Students at High School A are lacking the skills that they need in order to be proficient in literacy (reading, in particular). For the past six years, the school has failed to make Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) in reading, despite participation in an intensive, three-year literacy initiative, which included meeting regularly with a consultant and implementing reading interventions. Though many students are able to decode grade-level words, they often struggle with comprehension and higher-level thinking questions related to the text, according to the results of the Northwest Evaluation Association (NWEA) assessment.
Deficient reading skills at the secondary level is not an issue that is specific to High School A. According to Calhoon, Sandow, and Hunter (2010), this is a nation-wide crisis. They claim that “70% of our nation’s adolescents require some form of remedial reading instruction” (p. 58). Additionally, 40% of special education placements are for reading disabilities (Pearce, 2009, p. 419). At High School A, students who receive Tier 2 and Tier 3 interventions (including students who receive special education services) make up the largest percentage of students who do not score in the “proficient” range on state-mandated assessments. One question that arises as a result of this issue is “How can comprehension skills for Tier 1 and Tier 2 students be improved?”
Public and Archival Data
Public and archival data that were available for analysis included five years of NWEA scores (administered to freshmen and sophomores) and four years of Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) scores (administered to juniors). SAT score reports are available to the public, and are reported in both the local newspaper, and in written re...
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...tion for students with persistent reading difficulties. Journal of Learning Disabilities, 39(5), 447-466. Retrieved from Education Research Complete Database on October 23, 2010.
Meisinger, E., Bloom, J., & Hynd, G. (2010). Reading fluency: implications for the assessment of children with reading disabilities. Annals of Dyslexia, 60(1), 1-17. doi:10.1007/s11881-009-0031-z.
Pearce, L. (2009). Oral reading fluency as a predictor of reading comprehension with American Indian and white elementary students. School Psychology Review, 38(3), 419-427. Retrieved from Teacher Reference Center database on October 23, 2010.
Vaughn, S. (2010). Response to intervention for middle school students with reading difficulties: Effects of a primary and secondary intervention. School Psychology Review, 39(1), 3-21. Retrieved from Teacher Reference Center database on October 23, 2010.
This is a reading intervention classroom of six 3rd grade students ages 9-10. This intervention group focuses on phonics, fluency, and comprehension. The students were placed in this group based on the results of the DIBELS Oral Reading Fluency assessment. Students in this class lack basic decoding skills.
With such high numbers of adolescents falling below basic in reading, illiteracy is a battle that must be fought head on. The largest dilemma with the struggle is the number of variations that cause adolescents to become reluctant, unmotivated or struggling readers. Fortunately, a large number of strategies exist to encourage and strengthen readers of all ages, proving that adolescence is not a time to give up on faltering students. Rather, it is a time to evaluate and intervene in an effort to turn a reluctant reader into an avid one (or near enough). Ultimately, educators must learn to properly assess a student’s strengths and weaknesses (Curtis, 2009) and pair them with the proper intervention techniques. If one method does not work, countless others exist to take its place.
These DIBELS screening assessments were developed to help educators identify struggling, at-risk readers, so that appropriate types and levels of support can be implemented within the school system. They were designed to support efforts at the primary grade levels (K-6th) to prevent reading struggles as the learn progress through the school system. Furthermore, this test was to aid in the elimination in remediation lessons inside of the classroom.
Long-Term Trends in Student Reading Performance. Jan. 1, 1998. Web. The Web. The Web.
In Tier II, secondary interventions are used to help the students that are not making adequate progress towards developing appropriate literacy skills, despite the Tier I interventions (Smetana 2010). These students are classified with the color yellow, and are given more intense interventions that are targeted to their need. These interventions help determine if the student can eventually go back down to green, or if they...
The purpose of this proposal is to examine current and future Iowa State University admissions decisions processes. At the present time most colleges, including Iowa State use a combination of standardized test scores, high school class rank, high school grade point average, and essays to make decisions on admissions. All of the above are good determinants of a student’s possible success in college, except standardized test scores. Standardized tests discriminate against minorities and are not a good overall indicator of a student’s potential. For these reasons and others, Iowa State should not use standardized test scores when making admissions decisions.
Goldish, Meish. Everything You Need to Know About Dyslexia. New York: The Rosen Publishing Group, Inc., 1998.
The common learning disability in reading is called dyslexia. Reading problems occur in a student when they have difficulty unders...
Scarborough. H. S. (1998). Predicting the future achievement of second graders with reading disabilities: Contributions of phonemic awareness, verbal memory, rapid naming, and IQ. Annals of Dyslexia. 48 (1), p115-136.
Hugh, W. C., Fey, E. M., & Zhang, J. B. (2002). A Longitudinal Investigation of Reading Outcomes in Children With Language Impairments. Journal of Speech, Language & Hearing Research, 1142-1157.
Solley, J. (2014, February 18). Literacy for the 21st century: fluency. [Presentation] Powerpoint presented during in-class lecture. Davie, FL.
Rose, J. (2009). Identifying and Teaching Children and Young People with Dyslexia and Literacy Difficulties. Retrieved from http://www.education.gov.uk/publications//eOrderingDownload/00659-2009DOM-EN.pdf
It is a “reading world” we live in and students should be guaranteed every opportunity to succeed in this information driven society. Children today are overwhelmed with more reading material than ever before on billboard, television, the Internet and at school, causing reading to become a relevant and essential need in the life of every child (Lumpkin 1972). Being able to read has become the core of our information driven society. Yet, reading difficulties continue to plague the foundation of our education system creating a problem that only seems to be escalating. Hasselbring affirms that reading difficulties are a serious concern to our nation’s students claiming that, “as many as 20 percent of 17 year olds... [are] functionally illiterate and 44 percent of all high school students…[are] described as semi-illiterate”(2004). This is a harsh reality to face – a reality that stems from difficulties developed at the elementary level where reading complications arise and usually go unchecked. These reading difficulties are carri...
Reading is an essential skill that needs to be addressed when dealing with students with disabilities. Reading is a skill that will be used for a student’s entire life. Therefore, it needs to be an important skill that is learned and used proficiently in order for a student to succeed in the real world. There are many techniques that educators can use to help improve a student’s reading comprehension. One of these skills that needs to be directly and explicitly taught is learning how to read fluently for comprehension. “To comprehend texts, the reader must be a fluent decoder and not a laborious, word-by-word reader” (Kameenui, 252). Comprehension can be difficult for students with learning disabilities because they tend to be the students that are reading below grade level. One strategy is to incorporate the student’s background knowledge into a lesson. This may require a bit of work, but it will help the students relate with the information being pres...
readers: A perspective for research and intervention ―[Electronic version]. Scientific Studies of Reading, 11(4), 289-312.