Stephani Britt

Literacy Profile Report

Introduction
My name is Stephani Britt, and I am a senior at the University of Tennessee at
Chattanooga. I am currently enrolled in a literacy class that has allowed me to study,
create, and administer reading assessments as a way to learn more about and understand
how different assessments work. I chose to work with and administer my original reading
assessments to Suzie, a 9th grade student at CSAS. My cooperating teacher identified her
early on as a good student to work with on this project.
While working with Suzie, I created and administered four assessments: an
Interest Inventory, a Reading Performance Assessment, a Reading Comprehension ThinkAloud, and an Informal Reading Assessment, all of which I will discuss is this report.
With these I have not only gained a better understanding of reading assessment myself,
but I have been able to use the results of Suzies work to understand her literacy
development, comprehension, and ways that she can improve and challenge herself as a
reader. I hope these assessments give you some insight into ways that you can help Suzie
as she grows as a reader.
Interest Inventory Findings
This assessment was given first to give me a better idea of Suzies interests and
disinterests when it comes to reading. The short, five question assessment was given on
paper, and she wrote her responses for me. With the results of the inventory I was able to
create my assessments based on her likes in an attempt to make them a bit more
interesting.

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The results of the interest inventory showed me that Suzie is interested in History,
and she enjoys reading if the content is interesting to her. When asked what she does with
an assigned text that she doesnt want to read, she responded that she listens to an
audiobook or skims over the text for important information without having to read the
whole thing. I asked about one text that impacted her the most and she explained that
Unbroken is the most interesting book she has read lately; it interested her in History
even more. She mostly reads posts on social media outside of school reading, usually
article about current events or athletes. Overall, the inventory showed me that Suzie
doesnt mind reading, but doesnt do it too often outside of school.
Reading Performance Assessment Findings
This was the second assessment I administered. For the Reading Performance
Assessment, I chose the free verse poem Theme for English B by Langston Hughes. I
used her interest in history and current events to choose texts with historical themes and
relevance today. Because it is a poem, leveling it was difficult, but I felt that it was
appropriate for a 9th grade student based on the themes. It also seemed to be easier to
annotate and answer questions about because poems require more close reading than
basic prose.
I began by explaining the process to her, the kind of information it would give me,
and I gave her the option to read to herself; she chose to read the poem silently. The
assessment began by asking about her prior knowledge of Langston Hughes and having
her predict what the poem might be about by looking at the title and using critical
thinking skills. She had never read anything by the author, but she had heard of him, and
her prediction was that the poem would teach a lesson through an obvious theme.

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As she read, she annotated and asked questions about what she was reading. She
answered the questions at the end, which asked her to summarize the poem in her own
words. I also asked her to determine if any of her questions were answered later in the
poem, and she explained that they were, along with connecting the poem back to her
prediction about the title.
Overall, Suzie did well on this assessment. Without prior knowledge of the author,
she managed to grasp the concept of the poem through her close reading. She made
personal connections to the text and asked a couple of good questions. The text proved to
be suitable for her, as she read slowly and closely to comprehend the poem. Her
annotations showed that she was able to connect the text to herself and beyond, which is
similar to the way she answered the IRI comprehension questions. She could, however,
practice explaining her annotations a bit better. She marked quite a bit on the poem itself
and picked out important lines, but she failed to explain why she felt they were important.
I would work with her on this by modeling multiple annotation strategies.
Informal Reading Inventory (IRI) Process Findings
In preparing for the IRI process, I kept Suzies interest in history in mind, as well
as her remarks about enjoying the Hughes poem on the reading performance assessment.
I selected texts that held both a historical significance and related to the Hughes poem. I
decided to center these assessments around Martin Luther King Jr.s I Have a Dream
speech. The excerpt from the speech that I chose became my grade-level text. I also chose
an excerpt from To Kill a Mockingbird as a below grade-level text, and an excerpt from
Maya Angelous I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings as my above grade-level text.

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I first gave Suzie the exerpt from To Kill a Mockingbird because it was the lowest
leveled text at a 7.5 Flesch-Kincaid. I explained the IRI process, how it would help me
determine her reading abilities, and that there was no pressure to do any of it perfectly.
I then had her read aloud, which she wasnt thrilled about, but complied without much
coaxing. Her results for this passage were:
# of Words

Total Read
Time

Fluency

212

1 min. 7 sec.

177 words
per min.

Number/typ
e of Errors

Text
Accuracy
(%)
98%

2
1 missed
word and 1
hesitation
She answered the comprehension questions correctly, including an inference question that
required a bit of background knowledge.
The grade-level passage, the excerpt from the Martin Luther King Jr. speech, was
interesting to her, as she already knew that it was a historical speech of some sort. It was
a shorter passage, but she read it with incredibly fluency. The passage was leveled at a
10.0 grade level, but I decided that the vocabulary and overall syntax were appropriate
for 9th grade. The results are as follows:
# of Words

Total Read
Time

177

1 min.

