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Jenna Clark
Professor Horst
READ.366.0003
8 November 2016
Literacy Assessment
Brief Background
The child I used for the literacy assessments name is Kate
(name changed for confidentiality purposes). Kate is five years old and
goes to Deerfield Elementary School in Virginia (school name changed
for confidentiality purposes). She is in a Kindergarten class with
seventeen other children, and she attended Pre-Kindergarten. Kate is a
very curious student and always is eager to learn. She currently is in
the middle reading group, but her teacher think she will be moved up
to the high reading group after the next set of evaluations.
The literacy assessment portfolio is a series of assessments with
an emergent or beginning reader. The assessments include a
phonological awareness assessment, writing samples, and a retelling
assessment. A spelling assessment called Word Journeys would have
been added, but Kate has not developed enough in her spelling
abilities to complete the task; which is okay given she is only in
Kindergarten. The purpose of this assignment is to gather information,
look at the information collected, and to come up with literacy diet that
is appropriate for Kate and her continued instruction.
Phonological Awareness Assessment
The phonological awareness assessment has ten different skills
that are assessed. As Kate was assessed, she was very relaxed and
seemed liked she did not mind being taken away from computer time.
My cooperating teacher was also doing some assessments with other
students, so it was not out of the ordinary to be assessed during
computer time.
The first skill is alphabet recognition with uppercase letters.
There were 26 letters in no specific pattern for Kate to identify. Kate
identified 25 out of the 26 uppercase letters. She missed the
uppercase R letter. She has a very good concept of what the uppercase
letters look like.
The second skill that was assessed was alphabet recognition with
lowercase letters. There were 28 lowercase letters and Kate recognized
23 out of the 28 letters that were offered. Kate missed the letters p, w,
v, u, and b. When Kate missed the letter p she said it was q instead.
This is something I see a lot of her peers doing as well. Children also
sometime confuse bs and ds. Kate still has a good grasp on the
majority of lower case letters.
The third skill was letter sound identification. The teacher asked
Kate to say the sound the letter made as she pointed to each letter.

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There were 30 letters. Kate received a 21 out of 30 on this section. She
missed the sounds u, v, c, x, z, w, q, th, and wh made. She was still
working on letter recognition and putting them together with the
sounds. Throughout the time I have been in the practicum setting since
this assessment took place (took place October 26, 2016), she has
improved with putting letters and sounds together.
The fourth skill was rhyming recognition. The teacher would say
two different words and Kate would respond with a yes or no to if they
rhymed. There were 10 possible points in this section and Kate scored
a 10 out of 10. Kate has a good concept of words that rhyme.
The fifth skill was onset fluency isolating the initial phoneme.
This means the teacher would say a word and Kate would respond with
the first sound she heard in each word. There were 10 questions in this
section and Kate scored a perfect 10 out of 10. Her perfect score shows
that she can pick out the beginning sound of different words.
The sixth skill was blending compound words and syllables. The
teacher would give two words and Kate had to put them together to
make one work. There were ten possible points in this section, and
Kate scored a 10 out of 10. Kate was able to put the two different
words together in order to make compound words. She was aware that
the words could be put together to make one word.
The seventh skill was segmenting words into compound words
and syllables. This means the teacher would give a compound word
and Kate would then break the word up into two different words. This
section had 10 possible correct answers and Kate scored a 10 out of
10. Kate was able to hear a compound word and break it up into two
words without any problems.
The eighth skill was identifying final sounds in words. This means
the teacher would say a word, and Kate would say the last sound she
heard in each word. There were 10 possible correct answers, and Kate
scored a perfect 10 out of 10. Kate was able to hear a word and tell me
the sound it ended with. She did ask the teacher to repeat the words
for two of them, but got the answers right.
The ninth skill was locating a word on a printed page within text.
The teacher wrote Kates real name on the piece of paper within a
sentence and Kate had to pick it out. She was successful. This means
she can distinguish her name within a text.
The final skill was distinguishing letters from numbers. The
teacher would point at 10 letter or numbers on the paper, and Kate
would respond if it were a letter or a number. There were 10 possible
correct answers, and Kate received all 10 points on this section. This
shows that she could recognize the difference between numbers and
letters.
In regards to the print concept part of the phonological
awareness assessment, Kate could do all the tasks that the teacher
asked about. She could demonstrate how to hold a book with correct

