Assessing young readers involves more than determining a reading level and moving them onto the next.The CAFÉ Menu was developed to help students understand and master different strategies used by successful readers.

CAFÉ is an acronym for Comprehension, Accuracy, Fluency, and Expanding Vocabulary, and the system includes goal-setting with students in individual conferences, posting of goals on a whole-class board, developing small group instruction based on clusters of students with similar goals, and targeting whole-class instruction based on emerging student needs and fine tuning one on one conferring.