Struggling Readers/ How can we determine the level of intervention needed?

Submitted by Janet Kester on Thu, 04/13/2017 - 09:45
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I am trying to find an effective way to determine what kind of intervention an adult learner needs if they are struggling with reading.  

In my experience, there are four general levels of need: 1) those who need to start with phonemic awareness instruction; 2) those who need a thorough curriculum that gives direct, explicit instruction on reading and spelling (such as students with dyslexia); 3) others who need to learn these principles but can move along at a faster rate (needing a less intensive curriculum); and 4), those who mainly need vocabulary work along with some reading comprehension strategies.

I am searching for an assessment that will help me better distinguish between groups 2 and 3. Do you all have any recommendations?

Comments

Janet, thanks for asking. Knowing what a student needs is certainly a first step in planning instruction. I am not a great proponent of determining needs based on assessments. Even if we don't call them tests, students perceive them as such and can easily fail to connect to instruction. Yet, there are very simple assessments, such a the Fry Oral Reading Test, where learners simply start reading words. In that assessment, students read the underlined words aloud, and continue until they make five or more errors in a group of 25 words. This indicates a frustration level, and instruction should begin on the previous list. I've used this list successfully with adults. You can review a GUIDE to this practice with Fry word lists readily available on the Web.

Rather, than using assessments, I am a strong supporter of interviewing learners to get to know them better on a one-to-one basis. Having them read a list of words or a short passage during an interview would be very appropriate, in my view. In the process, the interviewer could notice reading challenges.

1. If decoding is a problem, phonics is the place to start although some basic phonemic and phonological awareness might need to be developed. Among adults, I've usually just gotten into phonics instruction. Of course, sight words can be added to sentences that call for them!
2. If the learner is reading by not retaining the content or is unable to respond to simply comprehension questions, he is not connecting or relating to the reading. Maybe he has never been asked to interpret anything in writing.  Activities like having students observe what happened on the way to school or other event and retelling it often help. In fact, taking down the "story" as dictation, you can then apply the Language Experience method, which is super! Of course, "neurological" challenges might be involved, and direct, explicit, and predictable instruction is called for.
3. If vocabulary is the issue, there are many ways to build that using the many academic word lists and games that are out there for learning. Since phonics and vocabulary training can easily become boring, it is recommended that it be kept short, sweet, and fun.

Others and I have had enormous success using the Neurological Impress Method. I have used this with adults although most studies reported of successes were conducted among younger students. Results from studies among struggling readers in schools show huge reading improvement over just a few weeks of practice. Essential to the method are the following elements:

1. Choose an interesting passage that is just slightly above (not much above and not below).
2. Read at a normal pace but not fast. Run your finger smoothly along the words as you read.
3. The students reads with you, following your finger and voice. (If he can't the passage is too difficult.) Every once in awhile, let your voice get lower and lower until the student takes over. If he begins to falter, bring in your voice again. Never correct. Don't test the student's comprehension. Just read. Period.  Keep it short but keep it up over a period of time. Following are a couple of links to short descriptions.

I hope others jump in with helpful comments in response to your inquiry! Leecy

Hi Leecy:

Thank you for sharing the Fry Oral Reading Test and Neurological Impress Method with us.  You reminded me that there are collaborative and student centered approaches to conducting formative and diagnostic assessments that minimize anxieties that students experience.    Many thank yous... Dane 

I'm wondering if the tools on the Assessment Strategies and Reading Profiles site would be useful, too. There are free reading assessments there for adult students in phonemic awareness, vocabulary, decoding, and fluency. https://lincs.ed.gov/readingprofiles/index.htm 

Di,

Yes, the ASRP resources are quite helpful. Thanks for the recommendation! Perhaps I can find a way to correlate student profiles with our student learning plans and rates of success over time. I know it would be helpful to have a data-driven way to help the assessment team determine which students would likely do best with the accelerated approach and which students need to take more time with their learning. Thanks for your comment! Janet

Janet, just a note on how data-driven ways can be useful. Like it or not, funders look for data even though that information may not reflect the progress and needs of our learners! I commend you for compiling info "to correlate student profiles with our student learning plans and rates of success over time. What do others think? Leecy