8eader lnLeresL Survey

Do you en[oy read|ng books?

A ?es
now many books do you own?
A A loL
now many books have you read |n the |ast s|x months?
A Cver 16
What k|nds of books do you en[oy read|ng?
A MysLery lanLasy Pumor 8eallsLlc llcLlon
now do you dec|de wh|ch books you'|| read?
A She'll read books LhaL her broLher has read and says was good or books LhaL she Lhlnks look good
nave you ever read a book tw|ce? If so wh|ch book?
A ?es 8loky tbe 5poce cot and oLher
Who are your favor|te authors?
A uoesn'L really have one buL does really llke 8oald uahl
What type of peop|e do you rea||y ||ke to read about?
A no preference
Do you ta|k about books and what you're read|ng w|th anyone?
A She Lalks Lo her mom or her broLher lf he was Lhe one who recommended Lhe book Lo her
What was the |ast good book you read?
A @be 8oby5lttets clob
What are some of your favor|te te|ev|s|on shows and mov|es?
A uoes noL have any

Do you cons|der yourse|f a good reader? Why or why not?
A ?es because she Lakes a whlle Lo undersLand whaL she ls readlng
Do you f|nd read|ng d|ff|cu|t at t|mes
A no
Do you ||ke your teacher to read to you?
A SomeLlmes
Do you prefer f|ct|on or nonf|ct|on?
A nonflcLlon
What do you ||ke to do for fun?
A She llkes Lo play ouLslde and play wlLh her dog
What sub[ects do you ||ke best |n schoo|?
A All
Do you read at home? If so how often?
A ?es every nlghL before bed
Where |s your favor|te p|ace to read at home?
A ln bed or on Lhe couch
Do you own a pub||c ||brary card?
A no
What are you great at as a reader?
A SLaylng focused
What th|ngs do you need to work on as a reader?
A She wanLs Lo work on Lalklng more abouL whaL she ls readlng



Context
When I Iirst was given this assignment, I thought it would be diIIicult to Iind a child in
my classroom with whom I could work with. As the student teacher oI a giIted 3
rd
and 4
th
grade
classroom, all oI my students are reading at or above grade level. I talked to my teacher at the
beginning oI the semester about who I could work with. She suggested the possibility oI working
with a couple students who had an IEP Ior speech. However, we were not positive about this idea
because they still were doing well in reading.
Then, one Wednesday I went with my teacher to the 4
th
grade collaboration where all the
4
th
grade teachers and the principle discussed all the students` reading abilities. The other two
teachers talked about the low levels some oI their students were reading at. I wondered what my
teacher was going to talk about since we had the giIted class. I was surprised when she started to
talk about how one girl, Sam*, was having problems with her long vowels. As soon as I heard
that I made a mental note to talk to my teacher about this more later. Later that day when I
Iinally brought my idea up, my teacher agreed that Sam would be a good person to work with.
From this point on, my teacher has been supplying me with samples oI Sam`s literacy work.
At Parkland Primary School*, there is a huge Iocus on literacy. Everyday we spend the
whole aIternoon working on diIIerent types oI reading and writing. Right aIter lunch recess, the
students do Making Meaning. In this type oI lesson, the teacher reads part oI a book to students
who then have to discuss questions about the book with a partner. AIter Making Meaning,
students start their Daily Five. The Daily Five includes read to selI, read to someone, listen to
reading, work on writing, and word work.Our class always starts by read to selI. Each class in
the school is suppose to keep a chart oI their stamina. Our records show that we are able to read
Ior about 30 minutes. I think iI the students had the opportunity, they would continue to read.
However, our teacher knows that they could read Iorever and stops them so them can do other
parts oI the Daily Five. When the teacher is up to it, the class will read to someone. For this part
oI the day, the students are allowed to do sit anywhere they want in the room. Recently, our
teacher began incorporating the third part oI Daily Five, listening to reading, into our day.
During this time, students can listen to someone read on a CD player or they can go to the
computer and have the computer read to them. AIter this, students are to do a word sort called
Words their Way. To end the day, students work on writing. So Iar, they have talked and written
about short personal narratives. There is such a push Ior literacy at Parkland Primary School that
all the grades start a schedule similar to this one in Kindergarten.

