Hear the Difference
During the first days of school, you want to get to know your students and build relationships with them, but you also want to learn how they read. You need to listen to them read. This is a practice that is common in early grades, but often shied away from in middle and high school. But with declining literacy rates and the stagnation of reading scores, this practice is imperative. Taking the time to listen to your students read will
- Allow you to learn their fluency
- Help you identify their reading strengths and challenges
- Help you determine their overall reading level
Such information can be helpful in planning instruction, crafting lesson activities, and creating reading interventions. For these reasons, I’ve created a reading assessment chart – and it is simple in nature, but it can be a game changer for English Language Arts teachers.
Use the Chart
Simply have your students read aloud each sentence. To the left of each sentence, you have the identified grade level. On the right side of each sentence, the reading Lexile level is given. Have your students read through each sentence, one-by-one. When the student arrives to a sentence that he/she cannot read without struggling (they likely can’t fluently read through three or more of the words with ease), you’ve identified their reading level. The students’ reading level will be the last sentence he/she fluently read.
Other Benefits
In addition to learning a student’s reading grade level and Lexile, a teacher can get to know how the student reads. For example, how well does the student read multi-syllabic words? When arriving at a challenging word, does the student demonstrate phonemic awareness or use decoding skills to read the word properly? Or does the student just brush over the word?
You can also use this tool to help you learn about your students’ personalities, specifically their confidence and willingness to persevere. When using this resource with my own students, for example, I noticed some students would just sit in silence when they came across an unfamiliar word. When I tried to nudge one student forward, he replied to me with a shoulder shrug and an, “I don’t know that word.” I quickly learned that he would rather not try than find himself wrong. Through this same assessment, I learned another student likes reassurance. This student was doing well with exercising phonetic awareness and reading aloud, but he would pause after every other word or so, look at me, and ask, “was that right?”
Knowing these things about my students helped me improve my instructional practice. I knew, when teaching, who I needed to give some extra encouragement to, who needed that pat on the back, and who needed some one-on-one or small group instruction. This assessment didn’t just inform me about the students’ reading abilities, it informed me about their personalities. This is something that would typically take a few weeks to learn, but not with this assessment. This is a simple tool with a HUGE impact.
Be the First to Learn About New Products & Events.
© 2025 Expand Instructional and Curriculum Design
Expand Instructional & Curriculum Design 