Fluency

Number/typ
e of Errors

Text
Accuracy
(%)
97%

177 words
1, a
per min.
hesitation
She answered all of those comprehension questions correctly as well, and even added a
bit about Abraham Lincoln in relation to the Emancipation Proclamation. She was also
able to identify the speaker, MLK, while I asked questions to guide her thinking.
The final passage, from I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, was the highest
leveled passage, with a 14.2 Flesch-Kincaid. The vocabulary in this passage made it a bit

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more complicated, coupled with the background knowledge required to understand some
of it. Suzie read it slower than the first two passages, but just as well.
# of Words

Total Read
Time

Fluency

194

1 min. 9 sec.

166 words
per min.

Number/typ
e of Errors

Text
Accuracy
(%)
98%

2,
hesitations at
unfamiliar
words
She did well on the comprehension questions, as she answered them all correctly. She
didnt add as much extra information to her answers on this passage, but overall
comprehended it very well.
The IRI process proved that Suzie can read independently at and above grade
level. When reading aloud, her fluency was consistent across all of the passages, and her
comprehension was 100% on every passage. I believe that Suzie could easily read more
11th and 12th grade level texts to challenge herself, and she showed that she was capable
of comprehending the higher level texts as well. She gave detailed answers for each
passage, identifying things that I hadnt necessarily asked about and required prior
knowledge to answer. She was only stumped when it came to vocabulary.
Reading Comprehension Think-Aloud Findings
This was the final assessment that I gave, and again, I chose a poem. Poems are
typically easier to annotate in detail, and annotation was my focus on this assessment. I
chose Sympathy by Paul Laurence Dunbar; this poem has similar themes to the other
texts, but it seemed to be leveled a bit higher than the Hughes poem.
I used the first stanza of the poem to conduct a think-aloud and model detailed
annotation. I made sure to not only mark the poem, but to write exactly what I was
thinking and questions as I read rather than one or two words like she had done on the

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Performance Assessment. I then turned the last two stanzas over to Suzie and talked her
through the second one. I didnt have to guide her much; she really only needed to be
prompted to explain some of her statements. She did well on the final stanza. She asked
good questions, was able to answer one of her own questions, and she explained her
thoughts very well.
Suzie comprehends texts very well, as seen in the previous assessments. The
Reading Think-Aloud proved that she can read closely and interact with a text
independently; her ability to ask questions about the text and answer them on her own
while reading shows that she comprehends what she reads.
Recommendations
I would recommend that Suzie challenge herself with more complex, above
grade-level texts. She reads with great fluency, and her comprehension is good. I would,
however, work with her on annotation. As Mortimer Adler states in How to Mark a Book
(1940), reading must be active (p. 40). I would teach text coding in this case, and
encourage her to interact with the text through a set of codes for questions, connections,
and thoughts as she reads. Adler (1940) provides other examples of annotation in his
short article, including his form of text coding, writing in margins, and circling important
words or phrases (p. 41). A combination of these would greatly help Suzie.
I also noticed her hesitation with unfamiliar vocabulary words in the IRI process.
While they didnt fully hinder her comprehension this time, vocabulary instruction is a
key component of developing engaged and successful readers (Bromley, 2007, p. 528).
With this, I would simply ensure that she has explicit vocabulary instruction when
reading challenging texts (Daniels and Zemelman, 2014, p. 302), or I would model

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vocabulary strategies, such as analyzing words parts and using context to infer a meaning
(Bromley, 2007, p. 533), that she can use on her own to build vocabulary knowledge.
Based on the results of her reading assessments, I recommend challenging texts
that might pique her interest in history even more. Between Shades of Gray by Ruta
Sepetys is a novel about the Russian invasion of Lithuania as told by the 15-year-old
main character and narrator. I would also recommend The Book Thief by Markus Zusak,
which is another WWII novel told from a different perspective than Unbroken. All Quiet
on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque is my final suggestion; this WWI novel
provides an interesting perspective on the first World War.
Reflection and Conclusion
I feel much more comfortable assessing a students reading comprehension and
level after completing this project. If I could change anything, I would tweak my text
choices. I had some freedom with my texts for Suzie because I discovered early on
through observing her in English class that she is an above-average reader. This
experience would have gone differently if I had worked with a struggling reader, so I
would definitely have to give my texts a bit more consideration. Overall, the process of
creating, administering, and analyzing reading assessments went smoothly. It gave me
even more experience in choosing appropriate texts, and I can more clearly see how each
aspect of literacy (annotation, vocabulary, reading aloud, comprehension, etc.) feeds into
the others. Lack of vocabulary instruction can inhibit comprehension, for example.
Seeing an example of this in a student was extremely helpful for me.

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REFERENCES
Adler, Mortimer. (1940). How to Mark a Book. Retrieved from https://utclearn.utc.edu/bb
cswebdav/pid-420372-dt-content-rid2047813_1/courses/FA16.EDUC3210.47447/
Adler_mark_a_book.pdf
Bromley, Karen. (2007). Nine things every teacher should know about words and
vocabulary instruction. International Reading Association, 50(7), 528-537. doi:
10.1598/JAAL.50.7.2
Daniels, Harvey, & Zemelman, Steven. (2014). Recommendations from Reading
Research. In Adams, Patty & Antao, Tobey (Eds.), Subjects Matter (291-304).
Portsmouth, New Hampshire: Heinemann.