Curriculum-Based Emergent Literacy Assessment in Early Childhood

ABSTRACT

Speech-language pathologists who work in early childhood settings are concerned with monitoring and evaluating progress and making appropriate instructional adjustments to promote at-risk children's language and literacy development. Curriculum-based assessment can be effective in providing practitioners with this type of information. This article discusses processes and procedures for implementing curriculum-based assessment and suggests methods that professionals can use to teach assessment tasks to children who struggle with the task demands.

Assessment - curriculum-based assessment - young children

REFERENCES

• 1 Fuchs D, Fuchs L S. Introduction to response to intervention: what why, and how valid is it?.  Reading Research Quarterly. 2006;  41 93-99
• 2 Gersten R, Dimino J A. RTI (response to intervention): rethinking special education for students with reading difficulties (yet again).  Reading Research Quarterly. 2006;  41 99-108
• 3 Gillon G T. Phonological Awareness: From Research to Practice. New York; Guilford Press 2004
• 4 Wallach GE, Butler KG Language Learning Disabilities in School-Age Children and Adolescents. New York; Merrill 1994
• 5 Snow C E, Jones J. Making a silk purse: how a national system of annual testing might work.  Education Week. 2001;  20 41-60
• 6 Witt J C, Elliot S N, Daly III E J, Gresham F M, Kramer J J. Assessment of At-Risk and Special Needs Children. Boston; McGraw-Hill 1998
• 7 Lidz S. Practitioner's Guide to Dynamic Assessment. New York; Guilford Press 1991
• 8 Merritt D D, Culatta B, Trostle S. Narratives: Implementing a discourse framework. In: Merritt DD, Culatta B Language Intervention in the Classroom. San Diego, CA; Singular 1998: 277-330
• 9 Meyers J, Pfeffer J, Elbaum V. Process assessment: a model for broadening assessment.  J Speech Ed. 1985;  19 73-89
• 10 Justice L, Sofka A, McGinty A. Targets, techniques, and treatment contexts in emergent literacy intervention.  Semin Speech Lang. 2007;  28 14-24
• 11 Norris J A. Phonic faces manual. http://Available at: www.elementary.com/phonaw.html Accessed April 15, 2006
• 12 Lidz C S. Dynamic Assessment: Theory, Application and Research. Paper presented at: the Annual Convention of the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association 1996 Seattle, WA;
• 13 Vygotsky L. ed.d. Mind in Society: The Development of Higher Psychological Processes. Cambridge, MA; Harvard University Press 1978
• 14 Richgels D J, Poremba K J, McGee L M. Kindergartners talk about print: phonemic awareness in meaningful contexts.  The Reading Teacher. 1996;  49 632-642
• 15 Culatta B. Representational play and story enactments: formats for language intervention. In: Duchan JF, Hewitt LE, Sonnenmeier RM Pragmatics: From Theory to Practice. Englewood Cliffs, NJ; Prentice Hall 1994: 105-119
• 16 Jervay-Pendergrass D, Erdelyi P, Mendolsohn A. Language delay and its relation to separation.  J Zero Three. 2005;  24-36
• 17 Culatta B, Culatta R, Aslett R, Wilson C. Balanced literacy in a Spanish-English Immersion Program. Proceedings of the International Symposium on Bilingualism. Somerville, MA; Cascadilla Press 2005
• 18 Culatta B, Hall K M. Phonological awareness instruction in early childhood settings. In: Justice L Clinical Approaches to Emergent Literacy Intervention. San Diego, CA; Plural Publishing In press
• 19 Culatta B, Kovarsky D. Project CALL: A Contextualized Approach to Language and Literacy Instruction (Award No. H324M9990066). Washington, DC; United States Department of Education 2003
• 20 Culatta B, Kovarsky D, Theadore G, Franklin A, Timler G. Quantitative and qualitative documentation of early literacy instruction.  Am J Speech Lang Pathol. 2003;  12 172-188
• 21 Clay M M. An Observation Survey of Early Literacy Achievement. 2nd ed. Portsmouth, NH; Heinemann 2002
• 22 Cunningham P M. Phonics They Use: Words for Reading and Writing. 4th ed. Boston; Allyn & Bacon 2005
• 23 Edmiaston R K. Preschool literacy assessment.  Semin Speech Lang. 1988;  9 27-35
• 24 Numeroff L. If You Give a Pig a Party. New York; HarperCollins 2005
• 25 McConnell S R, McEvoy M S, Priest J S. “Growing” measures for monitoring progress in early childhood education: a research and development process for individual growth and development indicators.  Assessment for Effective Intervention. 2002;  27 3-14
• 26 Good R H, Kaminski R A. Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills. 6th ed. Eugene, OR; Institute for the Development of Educational Achievement 2001
• 27 Cooper J, Kiger N. Literacy Assessment: Helping Teacher Plan Instruction. New York; Houghton Mifflin 2001
• 28 Bear D R, Templeton S. Explorations in developmental spelling: foundations for learning and teaching phonics, spelling, and vocabulary.  The Reading Teacher. 1998;  52 222-242
• 29 Gentry J R. A retrospective on invented spelling and a look forward.  Reading Teacher. 2000;  54 318-332
• 30 Laing S P. Miscue analysis in school-age children.  Am J Speech Lang Pathol. 2002;  11 407-416
• 31 Valencia S W, Rhodes L K, Shanklin N L. Miscue analysis in the classroom. In: Barrentine SJ Reading Assessment: Principles and Practices for Elementary Teachers. Newark, DE; International Reading Association 1999: 160-163
• 32 Richgels D J. Invented spelling, phonemic awareness, and reading and writing instruction. In: Dickinson DK Handbook of Early Literacy. New York; Guilford Press 2000: 142-158
• 33 Hall K M, Markham J, Culatta B. The development of the early expository comprehension assessment (EECA): a look at reliability.  Comm Disord Q. 2005;  26 195-206
• 34 Feuerstein R. The Dynamic Assessment of Retarded Performers. Austin, TX; Pro-Ed 1979
• 35 Campione J, Brown A. Linking dynamic assessment with school achievement. In: Lidz CS Dynamic Assessment. New York; Guilford Press 1987: 82-116
• 36 Goswami U. Early phonological development and the acquisition of literacy. In: Neuman SB, Dickinson DK Handbook of Early Literacy Research. New York; Guilford Press 2001: 111-125
• 37 Troia G A, Roth F P, Graham S. An educator's guide to phonological awareness: assessment measures and intervention activities for children.  Focus on Exceptional Children. 1998;  31 1-12
• 38 Yopp H. The validity and reliability of phonemic awareness tests.  Reading Research Quarterly. 1988;  23 159-177
• 39 Swank L, Larrivee L S. Phonology, metaphonology, and literacy. In: Paul R Exploring the Speech-Language Connection. Baltimore, MD; Brookes 1998
• 40 Griffin S. Determining the reliability of a preschool comprehension measure. Unpublished master's thesis. Provo, UT; Brigham Young University 2002
• 41 Culatta B, Ellis J, Page J. Story re-telling as a communicative performance screening tool.  Lang Speech Hear Serv Sch. 1983;  14 66-74
• 42 Scarborough H. Connecting early literacy and literacy to later reading (dis)abilities: Evidence, theory, and practice. In: Neuman SB, Dickinson DK Handbook of Early Literacy Research. New York; Guilford Press 2001: 97-110
• 43 Catts H, Fey M E, Zhang X. Predicting reading disabilities: research to practice.  Lang Speech Hear Serv Sch. 2001;  32 38-50
• 44 Hedberg N L, Westby C E. Analyzing Storytelling Skills: Theory to Practice. San Antonio, TX; Communication Skill Builders/Therapy Skill Builders 1993
• 45 Bravmann S L. Assessment's ‘fab four.'  Education Week. 2004;  23 56
• 46 Jones J. Early Literacy Assessment Systems: Essential Elements. Princeton, NJ; Educational Testing Service 2003

