[senco-forum] Reading Comprehension Assessment

so u will not know if comprehension errors

Jean,

Very wise words from you, I think!

--- On Wed, 7/5/08, Jean Hutchins 1 <jeanhutchins1 at ntlworld.com> wrote:

 In that case u do not hear the individuals read the text,
> so u will not know if comprehension errors
> are due to inaccurate reading or to lack of understanding.
> 
>Snip
> 
> It would be interesting if someone could use
> NFER group and Neale with the same pupils
> and compare the scores.
> 
> Jean
>-------

If it is indeed the NFER Group Reading (Sentence Completion) test which Barbara referred to I wold have the same reservations.  It is impossible to tell from the result whether the child's score is influenced by their inability to read what the words actually 'say', or that they don't know what the words 'mean'.  Or, by some lucky guesses.

Out of interest I gave the test orally to a Y8 child who is having big problems learning to read.  He has failed to reach the base score on the 2 occasions that he has been tested since entry in Y7.  When I read the sentences to him (not, I hasten to add on the test that he usually takes, but on the other test) he scored a reading age of 14y 4m, without any recourse to guessing what the words might mean.  His oral comprehension skills are excellent; word reading skills, rock bottom (though we're working on that!)

As we test children with this test 4 times over KS3 it is easy to see that some children are very shaky on either word attack or vocabulary skills when they answer questions wrongly that they have answered 'correctly' previously.  If they were secure with both there wouldn't be such a variation.  I wouldn't trust this test to give a true picture of where they are 'at' if they fall into a 'bottom middle' to 'lower' band of scores.

Maggie

      __________________________________________________________
Sent from Yahoo! Mail.
A Smarter Email http://uk.docs.yahoo.com/nowyoucan.html