Assessment Assignment

READ 620
Emily Cornett
Longwood University
September 16, 2015

Running head: ASSESSMENT

Class Overview
My third grade class is made up of 18 students from a range of spelling stages. The
spelling stages range from Late Letter Name to Middle/Late Derivational Relations with a large
amount in various in between stages of Within Word and Syllables and Affixes Stages. The class
has been separated into spelling groups that I feel will best benefit their individual spelling
growth and development.
Group 1
In this group I have placed Caleb, Trevor B., and Sam. Caleb and Trevor B. are both in
the Late Letter Name stage of development meaning they are moving out of the Beginning stages
of reading/writing and into the Transitional stage. Sam is in the Middle Within Word spelling
stage placing him in the Transitional stage of reading and writing. Caleb has appeared to have
mastered consonants, short vowels, and blends. He is still using, but confusing digraphs, long
and other vowels, inflected endings, syllable junctures, and unaccented final syllables. Absent
from his spelling included harder suffixes and bases and roots. Trevor B. has mastered
consonants, short vowels, and blends, but he still confuses digraphs, syllable junctures and
unaccented final syllables. Long and other vowels, inflected endings, harder suffixes, and bases
or roots are absent. Finally, Sam has mastered consonants, short vowels, digraphs, blends, and
syllable junctures. He uses, but confuses long and other vowels, inflected endings, unaccented
final syllables, and harder suffixes, while bases and roots are absent.
I chose to group these students together because each could benefit from more practice
with features from the Late Letter Name stage. Caleb and Trevor both mastered blends, but need
more practice with digraphs. Although Sam has mastered digraphs, I felt that he would benefit
more in this group where he could practice and prepare more before moving into the next stage
of spelling where his score was very low. Also, I felt that it would be beneficial to have one
student who is in a slightly higher spelling stage to help the other two students practice and grow.

Running head: ASSESSMENT

This being said, Sam would be the outlier in this group because he is working towards MidWithin Word. If he is given a little more practice, I believe that he will be more prepared to work
with long vowels in his spelling.
sh
shall
ship
shell
shed

ch
chap
check
chip
chill

th
them
thick
thin
than

Above is the initial sort I would use to start instruction. I chose this sort because it
worked with the digraphs that all three students showed confusion on (ch and sh). Ch also
happened to be the one digraph that Sam confused in his spelling at that stage, so I felt that he
would benefit from this instruction even if he is slightly advanced in comparison. An
understanding of these digraphs is an important part of progression through the next stage
towards the end-of-year goal.
Assuming this is a beginning of the year assessment, I would want to guide my planning
at a fast pace because this group is right behind Early Within Word and I know that the Within
Word stage has many features and takes a good amount of time and practice to master. I would
anticipate that this group may need intervention support to achieve the end-of-year expectation
simply because there is so much information in the Within Word stage. As my lowest group, I
would make a few considerations for struggling readers and English Learners in my group. I
would consider bringing in a reading specialist to help assist me with this group, specifically in
providing them with that extra support they need to make it to Early Syllables and Affixes by the
end of third grade. I would make sure to have a variety of activities available for the students to
work with words so I could find which worked best for each student. Finally, I would make sure
to really encourage partner work in this group because I know that having another student who is

Running head: ASSESSMENT

willing to help an EL or a struggling reader has a positive effect on that particular students
learning experience.
Group 2
The students in this group include Bridget, Steven, Anna, and Kaylee. Bridget, Anna, and
Kaylee are in the Late Within Word spelling stage and moving out of the Transitional and into
the Intermediate reading and writing stage. Steven is in the Mid-Within Word spelling stage and
in the Transitional reading and writing stage. Bridget, Anna, and Kaylee have mastered
consonants, short vowels, digraphs, blends, and long vowels. They are using, but confusing other
vowels, inflected endings, syllable junctures, unaccented final syllables, and harder suffixes,
while bases and roots are absent. Steven has mastered consonants, short vowels, digraphs, and
blends. He is confusing long and other vowels, inflectional endings, syllable junctures,
unaccented final syllables, harder suffixes, and bases and roots meaning that no features appear
to be absent from his spelling.
I chose to place these four students in a group because all appear to have a firm
foundation in the Early Within Word stage and could benefit from more practice with vowels.
Although Steven has not quite mastered long vowels, I thought that with more practice and help
from the other students in this group he would be well read to move in the last stage of Within
Word. I chose to use the word sort below to start instruction because I felt that more practice with
long vowels would not only help Steven progress to where his other group members are, but
would also help Bridget, Anna, and Kaylee to prepare for characteristics of other vowels that
they will come in contact with soon in this stage. The long a vowel was one feature that most of
the group had some confusion with, so I decided to work with the three spellings of long a for
this sort.
a-e
same
grape

