ED346 and ED 346E Assessment Project

a. Description of the Assessment

i. The assessment was called CECA LA. It is online, and a progress monitoring
assessment. This assessment measures the ability of a child to correctly identify
uppercase letters, lowercase letters, lowercase sounds, and National Geographic
Sight words.
ii. The standards that this assessment addresses: CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RF.K.3.C:
Read common, high-frequency words by sight (e.g., the, of, to you, she, my, is,
are, do, does). CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RF.K.1.D: Recognize and name all
upper- and lowercase letters of the alphabet.
iii. The assessments were given in the morning during their morning routine and
circle time. This meant that there was talking, and sometimes singing in the
background, so the children were sometimes distracted. The children would
individually get pulled to complete these assessments. They would sit at the
computer, and the teacher would sit to their right. The screen would be pulled up,
and the teacher would tell the student to name the letter, name the sound, or read
the word. The student would respond, and the teacher would hit the ‘correct’ or
‘incorrect’ button, which would trigger the next test question to appear on screen.
At the bottom of the screen is the number of the question they are on out of the
total questions, and occasionally the teacher would let the student know if they
are halfway. The date theses assessments were given is September 9th, 2018. We
iv. were not informed of any accommodations we should make with any of the
students we assessed.
v. Emma (6 years old) is a student who has difficulty with staying on task and
focusing. She has some mild delays that include social and cognitive. She knows
a few letters, but will often label incorrectly, or guess instead of saying she does
not know the answer. Elizabeth (6 years old) is very focused and motivated. She
enjoys learning, and is above her grade levels in reading and math.
b. Analysis of assessment results
i. Emma scored below average at a 3 out of 26 on uppercase letters, and 4 out of 26
on lowercase letters.
ii. Elizabeth scored above average at a 24 out of 24 on her uppercase and lowercase
sounds, as well as 24 out of 24 on her lowercase sounds, and 44 out of 44 on her
sight words.
c. Student Learning
i. Emma is able to identify the letter E, and the letter K 100% of the time for
uppercase letters. She is very confident, and is easily engaged in large group
activities. Emma would benefit from staying in morning circle activities and
being tested in an environment that is less distracting. Elizabeth’s strengths are
that she is above grade average for both English Language Arts, and Math. She is
very motivated and focused. She will need a constant stream of more challenging
work to keep her engaged and motivated, as well as extra teacher and family
support to continue to challenge herself.
 ii. The environment in which they do the testing is not ideal. We take them from
activities they are really engaged in, and then try to have them focus while the
teacher is talking, their friends are talking, and music is playing. It is very
distracting and makes taking assessments seem like more of a negative thing, and
may cause the students to rush through the test to get back. The testing area is
also a row of 5 computers. Several times, two different children would be
assessed at the same time. This is also a distraction as they are both naming
letters. It has distracted Emma before, and confused her as she started repeating
the letters the girl next to her said, instead of reading them off of the screen in
front of her.
d. Instructional Design
i. Emma is delayed enough to warrant one-on-one interventions daily to work on
first, uppercase letter recognition. It would be most beneficial if it were in a less
distracting environment, and the strategies were hands on, and tailored to her
interests. Emma would also benefit from extra attention during circle rotations to
ensure she understands the instructions, stays focused, and can easily ask
questions and receive quick assistance. Elizabeth will require higher level
curriculum. This may include sending home more challenging books, above
grade level, so that she can be challenged and continue to learn, rather than
getting bored of school. This may also include more challenging homework
assignments, such as studying more advanced sight words so that she has
something to work towards. This may also include a reading program in which
she is placed with a reader that reads at a slightly higher level than herself so she
can see a good model of reading, while being challenged.
ii. It would be beneficial for the student if they had interventions to catch them up to
the level of their English-speaking peers. It would also be most beneficial if the
person doing the interventions spoke their language, especially for the children
that struggle more with speaking and understanding English. Another strategy is
teaching them the letters in their language, and then teaching the English version,
and the same for sight words.