Running head: THE ART OF LITERACY

The Art of Literacy Through the DIBELS Assessment

Theresa Walker
EDU 325

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The Art of Literacy Through the DIBELS Assessment

Jack is a six year old, 1st grader, who comes from a family of five, and has a dog
named Dusty. This suburban school, Springville Elementary, has a focus on reading and
math. Jack ranged in the 95th percentile for math, while reading and spelling were in the
lower 60th percentiles compared to his classmates at Springville Elementary. Therefore,
Jack lacked the motivation to improve his literacy abilities because he did not think that
he would ever succeed in this area. He often would shut down and pull away when
challenged with a more difficult assignment. While discussing Jacks relationship within
the classroom, his teacher shared his lack of motivation, yet also his inability to
comprehend written language. Jacks teacher also explained that if Jack applied himself
in a more thoughtful way when it came to school, he would excel in learning. His teacher
discussed that Jack would often become distracted easily and he preferred to be with his
friends, rather than in school. However, while getting to know Jack before giving him the
Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills (DIBELS) assessment, it was realized
that he has other passions such as hunting with his dad, skateboarding, and artwork.
Therefore, collaboration skills were discussed with the teacher about motivation
techniques that will engage Jack within the lesson.
A strategy that could be incorporated to help him become motivated is setting up an
individualized, token reinforcement strategy, when he does something well the teacher
will give him a token. If he receives a certain amount of tokens, he can trade them in for a
prize. This strategy will enhance his motivation and his efficiency in other assignments.
Although Jack is found to often times be less motivated than others, his behavior is not a
problem and can be changed by replacing problem behavior with positive behavior. Jack

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enjoys his classmates and loves gym time because he can be with his friends in a less
structured period of time. He is often very sure of himself and can make decisions upon
what he likes and dislikes. Jacks parents hope that he can be successful in life and to
have the motivation to succeed in his schooling. Jacks parents hope that he will go to
college when he grows up and have a successful career doing what he loves to do. By
having this background, Jack has the support he needs to excel in his learning and to
provide successful learning outcomes.
Procedures
For the project, I called Springville elementary inquiring about using a student for this
project where I could get to know the student and give him or her the DIBELS
assessment. I was able to speak to the 1st grade teacher and she allowed me to come to her
classroom and use Jack, a clever 1st grader, to do this assessment. While speaking with
the 1st grade teacher, I asked questions to identify Jacks strengths and weaknesses in the
classroom. While I began preparing my materials to assess Jack, I was overwhelmed with
anticipation as I walked down the hall to pick him up. On the day of the assessment, I
introduced myself to Jack and I realized what a clever, yet unmotivated student he was
and how his lack of motivation negatively affects his learning outcomes. However, I had
the opportunity to sit down and talk to Jack and get to know him personally. I
administered the assessment and gathered the data that I needed in order to target areas of
improvement, and more importantly identify areas of strength. I explained to Jack the
assessments that I was going to administer and I explained to him the reinforcement
strategy that I would use during the assessments. I explained that each test he completed
would earn him a star sticker. Once he received five stars, I had him pick a prize from the

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selection and it was given to him. By setting his goal before the assessments started, Jack
was able to work for a reward. In between each assessment, I allowed three minutes to
play with the silly putty that I brought or the bouncy ball. The breaks kept Jack focused
during the assessments. Jack responded very well to these reinforcements and was able to
stay on task throughout each test.
Assessments Given
The DIBELS assessments are a set of measurable procedures and skills for assessing
early literacy progress for students who are in kindergarten through sixth grade (Good &
Kaminski, 2007). One-minute probe tests are used to assess the student, yet also helps to
monitor the students progress throughout the school year (Good & Kaminski, 2007).
While assessing Jack, the Letter Naming Fluency (LNF), Phoneme Segmentation Fluency
(PSF), Nonsense Word Fluency (NWF), Oral Reading Fluency (ORF), Retell Fluency
(RF), and the Word Use Fluency (WUF) tests were given.
The LNF is an assessment that lists multiple uppercase and lowercase letters and
requires the student to identify as many letters as he can until the timer stops. This
assessment is normally given from fall of kindergarten to the fall of first grade (Good &
Kaminski, 2002). Yet, this section was administered to Jack in order to distinguish his
level of phonemic and phonological awareness. Next, the PSF assessment tests the
students phonological awareness level (Good & Kaminski, 2002). The assessment begins
by the administrator saying a word and having the student say all the sounds in the word.
While the student says each sound of each word, the teacher scores the number of sounds
student produces correctly and calculates the total amount of sounds heard per row (Good
& Kaminski, 2007). The PSF test is an optional assessment for first grade. By giving this