APPENDIX A

Task Demands and Levels of Support: The Basis for Developmental Checklists

Level I: Produces target responses only with high levels of support

• Produces appropriate responses only when provided with direct and immediate imitative support

• Does not respond to probes to generate or recognize examples and does not spontaneously produce target behaviors even in instructional contexts

• Gives a semantic response to a phonological awareness task (e.g., when asked to identify objects that start with /p/ to go in a pot, the child says, “The pot is for making soup”; when asked what rhymes with cat, the child responds “cat and dog rhyme.”)

• Says, “I don't know,” gives an irrelevant response, or is puzzled in instruction

Level II: Recognizes and retrieves target responses with modeling in instruction

• Imitates productions or responds appropriately to very salient targets during instruction

• Generates or recognizes target behavior with moderate levels of support (e.g., yes or no headshake, modeled response, gestures toward an object that reflects the target response)

• Recognizes or identifies exaggerated, familiar examples of a skill in a familiar activity

• Repeats target stimulus (e.g., when asked to generate a word that begins with the same letter as bed the child says, “bed”)

Level III: Retrieves or recognizes familiar targets

• Identifies or calls attention to familiar targets (those encountered in prior instruction) in noninstructional contexts

• Generates familiar targets in noninstructional contexts (e.g., after participating in a rhyme activity using -ug, the student sees a bug and says, “I know what rhymes with bug - hug”)

• Responds correctly, consistently, and confidently to familiar positive examples but not to negative examples (e.g., is confident when asked to identify word pairs such as “park-pot” but is less confident when asked to identify word pairs such as “park-ship”)

Level IV: Retrieves or generates novel targets in a new context

• Recognizes or generates several different novel targets (those not encountered in instruction) in novel contexts without support

• Identifies or calls attention to target words, sounds, or phrases that are encountered in texts, either oral or written depending on whether it is a phonological awareness or print-based skill

• Generates more than one example (e.g., “think of a word that rhymes with _________; now think of another word that rhymes with________.”)

• Generates nonsense examples (e.g., makes up words that start with a target sound [sable for table]; plays with nonsense rhyme words; spontaneously uses letter-sounds to produce invented spellings)

• Consistently and confidently responds correctly (at or near 100%) to requests to identify or generate target words, sounds, or phrases in new contexts