ai
mail
pain

ay
day
say

Running head: ASSESSMENT

chase
flake

chain
snail

stay
clay

Based on the Early Syllables and Affixes end-of-year spelling stage expectation for third
grade, I would guide my planning at an average instructional pace. The students are clearly on
track of making this goal because they are approaching the last stage of Within Word. I do not
want to plan too slow, however, because I know that they will need an adequate amount of
practice with this last stage and start working with inflected endings.
Group 3
The students in this group include Molly, Dana, Lexi, Natalie, and Brian. Molly, Lexi,
and Brian are in the Early Syllable and Affixes spelling stage also placing them in the
Intermediate reading and writing stage. Dana and Natalie are in the Late Syllables and Affixes
spelling stage and the Intermediate reading and writing stage. Lexi has mastered consonants
through other vowels and syllable junctures. She is using, but confusing inflected endings and
unaccented final syllables, while harder suffixes and bases and roots are absent. Molly has
mastered consonants through other vowels and unaccented final syllables, but still confuses
inflected endings, syllable junctures, harder suffixes, and bases and roots. Brian has mastered
consonants through other vowels, syllable junctures and unaccented final syllables. He uses, but
confuses inflected endings, harder suffixes, and bases or roots. Dana and Natalie have mastered
consonants through syllable junctures; however, they still confuse unaccented final syllables,
harder suffixes, and bases or roots.
I chose to group these students together because they are all beginning to work in the
Syllables and Affixes stage. Although Molly and Brian have mastered unaccented final syllables,
they still confuse inflected endings, the same area that Lexi confuses. Dana and Natalie are
slightly ahead of the rest of the group in the Late Syllable stage, but I feel that they will benefit
from working with features from earlier in this stage to make sure they have a complete

Running head: ASSESSMENT

understanding of those features before finishing up the stage. Also, Dana and Natalie will
provide that extra support that the others in the group may need, especially in syllable juncture
words.
-ies
babies
ponies
carries
parties
bodies

-ys
monkeys
boys
enjoys
valleys
plays

I chose to start instruction with a sort working with inflectional endings because that is an
area that most members of this group use but confuse. Specifically, I chose to work with plurals
with y because this group seemed to have trouble with when to drop y and add ies or to just add
s. For example, the group spelled carries as carrys on their spelling samples. The sort above
will give them practice identifying when they need to change the ending of the word or just ad an
s to make it plural.
Based on the end-of-year spelling stage expectation, I would guide my planning at a slow
pace because this group of students has already reached the Early Syllables and Affixes stage. I
believe that this group definitely needs to continue practicing features with this stage because it
can be a very difficult stage to master, but I do not fear that they will fall behind in their
instruction. If they continue instruction at a slow and steady pace, they will be very prepared for
the fourth grade.
Group 4
The students in this group include Trevor H., Callie, Miguel, Edwin, Lindsay, and Ben.
Lindsay has mastered consonants through unaccented final syllables. She uses, but confused
harder suffixes, however, bases and roots are absent. Lindsay is in the Early Derivational
Relations spelling stage and going into the Advanced reading and writing stage. Ben and Callie

Running head: ASSESSMENT

have mastered consonants through unaccented final syllables, but they both still confuse harder
suffixes and bases or roots. Ben and Callie are in the Early DR spelling stage and the Advanced
reading and writing stage. Trevor H. and Edwin have mastered consonants through harder
suffixes, but use and confuse bases or roots. They are in the Mid-DR spelling stage as well as the
Advanced reading and writing stage. Finally, Miguel appears to have mastered all of the features
ranging from Emergent to DR stage placing him in Mid/Late DR and the Advanced reading and
writing stage.
I chose to group these students together because they are all in the Derivational Relations
spelling stage making them the most advanced spellers in the class. These students are in
different ranges in DR (from early to late) making them a good fit for a group because I believe
that they could benefit each others word feature knowledge. What one student may struggle
with, another may have better understanding with. From this group, I would say that Miguel
would be considered the outlier just because he has mastered all of the features on the spelling
inventory. However, he does have one word from harder suffixes and bases or roots that he
spelled incorrectly, so I think he will benefit from more practice with this group in those areas to
strive towards grasping those words as well.

-ate
educate
create
decorate
separate
complicate

-tion
education
creation
decoration
separation
complication

I chose to start instruction with the sort above because it works on harder suffixes, an area
that all of the students in this group need some extra practice with. I chose to start with this
particular e-Drop add ion sort because it works with ate words and many of the students in this

Running head: ASSESSMENT

group confused the word fortunate by not placing enough emphasis on the end spelling of the
word. However, I also like this sort because it works with adding ion after the t in a word, a
feature that Miguel, the outlier in the group, will benefit from working with.
Assuming that this is the beginning of the year assessment, I would guide my planning
for this group with a slow instructional pace. This group is well past the end-of-year spelling
stage expectation for third grade and I know they will continue to be advanced at the end of the
year as well. However, I believe that all students can benefit from more practice with word study,
so I will continue to instruct them on features in the DR stage throughout the year. Because this
is my highest group, I would consider finding a variety of activities that would foster their
learning in creative ways to ensure that they do not get bored with instruction. For example, I
could give them more writing activities in which they were able to use their knowledge of more
advanced words. Also, I would give them projects to do as a group that would incorporate team
work and outside research of words and reading.