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assessment, it is important to identify how students are able to practice segmenting

sounds to produce words. The next one-minute test that was given was the NWF. This test
is administered to measure knowledge of alphabetic principle (Good & Kaminski, 2002).
The students are given a list of nonsense words and are asked to say the individual sounds
of each word or say the word as a whole (Good & Kaminski, 2007). This test is important
for students because fluency and the students ability to decode sounds in words is
essential in literacy. The ORF assessment is the next test in DIBELS. ORF is given to
measure accuracy and fluency with connected text (Good & Kaminski, 2002). This test
allows the administrator to identify children who may need additional instructional
support and monitor progress toward instructional goals (Good & Kaminski, 2007).
While assessing the students using the ORF assessment, the administrator is able to
identify the students reading level and is able to identify the specific supports the
students needs. Starting the ORF test, a short story is given to the student and the
administrator tells the student when to stop and when to begin reading aloud (Good &
Kaminski, 2007). The administrator records how many words were read and what errors
the student makes. After the one minute ends, the student stops and explains what the
student had just read using the RT assessment. If the student had difficulties arranging his
thoughts, prompts are given to help him. During the retell, the administrator records how
many words the student uses during his retelling of the details of the passage (Good &
Kaminski, 2007). This test is beneficial to distinguish the students comprehension level.
Good and Kaminski (2002) explain four purposes for the RF assessment: to prevent
accidental learning, identify children who lack comprehension skills, link core
components to the NRP report, and increase the validity of the ORF assessment. The final

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test that was given was the WUF. During this test, the students are given the opportunity
to hear a word and verbally use it in a sentence. Each word that was used, per selected
word given, was recorded (Good & Kaminski, 2007). The WUF test is given to provide
information regarding literacy and the students learning levels of literacy(Good &
Kaminski, 2002).
Results & Analysis
Jack received a 55 on LNF which is above the 38 core benchmark for the beginning of
the fall. Jack was able to feel his confidence level rise after completing the LNF probe
and went into the other sections with a motivating attitude. The following test that was
given was the PSF test. This assessment is not endorsed for first graders, however Jack
received a 30 on this section, which was scored on the kindergarten benchmark,
indicating him in the strategic level (Benchmark Goals, 2014). Jack was challenged
because he combined sounds and did not separate the different phonemic sounds.
Therefore, by identifying this information, it was recorded that the error pattern through
this test was the blending of the different sounds as well as not being able to distinguish
the difference between the separate sounds of phonemes. Relative to NWF, Jack received
a score of 49 for the correct letter sounds (CLS) and a 13 for words recorded correctly
(WRC). Throughout the NWF section, Jack received a strategic score for both the CLS
and WRC sections, for the middle of the year (Benchmark Goals, 2014). Jack received an
average of 25 on the three probes of the ORF assessment which is a core ranking during
the middle of the year for first graders. The learning outcomes of this test provides
beneficial information that explains that Jack is able to read fluently and in a core scoring
level. This information explains that Jack is on an enhancing level towards success with