What I learned About My Student
When I asked my teacher about Sam, she said that Sam was a good reader overall,
especially when you compared her to the other 4
th
graders in the school. However, she has had a
lot oI trouble with long vowels. She can read words with long vowels just Iine; Sam`s problem is
that she has trouble spelling words with them in it. My teacher showed me the spelling test that
Sam took as part oI a beginning oI the year assessment. The results showed that Sam spelled
about halI the words with long vowels in them wrong. A couple oI the words she misspelled
were 'spoil and 'noise. From my teacher, I also gathered that Sam goes too much into detail
when she gives summaries. These were her suggestions, but she reassured me again that Sam
was a good reader overall.
From mine own experience working with Sam, I realized that she loved to read and
realized what she thinks are her strengths and weaknesses. Her love oI reading, in my opinion,
comes Irom the Iocus on reading in her Iamily. With so many books at home, it is easy Ior Sam
to pick up and a book and read almost any time she would like. It also helps that she has an older
brother who is always willing to recommend a book to her based on what he knows she likes.
With this Iocus on reading, I Iound it strange that she did not own a library card. I never got to
the reasoning behind this, and I am not sure Sam knows the answer why either. Whatever the
reason, it is a good thing that Sam can check out almost any book that she wants when she goes
to the school library on Thursdays.
Although I am sure that there is some truth to what Sam thinks are her strengths and
weaknesses, I actually think that they should possibly be switch around. Sam thinks that she
stays Iocused when she reads. This could be true oI when she reads to herselI. However, when I
observed her in her reading group one day, I watched her get distracted reading more than once.
Every once in a while Sam`s head would look up and look around. On the other hand, Sam
thought she needed to work on talking about what she was reading. However, whenever I talked
to her about a book, she always knew what was going on and was easily able to discuss what was
happening or what she thought oI the book. Even though she is able to do this, it is possible that
she does not practice doing this very oIten and knows she should be better about doing it.

Reading ConIerence
During the Iirst reading conIerence I held with Sam, we talked about the book she was
reading Ior her reading group, Ama:ing Arachnids. I learned that although she does not normally
read scientiIic books like Ama:ing Arachnids, she does enjoy reading this type oI literature and
does not Iind it boring. In Iact, Sam Iinds reading her reading group book about spiders to be
quite interesting because it teaches her Iacts that she never knew. What was even more
impressive is that Sam was able to connect what she had just been learning in class to our
conIerence. Her teacher had been talking to the students about creating 'I wonder statements.
Sam`s question was, 'I wonder why there aren`t diIIerent colors than what the main colors are
|in spiders|? Like why won`t they be like brown, grey, or black? I thought this was a very
interesting and excellent question. Many times we take small things in liIe Ior granted and never
really think about why they are the way they are.
For our second reading conIerence, Sam and I discussed %he %itans Curse. She had been
reading this book Ior a while because her brother suggested the Iirst book in the series to her.
One oI Sam`s greatest strengths/weaknesses I realized was her ability to summarize. I noticed
this too earlier in the day when she was working with her reading group. Sam`s summaries are
too long. She adds so many details into summaries that they can sometimes almost be like a
retelling oI the story by the end. At least this proves that she remembers and understands what
she just read. Sam thought that her strength was imagining what all the characters looked like.
She sometimes will read books that have been turned into movies. When this happens, she will
occasionally picture the person Irom the movie when she is reading the book. Her goal Ior
herselI in both books was to get better at pronouncing words in the books, such as god`s names
and scientiIic names.
I would say though that the most interesting part oI our conIerence was when she we
talked about what genre %he %itans Curse was under. I think most people would have said
Iantasy right away. However, when I asked Sam, she replied realist Iiction. When I asked her to
expand her answer, she said that depending on what religion you were, you might believe the
stories about all the gods in the book. This is deep thinking Ior a 4
th
grader and I was impressed
with her thought process behind this.

Running Record
Overall, Sam does a great job reading. From looking at the running record my teacher did
Ior her and Irom the running record I did, Sam`s biggest problems are repeating words or
accidently saying a word wrong. The running record my teacher conducted showed three oI her
Iour markings to be Irom repeating a word. In my own time spent doing a running record with
her, Sam said a Iourteen words wrong. I do not think she usually realized that she said the word
wrong because she read it so smoothly. I think iI she would not have known the word she would
have struggled with it a little more. I think she would have tried sounding it out because she used
this technique Ior a couple oI the harder words she did not know. Although she needs to practice
reading the words on the page, there were quite a Iew times that Sam would catch herselI say the
wrong word. When this happened, she would selI correct right away. Overall, Sam did a good
job reading this passage. She has an accuracy rate oI 96.5. Sam`s error rate ratio is 1:29. This
means that Ior every 29 words Sam read, she got approximately one wrong. Finally, Sam`s selI-
correction rate is 1:6, which means Ior every six mistakes Sam makes, she corrects one.
ThereIore, Sam is reading at the correct reading level because she needs to be reading with at
least 95 accuracy to be an independent learner and Sam is at this level.