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orientation. She could distinguish pictures from words by pointing
when prompted. She could locate where on a printed page to start
reading with multiple lines of text. She could demonstrate that the left
page of the book is read before the right page of the book. Kate
tracked text with a finger on a printed page from left to right. She
pointed to individual words using one-to-one correspondence. Kate
isolated words within printed text. Kate could locate a word on a
printed page within the text, such as her name. She could distinguish
letters from numbers on a printed page by pointing. Kate could listen
to a spoken sentences and state individual words in the sentence.
Overall, Kate has very good phonological awareness. She still needs
practice on letter recognition and pairing sounds with letters. Kate is
still in the very early stages of phonological development. With
practice and time, she will master these concepts.
Writing
For the writing sample the teacher used journal time to talk to
Kate. The journal of the day was to draw something that was green.
The teacher asked Kate to draw and write about something that was
green. Kate chose grass, or as she spelled it gras. She said,
Something that is green is grass. While the teacher observed Kate
working during journal time she notices that Kate worked very slow,
but was very focused. She did not talk to other children around her
when she was doing her work. She only got distracted when someone
called her name from across the classroom, but quickly got back on
task.
The teacher also asked her to go through her journal and read
some things that she had written about in the previous classes during
journal time. She chose what she liked to do at school. She responded,
I like to play on the playground. She wrote PGD. This shows the
teacher that Kate is still working on writing what the word sounds like.
She understands the main sounds certain letters make, but is not
completely aware of all the other letters that make up the whole word.
Retelling
The story retelling assessment was where the instructor read the
story of The Three Billy Goats Gruff, at least once. In this case, the
instructor read it twice. The instructor talks about the pictures and
what happened in the story with Kate. The instructor then asked Kate
to use the story puppet figures to retell the story. Kate used her
memory to retell the story the instructor had read and had talked
about with her. Kate was assessed using a zero to three grading scale
for five sections. The grading scale had zero being inaccurate, one
being fragmentary, two being partial, and three being detailed. Kate
received scores for telling about setting and characters (how, where,
and who), the story problem, the sequence of major events that

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included episodes 1-3, the resolution, and the reaction of characters or
ending.
The retelling literacy assessment took place in the computer lab
during free choice time. The instructor asked Kate to come read a book
at the middle table. When Kate saw the book she excitedly said, Ive
read this book before! I have it at home. The instructor asked when
the last time she read the book was, and learned that it had been a
long time ago. The instructor continued by reading the book to Kate
and pausing to talk about certain pictures and events that happened
throughout the story. Kate then went back to her computer and played
one game and then returned to the middle desk to read the story
again. After the instructor read the book the second time, Kate was
asked to use the story puppet figures to retell the story to the
instructor. Kate began by grabbing the three Billy goats of different
sizes and said that; There were three Billy Goats in the story, a little
one, a medium size one, and a big one. She talked about how they
were outside and wanted to go a different place over the bridge to eat
grass. They have to go over the bridge and a troll is under the
bridge, Kate said. She grabbed the bridge and placed the troll under
the bridge. Kate then went on to talk about the first episode. The little
Billy Goat went to cross the bridge and the Troll was there. He said to
wait, because his bigger brother was coming. She used the little Billy
Goat to cross the bridge, and had the Troll popped out to talk to the
Billy Goat. She then went on to episode two and started, but then
stated that she remembered the little Billy Goat made it to the other
side. She then started episode two. The medium size Billy Goat went
to cross the bridge, but was stopped by the Troll, but said that his
bigger brother was coming. The Troll let him go. She used the medium
size Billy Goat to cross the bridge, and the Troll was also there. Kate
then went on to talk about the third episode. The big Billy Goat went
to cross the bridge and the troll was there. She used the big Billy Goat
puppet. Big Billy Goat tricked the Troll. She paused. She began to talk
about the resolution; He was pushed off the bridge into water. The
instructor asked who he was and she said the Troll. Kate used the big
Billy Goat to push the troll off the bridge into the imaginary water
below. Kate then finally talked about the ending, The three Billy Goat
brothers ate grass on the other side. Kate grouped the three Billy
Goats together.
Kate performed the task of retelling the story of The Three Billy
Goats Gruff. At the beginning, she was very excited, because she knew
she was familiar with the book. When Kate was being read to and
during the beginning of the retelling she was very excited. Her
excitement seemed to disappear towards the end of the retelling. At
the end she stated she wanted to go back and play on the computer.
Kate completed the assignment. Her score on the setting and
characters received a three out of three. She included that there were

