Assessments and Expectations

The first few weeks of school are meant for assessments and guaging where students are in their reading and writing skills. The assessments used help us determine what skills students should be addressing, and to appropriately place students in a reading group.

The following assessments are used to determine where students are reading currently, and what skills to focus on in the future.

Fastbridge

Fastbridge's aReading is a computer-administered adaptive screener that measures broad reading ability and predicts overall reading achievement. Items were developed for students in grades K-5 to target concepts of print, phonological awareness, phonics, vocabulary, and comprehension.

Words Their Way Spelling Inventory

Words Their Way: Word Study for Phonics,. Vocabulary, and Spelling Instruction has spelling inventories for primary, elementary, and upper- level grades. The 31 words are ordered by difficulty to sample features of the within word pattern to derivational relations spelling stages.

Teachers College Running Records

A Running Record is a tool teachers use to assess a student's reading progress by identifying patterns in student reading behaviors. The Teachers College Reading & Writing Project offers running records of Kaeden Books for reading assessment.

IXL Real-Time Diagnostic

The Real-Time Diagnostic evaluates students' grade level proficiency in language arts at a deep level. With an understanding of students' knowledge, we can make informed decisions about how to meet each student where they're at.

While classmates are working on assessments...

Literacy lab students are expected to work to build their skills independently during class time using IXL. IXL uses insights from student work in the curriculum and the Real-Time Diagnostic to generate personalized guidance for each learner. These personalized action plans seamlessly link students to the skills that will help them build on their knowledge and remediate gaps in understanding.

Working on our skills right away is the best way to kick start the year. While Lexia is supposed to be classwork, it is perfectly fine for students to log in at home and work on it.

Prodigy English is a fantasy game that reviews English language and reading comprehension based on Common Core ELA standards. Students explore a virtual village where their avatar gathers supplies, builds things, and buys and sells in virtual marketplaces.

If you have any questions, please reach out to me at jmorgan@opschool.org.

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