Oral Language Assessment The purpose of using an oral language assessment is to determine how students use language in the

classroom. Listening to students talk is one of the easiest ways a teacher can use to determine what the students know. From there a teacher can use the information to increase lesson potential. If there is an area in the oral language functions that the class or a particular student is struggling in the teacher can find ways to help the class or student. The assessment was done at Wicoff School in Plainsboro, NJ. It was done in Mr. Jones third grade classroom. I conducted an oral language assessment of the whole class. I also focused on one particular student, Sean who is nine years old. To conduct the assessment I first focused on the whole class. I wanted to see what language functions the class uses and what they dont use. It was clear that the students are all very good at speaking in complete sentences. They are all also to be able to read and write because of their age level. After determining the language functions of the class I chose one child to focus on. After I chose to focus on the language functions of Sean, I started to pay close attention to what Sean said and how he spoke. I took down notes of his oral language abilities. Once I had enough information on Seans language functions I looked at all of my notes and looked at what I could determine about his ability. And then look about how to apply his ability to further instruction. The whole class findings were that the class using a lot of language during the school day. I noticed that the students enjoy talking to each other about things going on at home and also about school related topics. I observed that majority of the students also enjoy reading. I noticed this several times when Mr. Jones allowed the kids to read one of their books. They got excited to read and were even asking Mr. Jones and me about books they should read. Also, the entire class likes to answer Mr. Jones questions. Their hands shoot up into the air even before he has finished asking the question sometimes. The class was recently working on poetry. They read a bunch of different poems and then got to write their own. They just started going over realistic fiction. In addition, the class does some group work and they usually do it with the other students at their table. This is building collaborative relations among the students.

When I first met Sean he seemed like a very quiet boy. He did not seem to have any interest in talking to me. He did, however, talk to his classmates. I think he acted this way because it was the first time he met me and was not comfortable with me yet. The class went to the library that day and when they came back I asked Sean and the other students at his table what they did at the library. Sean was the first one to tell me what they did in the library and when his classmates jumped in he was quick to let them speak and also quick to correct them. Later on he read me a poem that he wrote. He spoke very clearly to me and said all the words correctly. The next time in the field I asked Sean to tell me a story. At first he looked at me like I was crazy and then told me an extremely short story. The story was about a green, hairy monster with teeth that are three feet long. I then asked him questions about the monster and what the monster does. Then he elaborated that the monster cannot close his mouth because he has a really big under bite and that the monster stomps around trying to find different things to eat. Later on, I observed Sean working on a math problem. While he was solving the problem he was quietly talking/mumbling to himself. Once, he had completed the problem I asked him how he solved it and he went step-by-step through his process of solving the problem. Mr. Jones soon came over and looked at his work and told Sean quietly that he got the right answer. Sean expressed to me how happy he was that he got the problem correct because it was a difficult problem to solve. At this point, I was able to determine that Sean is a bright student. Compared to other students in Mr. Jones class, he is one of the more gifted and talented students. On my final day of observing Sean, I noticed how much he liked to read. Every chance he got he had his nose in a book. It made sense to me because he had previously told me that he preferred to read than write. The class also worked on a science worksheet. They were to do the worksheet individually and then go through each problem as a table group to come up with one answer and then go over the worksheet as a class. Like how Sean talked to himself while solving a math problem, he talked to himself again when working on the science worksheet. Also, this time I noticed that when Mr. Jones asks the class a question, he mumbles the answer to himself while he has his hand in the air. Since Sean was the first student at his table to finish the worksheet I asked him if he knew how gravitational pull works. And he gave me a concise answer

about how gravity keeps us on the Earth instead of floating in the air. Once the entire table finished the worksheet, Sean showed leadership by guiding his group through the worksheet. He did a good job, except when he would get frustrated when his group did not understand his answer or when they were not explaining something correctly. I had to tell him a couple times to calm down and to try explaining it to them again or in a different way. It seemed to help him calm down and listen to his classmates. To further instruction for Sean I would challenge him more in class. I would assign him books that are a little more challenging for him and to then see how he does before continuing to challenge him. I would also encourage Sean to use more descriptive words in his writing and also to just write longer papers and stories. Based on my oral language assessment of Sean I would try harder to challenge Sean in class. I would also be interested to ask him why he mumbles to himself while do a math problem or a worksheet. It could be possible to work with him on that so he does not have to talk to himself all of the time.