Reading Analysis
Decoding
After assessing Brandon, it was determined that Brandon would benefit from foundational work work instruction. The results of the assessment showed that specifically Brandon needs additional instruction and support in his letters and sounds, short and long vowels, blends and digraphs, and other vowels. Additional practice in these areas will help strengthen his phonemic awareness skills and help Brandon be more confident in decoding unknown words while reading.
“Students need to have well-developed levels of phonological awareness if they are going to be able to use their phonics knowledge effectively as one source of information as they read and write” (Trehearne et. al, 2003). Brandon’s lack of phonemic knowledge and decoding strategies are the main components that are impeding on his reading development. Within his phonological knowledge, Brandon displays inconsistencies with knowing his letter-sound relationships when attempting to decode or spell an unknown word. “Phonemic awareness is the ability to distinguish among sounds. It is a crucial prerequisite to phonics because it is difficult to use letter sounds to figure out an unknown word if one cannot distinguish one sound from another” (Duffy, 2003). Brandon needs to continue building on these foundational skills so he can effectively use this information when decoding words.
When Brandon comes to a word he doesn’t know, he does not employ strategies to figure it out. He will take a guess or say ‘I don’t know’ and move on regardless if it sounds right to him or not. Over the course of the clinic, Brandon learned some additional strategies to help him solve an unfamiliar word while reading. In context of that specific clinic session, with that specific strategy, Brandon was able to successfully use or attempt to use the strategy when attacking a word. However, there was no going back to the strategy once we we moved on within the clinic. He was not using them independently beyond when it was our focus. “Students must learn to self-monitor their own reading, and when a word they read doesn’t look right, make sense, or sound like it would in text, they should cross-check it.” (Serravallo, 2015) As students begin to compile a ‘toolbox’ of strategies, it is important that they understand that proficient readers use more than one strategy when solving a word, and when one doesn’t work, they can try another. The goal is that these strategies become habitual where they will not require attention and the reader can shift its focus to fluency and comprehension. Lessons on specifically that, using multiple strategies to decode a word were also implemented to reinforce that point. During the activities of the clinic, Brandon would attempt to use the strategies we were focusing on. However, because of Brandon’s lack of foundational phonological knowledge, he was unable to do so without substantial teacher support. Towards the end of clinic, I recognized Brandon being more thoughtful when he comes to a word he doesn’t know. In the beginning of clinic, Brandon would immediately say ‘I don't know this word’, now I observed him looking at the word and trying to employ some decoding strategies to attempt to solve it. Brandon would benefit from continued instruction and practice on manipulating letters and sounds to build that phonemic knowledge and decode unknown words.
Fluency
Brandon is at the point is his reading development, where all of his attention is still being placed on decoding. As Brandon’s decoding skills increase, his attention while reading will be able to shift to his fluency. “Fluency enables learners’ word recognition to move from laborious to automatic. It also allows learners to apply elements of oral language to written text.” (Kuhn & Levy, 2015) Throughout this clinic, Brandon worked on strategies that would help him build his expression, pacing, stress, intonation, accuracy; all components that build a fluent reader. Brandon tried hard during clinic when we were working on fluency to read orally in an interesting way, however still gets tripped up when he is decoding words and required support along the way, making his reading still sound choppy. To still gain some fluency practice and develop those skills, rereadings and echo readers of the same texts were done. This allowed the focus of trying to decode the words to gradually lessen to allow him to focus on his fluency. When Brandon got to the point in his rereadings where he knew the words, he was able to put effort and thought into how he was reading them. Brandon would benefit from continued fluency instruction and practice to build on these skills as his decoding improves.
Comprehension
From the results of this DRA, it was determined that Brandon was staying on the surface level of comprehension and was not really thinking about what was going on in the events of the story. Brandon was only focused on what was right in front of him; what was directly stated in the text or visually shown in the picture.
Along with fluency, comprehension that also takes a back seat to decoding in Brandon’s reading development. “Remind students, once again, to reread in order to learn even more about the character, noticing new details to help them understand characters in new ways.” (Calkins, 2006) As Brandon reread stories multiple times, he was able to focus on thinking about the story itself more rather than the words on the page. Through comprehension instruction, YouTube was also utilized to orally watch and listen to a story being read so he could focus on the comprehension piece. Brandon began to start shifting his thinking and paying closer attention, he was able to form opinions, make connections, and relate to the characters in the story when he wasn’t focused on reading the words. Throughout the clinic I have seen improvement, however, I believe that Brandon would benefit from continued instruction and practice on strategies that will build on his metacognitive and comprehension skills.
Writing
Similar to the other aspects of his literacy skills, his lack of phonological knowledge of letter sound relationships and the ability to use that knowledge to form words, impedes on his writing development and confidence as a writer. The first day of clinic, Brandon was asked to write 10 things about himself to share. Brandon was very oppositional about doing so because of his dislike of writing. This speaks to his low confidence as a writer. However finally, Brandon wrote that he liked pizza.
During the clinic, Brandon was also asked to write a story of something that happened to him. The purpose of this was to motivate him to want to tell a story about himself. “Constructing stories in the mind - or storying – is one of the most fundamental means of making meaning” (Wells, 2009). When students are writing about their own lives and experiences, they are making a connection to their real world, making what they are doing more significant to them. Brandon was able to formulate ideas about what he would write about, and wanted to orally tell the story, however was not willing to write anything. Google Drive was then used to utilize the voice typing tool. This allowed Brandon to formulate his ideas and sentences without worrying about spelling. He required support and prompting throughout, however was able to retell his day at the farm in sequence.
Throughout this clinic, we worked on other activities that required Brandon to write words and sentences. Brandon struggled with spelling words because of his low phonological knowledge and decoding skills, however did make attempts to write the correct sound. Brandon would benefit from continued instruction on the craft of writing. Learning specific strategies and techniques that will help him to write well. As his phonics skills continue to develop, his spelling will improve as well.