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fluency and oral reading, meaning Jack would continue to benefit from core reading
instruction in general education classroom. During the RF test, Jack scored a 10, which
means he used 10 words to discuss what he had read in the passage. By scoring a 10 on
the RF assessment, this suggests that Jack struggles with comprehension and that he is in
the intensive scoring level. Strategies for Jack to be able to enhance comprehension need
to be implemented into his daily routine in the classroom. Finally, when given the WUF,
Jack was able to create sentences using the provided words. Jack scored in the strategic
level by receiving a total of 37 words that were used during the one-minute WUF test
(Benchmark Goals, 2014).
Using Jacks strengths to determine strategies for engagement and improvement, it
was clarified that phonological awareness and comprehension were his two weaknesses.
Therefore, through this study, my goal was to gather data from the DIBELS assessment,
yet also display strategies that could potentially improve Jacks motivation, along with his
phonological awareness and comprehension within the classroom.
Areas Targeted for Improvement
It was concluded that Jack was able to perform well in many areas of the DIBELS test,
especially LNF, NWF, ORF, and WUF. However, PSF was discovered to be a challenge
and comprehension within the RF assessment exemplified difficulties of Jacks
understanding and word processing. Therefore, this part of the study discusses strategies
that could be use for Jack to enhance his phonological awareness and his comprehension
level.
Phonological Awareness. While analyzing Jacks PSF outcomes, Jack is at the
strategic level for a kindergarten student, although Jack is in first grade. Teachers have to

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acknowledge that each student learns differently and that teachers should be able to
differentiate instruction to assist each students instructional needs. In order to teach
phonological awareness more effectively to Jack, phonemic awareness needs to be
established before moving on to phonological awareness. Phonemic awareness is the
ability to use phonemes, the smallest unit of sound, in a spoken word (Antonacci &
O'Callaghan, 2012). Antonacci & O'Callaghan (2012) discuss a strategy called rhyme
generation to develop explicit phonemic awareness skills. These skills enable the students
to practice identifying the onset and rime of words to enhance their phonemic awareness
and manipulations of phonemes (Antonacci & O'Callaghan, 2012). Antonacci &
O'Callaghan (2012) explain the five steps of this strategy. The first step is for the teacher
to introduce the rhyme generation to the students by defining the concept of it and giving
examples. Step two involves presenting rhymes in the context that the teacher will be
instructing the student, examples of this would be a poem or a song. The next step is
demonstrating how to manipulate the onset and rime by using visuals such as a word
ladder graphic. The fourth step involves recording rhymes generated from the poem or
song and allow the students to create new words or sentences. The final step is to
facilitate students application of the rhyme generation by using the students own name
and creating a list of rhymes (Antonacci & O'Callaghan, 2012). This strategy can be used
in a whole class instruction, small group instruction, or individually, while the teacher
assesses each students participation by using a checklist for monitoring progress. The
teacher can also differentiate the instruction for students with a learning disability by
using multisensory materials to enhance instruction (Antonacci & O'Callaghan, 2012).
After establishing phonemic awareness, phonological awareness instruction is also an

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essential part in the academic development of a child. Activities can be incorporated into
a lesson to engage the students in a fun, yet educational way. In their article, Chard and
Dickson (1999) explain instructional activities that would be beneficial to Jack and his
education. One such method that Chard & Dickson (1999) portray is the guess-theword game where students will have the opportunity to blend and identify a word that is
stretched out into its individual sounds. Picture cards are needed and each card is placed
in front of the students. The administrator will say a word very slowly, sounding out each
phoneme. While observing the pictures, the student will then choose which picture the
teacher is sounding out (Chard & Dickson, 1999). This strategy is an instructional activity
that teaches students to synthesize phonemes into words (Chard & Dickson, 1999). Each
student will have the opportunity to take a turn identifying the picture. Through this
strategy, the teacher will be able to monitor progress by keeping anecdotal notes on each
child.
Comprehension. Jack is able to read a story, however comprehension is an area of
literacy that appears to be challenging and can be improved tremendously, given the
correct strategies. Garner and Bochna (2004) open their article with a discussion about
how the meaning of a text is one of the fundamental components of successful reading.
Therefore, educators should be striving to enhance the classroom as a whole, in order to
teach fundamental skills and strategies in literacy, especially comprehension. A
procedural activity that could have taken place to enhance Jacks comprehension is to
provide listening comprehension. Listening comprehension consists of listening to a story
being read with the intention of remembering it. During reading, an activity that could be
incorporated is the Say Something strategy (Beers, 2002). This strategy engages the