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three Billy Goat brothers, their names, and that they were outside. She
scored a three out of three on the Story problem, because she stated
that they wanted to cross the bridge to get to the grass. On episode
one to three, Kate received a two out of three. On the resolution, she
received a two out of three, because she did not state that Big Billy
had a plan to ram butt the troll off the bridge. Kate also received a two
out of three on the ending. She did not state that they could cross the
bridge whenever they wanted to eat the sweet grass. She also did not
state they the grass was delicious! Out of the fifteen points possible,
Kate scored a twelve. Kate shows strong retelling abilities.
Kate did a very good job of completing the retelling literacy
assessment. Kate showed strong retelling abilities. For further
instruction, Kate should work on looking into the details of the story.
She only missed a few key pieces. The instructor could guide her more,
by prompting her. It may also be helpful if Kate continues to work one
her reading skills (she is only in Kindergarten). As she develops her
reading skills and points to each word, she may make a better
connection to the story and what the words mean. This could be one
way she might gain the understanding of detail to become an even
stronger story reteller. The instructor should also do another retelling
assessment with her with a book that she has not read before. The
instructor could also use book that are more advanced if Kate is not
being challenged enough.
Recommendations for Teaching
Based on the assessments completed with Kate and the data
collected from the results, Kate appears to be in the emergent stage
for literacy. We should consider Kate to be in the emergent stage,
because she demonstrates alphabet knowledge, concept of word, a
sense of the beginning, middle, and end of a story, retelling abilities,
and phonemic awareness. She still struggles with reading multi-line
text and focuses a lot on pictures that connect to the words.
Kate needs to continue in her learning and practice in order to
become fluent in her literacy abilities. I think one thing to consider is
that Kate is doing a very good job, especially for a Kindergartener. For
further instruction, Kate should continue to work on recognizing
uppercase and lowercase letters and the sounds that each letter goes
along with. This could be done through repetition, journal writing, or
several different types of literacy instruction. She should continue with
her writing and journal, because this will help her fine motor skills like
handwriting and drawing. Her journals, with time, practice, and
exposure to different instruction, will develop further. Kates retelling
abilities are very good, but could be strengthened by using different
books with harder content.
Since Kate is in the emergent stage for literacy, an emergent diet
is acceptable. This includes instruction consisting of concept of word,

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the alphabet, phonological awareness, concept of print and
comprehension, and writing. All five of these categories should use
20% of instruction time each (which adds up to 100% instruction time).
Instruction of concept of word could include rhymes, songs, or small
books. Instruction of the alphabet could include alphabet games and
activities, matching games, and pictures sorts by sounds and letters.
Instruction of phonological awareness could include rhymes, words and
sentences, syllables, and the beginning and ending sounds of words.
Instruction of concept of print could include read-alouds, retelling
stories, or concept sorts. Instruction of writing could include drawing
and labeling, writing letters, and drawing pictures with captions.
Conclusion
This literacy assessment portfolio uses several different
assessments to gage where a child is. It helps distinguish what a child
needs to work on, and what teacher could do to help further their
learning. With time and the correct instruction, Kate is on the right
track to becoming fluent in literacy.