Concepts about Print
From my experience working with Sam, I think she has a great grasp on print concept.
When I read with her, she knew where in the book to start. She knew that she should stop at
periods. We never had any trouble with the way she was reading.
I think she also has a good grasp on print concepts because she knew how important it
was to read the boxes in a scientiIic reading. Many people would just skip over the boxes
because they do not think they are important. However, Sam read this part without being
reminded to do so. She even knew the correct way to go about reading the box in Ama:ing
Arachnids. She read head and thorax and than what they meant in a spider. Some people might
have either just read down one column and then the other or try to go across the row. Sam knew
the right combination oI these two ways.
Finally, I think Sam has print concept because she knows the set up oI a paper. I Iirst
realized she understood this concept when I noticed that she wrote a paper and switch paragraphs
at appropriate times. Although this can sometimes be a tricky concept to grasp, Sam knew
exactly when she should do this in the paper she wrote. She was aware that each paragraph was
suppose to talk about a new concept. She also knew that a paper had a beginning, body, and
conclusion. Similarly, her short narrative makes me believe she knows the set up oI a paper
because she included a title that nicely states what the paper is about.
Overall, Irom my experience working with Sam, I do not think there is anything in print
concept that I think she needs to work on right now. She seemed to be aware oI everything
important. It is possible that she would need instructions on harder print concepts, such as how to
use an index. As Iar as what she should know now though, Sam is well educated in this Iield.


Data Analysis, ReIlection, and Recommendations
Though my time working with Sam, I learned a lot about her as a reader and a writer. I know that
overall she is a good reader. In my opinion, she is very good at talking about what she is reading. She
knows what she is reading when she is reading it and can give you a detailed summary oI the reading
aIterwards. That being said, there are still some aspects oI literature that Sam needs to work on.
Although Sam`s reading record show that she reads Iairly accurately, she needs to continue to
practice reading to be able to say all the words correctly. I know that she knows what most oI the words
are. Many times though she will say substitute a word and not even realized that she did this. The more
practice Sam gets the better she will be at reading out loud. It might be beneIicial Ior her to point to the
words as she reads them to make sure she reads every word as it is written on the page.
Personally, I think Sam needs to work on her speed and Iluency. I know she scored in the
advanced category Ior this particular Ieature. However, twice I know I Ielt as though she was reading it
with brieI pauses between words. I think her reading would sound better iI she was able to read
continually in a smooth manner.
It is great that Sam likes to talk a lot about the books she is reading and give detailed summaries.
However, she needs to work on how long her summaries are. I witnessed her working with the teacher in
a small group where she was suppose to give a summary. Sam`s summary was so detailed that it seemed
as though she was retelling everything that she had just read. The teacher even mentioned to her that she
needed to practice giving a summary in just a Iew sentences. When asked to give the summary again, but
to make it shorter, Sam was able to do this. I know she is capable oI making short summaries, but she
needs to continue to practice it so it comes more naturally. It is great that she loves to add detail, but only
so much is needed in a summary and it is crucial she knows just how much.
The biggest thing Sam needs to work on are her long vowels. This was the reason I started
working with Sam in the Iirst place. Most oI the time, I would not notice her messing this up, but once it
was pointed out, I knew what my teacher was saying was correct. When I asked my teacher more about
this, she showed me a spelling test Sam did at the beginning oI the year that was suppose to test what
types oI words students knew. Sam got most oI the words wrong that had long vowels in them such as
'spoil and 'noise. I was interested to Iind out more about what my teacher meant, so I conducted a
short assessment oI my own. When I was conIerencing with Sam one day I asked her to spell spoil and
noise again. At Iirst she spelled noise as 'nois, but she soon realized that it was wrong and selI-
corrected. Even though she got this word correct, she had a little more trouble with the word spoil. Sam
spelled it 'spoul. Sam might not have known how to spell it, but she did know that it was spelled wrong.
When I was looking through her writings, I noticed a long vowel problem a Iew more times. The word I
witnessed being spelled wrong the most was 'ride. Instead oI spelling it 'ride, Sam decided to spell it
'rid. I think this is because she does not know about how the e at the end oI a word, makes the i long.
In conclusion, I really enjoyed my time working with Sam. It was nice getting to know her better.
I learned that although students are good at reading there is always something more that they can work on
to become even better readers. I think one oI the most important things I learned was how to conduct a
running record. I think this type oI assessment can be very beneIicial to how well I am able to help
students. Knowing how to do this, has had an eIIect on me. One oI the subjects I teach at the tutoring
center I am employed at is reading. Part oI my job is to have students orally read to me. We never do a
running record, but aIter learning about what they are, I have been thinking about what it would be like iI
I were to do this as part oI my job. I think it is important to use multiple measures oI assessment because
it gives the teacher a more well-rounded view oI the student. One type oI assessment can only tell the
teacher so much about the student. ThereIore, the more types oI assessment the teacher uses, the more the
teacher will know about the students. II I could do this over, I think it would have been interesting to do
this project and then work with my student one-on-one to try and help them improve in the areas I saw I
need Ior growth.







Individual Child Project
CI 475
October 2011