from their reading, then they would have felt just as they do in school, like they are being given up on. Even just the one-on-one time helps students get the confidence they need to want to read in front of people. I think that was the most important idea I took away from this class was to make students feel like you feel that they can do it and you want to see them succeed!
Well when I started I had a training on running records and two reading classes in my undergrad. I really didn’t know much about teaching reading stretgies.
Through out the class I learned how to give the Flynt and then figure out where to start with my student to help him better his reading. I learned about differnt decoding skills and technical terms.
I now know how to assess where my students are and how to help them improve.
At the beginning of this class, I felt a little unsure of the expectations that were required of me. Through reading the different assigned books and class dicussions, I felt more confident in applying the knowledge gained from this experience.
As a teacher, I have always tried to motivate and keep a positive spin when working with children. I have learned more, aspecially after working with other teachers and attending workshops, on how to relax more and work with the children and keeping them motivated. Motivation is the key in my beliefs to keeping children interested and willing to work. Positive feedback and encouragement has ALWAY been big for me and I see how it affects children’s learning abilities by showing them I believe in them.
By the end of this semester, i feel more confident and ready to work more with students dealing with reading strategies. To see a child build and grow from me teaching them is such a wonderful feeling. I gained great knowledge from the texts that were provided, aspecially the “fab 5″ books. They included great information about each component, good examples and resources.
I am glad I took this class. I feel I have come a long way, since the first day of class. I did not have a lot of experience with teaching literacy, since I am a special education major. I have been able to learn different assessments and strategies to do when I have my own classroom. I am also more comfortable using the different assessments and strategies. Also I feel a lot better figuring out the data that has come from the assessments. I am glad I was able to learn about BADER assessment and Flynt and Cooter assessment. These are two assessments that I plan on using when I have my own classroom.
I now also feel comfortable doing assessments on younger grades, including kindergarten.