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student within the text by reading the text aloud with a small group and taking turns with
the paragraphs. As the students continue to read, each student will have the opportunity to
pause to say something about what he or she is reading (Beers, 2002). This will clarify
confusion and open up discussion on the selected text. This promotes listening
comprehension because each student will have the opportunity to say something about
the text. Yet, it also gives each student a chance to listen to what the other students have
to say about the text in order to comprehend what each student is thinking as they predict,
question, clarify, connect, and comment (Beers, 2002). The teacher will first model the
strategy, then proceed to explain the procedures to the students and divide the students
into small groups. Each student is then responsible to make predictions, ask a question,
clarify a confusion, connect an idea, or make a comment about the reading. Then the
other students within the group have to offer a response to what was said. Students should
practice this strategy on smaller and grade level texts (Beers, 2002).
Mills and Hogan (2009) summarize in their article how strategies for comprehension
are an essential element in the classroom. Comprehension is discussed at every level of
instruction and will continue to be an essential role in literacy. During comprehension
instruction, each student has to activate their prior knowledge and apply it to the
instruction. A pre-reading strategy that could be implemented is the Probable Passage
strategy (Beers, 2002). This strategy allows the student to create a brief summary of the
article before reading (Beers, 2002). During this strategy, the teacher presents words from
the article that allows the student to predict what they think will happen. The main points
that are focused on are the characters, outcomes, setting, and the problem that
are present (Beers, 2002). The teacher will choose a small group of words, model the

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strategy a couple times, then have the students implement it themselves. Separated into
partners, each pair will receive a group of words and will be able to verbally discuss to
the teacher what they think the story is about by looking at the characters, outcomes,
setting, and the problem within the story (Beers, 2002). This will promote students
thinking comprehension and verbal expression of a text. Both of these comprehension
strategies will be monitored through a checklist created by the teacher to observe and
assess each student is participating.
Conclusion
Looking over the DIBELS assessment, I had realized that the daunting feeling I had
received in the beginning was no longer there. While giving the assessment, my love for
teaching came through. I realized that if I could continue to instruct Jack and continue to
be with him for the rest of the year, I would be able to incorporate strategies to increase
his phonological awareness and comprehension. Being able to differentiate instruction is
an increasingly important component that every educator should be able to integrate into
the classroom. Being able to give the assessment, calculate the results, and provide
potential solutions to the challenges helped me to realize the task that we have as
educators, to provide increasingly important instruction and to meet each student where
they are at academically and socially. This provides a safe environment where each
student will have the opportunity to excel and learn to the best of their ability.

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Bibliography

Antonacci, P. A. & O'Callaghan, C. M. (2012). Essential strategies for teaching phonemic

awareness. Promoting literacy development: 50 research-based strategies for K8
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Beers, K. (2002). When kids cant read - what teachers can do. Portsmouth, NH:
Heinemann Educational Books.
Chard, D. & Dickson, S., (1999). Phonological awareness: Instruction and assessment
guidelines. Intervention in School and Clinic, 34(5).
DIBELS 6th edition benchmark goals. (2014). Eugene, OR: University of Oregon, Center
on Teaching and Learning. Available http://dibels.uoregon.edu/
Garner, J. K. & Bochna, C. R., (2004). Transfer of a listening comprehension strategy to
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Good, R. H., & Kaminski, R. A. (Eds.). (2002). Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early
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Literacy Skills (6th ed.). Eugene, OR: Institute for the Development of Educational
Achievement. Available http://dibels.uoregon.edu/.
Mills, L. & Hogan, J. (2009). Effective comprehension instruction at the pre-service
level. Journal of College Teaching and Learning, 6(7). 63-69.