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Running head: LITERACY PORTFOLIO 1

Literacy Portfolio

Lisa Albarella

University of South Florida

Emergent Literacy 4312

November 30, 2016

Literacy Portfolio 2

Table of Contents

Introduction……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..3

Component 1: Attitudes towards Reading………………………………………………………………………………..4

Component 2: Print Concepts, Letters and Sounds & Phonemic Awareness……………………………..7

Component 3: Word Knowledge: Vocabulary and Word Study………………………………………………..12

Reference Page………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..18

Appendices……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….19

ERAS Analysis Page……………………………………………………………………………………………………………….19

Yopp-Singer Test of Phonemic Segmentation……………………………………………………………………….20

Spelling Inventory…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………21

CORE Vocabulary Screener…………………………………………………………………………………………………..22


Introduction

Reading is an integral part of a students’ learning process. It is the basis for almost

everything students do in school. The purpose of this portfolio is to discover the literary ability

of an emergent reader. This portfolio will consist of the emergent readers attitude towards

reading, phonological awareness, print concepts, letters and sounds, and word knowledge. A few

of the assessments that are going to be covered are an Elementary Reading Attitude Survey, and

a Yopp-Singer Test of Phonemic Segmentation.

The school that I am observing is Parker Elementary School (pseudonym) in Pasco

County, FL. Parker Elementary School is a Title I school consisting of 706 students. Half of

these students are Caucasian, and the other half consist of mostly African American and

Hispanic students. There are a select few students who are American Indian, Alaskan, Asian, or

Pacific Islander. There are a total of 391 males, and 315 females in Parker Elementary School.

My field experience class is a third grade class with 21 students. There are nine girls and twelve

boys in this classroom. The majority of the students are Caucasian; however, there are two

Hispanic students and four African American students in the class. In my field experience class,

there are not any students who are considered gifted or English Language Learners. In addition,

we have a Deaf student in our class who has an interpreter with her all day and a cochlear

implant.

The student that I chose as my focus student is Jason (pseudonym) and he is eight years

old. He likes wrestling, sports, and playing baseball with his brothers. Jason is very motivated

during class and has a desire to do well in school. He is always kind to his classmates and gets

along with everyone. Also, Jason enjoys reading when it is for fun, but does not like be asked


questions about his reading, or completing worksheets on what he has read. My focus students’

strongest subject area is math; however, he has a 2B (almost second grade) reading level.

Furthermore, Jason is considered on point with science. At times, no matter what the subject, he

does need repeated directions or instruction and does need his test read aloud to him since his

reading level is so low.

Component 1: Attitude towards reading

Explanation and Description of Assessment

The Elementary Reading Attitude Survey (ERAS) is a survey that consists of twenty

questions that help teachers understand their students’ feelings towards reading. Each question

on the test has four pictures of Garfield; they each display a different emotion. The first Garfield

is a very excited Garfield, the second is a Garfield that has a smirk on his face, the third Garfield

has a slightly mad face, and the fourth Garfield is very angry. When the student taking the test is

asked a question about reading, they circle which Garfield matches their emotion when they hear

the question. The ERAS measures a students’ attitude about reading; it does not determine why

the student feels this way or ways to improve a students’ attitude about reading. There are a total

of 10 questions related to attitude about recreational reading, and 10 questions related to attitude

about academic reading. This survey is intended for students in grades 1-6 (McKenna & Kear,

1990).

Overview of Administration

When I administered this survey, I called Jason over and explained to him that I just

wanted to ask him a few questions about how he felt about reading and I assured him that there

was not a right or wrong answer. I did not tell him it was a test; I told him that I just wanted to


find out more about him. Jason was willing to take this survey with me and did not express any

concerns about taking it. I explained to him that he was supposed to circle the Garfield that he

related to most when answering each question. Since Jason needs his tests read to him, I read

each question to him and he answered them. He was very hesitant to answer the very angry

Garfield because he was afraid of what I would say. He slowly circled the angry Garfield while

looking up at me for approval. However, he did not do this for every question, only the ones

where he circled the angry Garfield.

Summary of Results

Each answer in the ERAS is assigned one, two, three, or four points. A four would

indicate the happiest Garfield. The test is split up into two sections, the academic reading section

and the recreational reading section. Each section there is a possible 40 points. When both

sections are added together, it is what they call the raw score. Each score (recreational, academic,

and raw) can be translated into a percentile score (McKenna & Kear 1990). While looking over

Jason’s answers I noticed that he does not like reading during summertime or instead of

playtime; however, he does like reading at home most of the time. He did seem to enjoy reading

during school as long as he did not have to take a test on his reading or read aloud during class.

Jason scored a raw score of 25 in the recreational reading section (21 percentile) and a raw score

of 26 in the academic reading section (41 percentile). His total raw score ended up being 51 (28

percentile). For about half of Jason’s answers, he circled the second Garfield; the rest of his

answers were varied.

Instructional Decisions


When looking over Jason’s answers, I noticed that he circled mostly the middle two

Garfield’s. There were only a few questions that he answered with the excited or angry Garfield.

Some instructional decisions that I would suggest for Jason would be to have books read to him

more often, having someone help him pick out books to read, and buddy reading. First, I would

suggest that Jason should be exposed to many read alouds. “Elementary students were asked

what motivated them to read particular books. The most frequent response was my teacher read it

to me in class” (Cunningham & Allington, 2016, p. 15). I believe that Jason would benefit from

having books read aloud to him because it will expose him to a variety of books. It will show

him what types of books are available to him to read and will encourage him to read them on his

own. Furthermore, an instructional decision that I would suggest for Jason would be to have

someone go to the library with him and help him pick out appropriate books for his reading level.

Since Jason has a low reading level, he might be picking the wrong types of books because he is

trying to pick books like his classmates do. However, Jason needs to be reading books on his

level to really see improvement. This would help Jason be more enthusiastic about reading

because he will actually be able to read the books instead of getting frustrated while reading

because he does not know what most of the words are. Lastly, I would suggest that Jason should

be paired up with another student, either in his class or an older student, to participate in buddy

reading. Buddy reading is a strategy used with readers who lack fluency. Students would read

aloud to each other; more fluent readers should be paired with less fluent readers to enhance their

reading experience (Paired (or partner) Reading n.d.). This would help Jason become more

enthusiastic about his reading because he will get to read with his buddy. He will be able to hear

the book read aloud to him by his partner, and to be able to practice reading it to his partner as

well.


Reflection

I believe that the ERAS assessment itself needs some improvements and may have

resulted in scores that are not accurate. For example, I think that this test should be updated to a

more current cartoon. The cartoon Garfield is older and most students may not know who he is.

Jason did not show any indication that he knew who Garfield was. In addition, the two middle

pictures of Garfield could be misleading to students, causing them to circle the wrong answer.

The second Garfield (semi-happy Garfield) has his arms folded just like the third Garfield does.

The only difference between the two pictures is his facial features. If the students confuse these

two pictures, then their results will vary greatly. I believe the test should be updated to something

like smile faces representing the different emotions clearly. Taking this into consideration,

Jason’s feelings may not necessarily reflect what he circled. However, I do believe that the

instructional practices mentioned above would greatly help Jason’s attitude towards reading.

Component 2: Print Concepts, Letters and Sounds & Phonemic Awareness

Literacy Practices Observed

Explanation of How Student Was Observed

The classroom that Jason is in is a departmentalized classroom. This means that for half

of the day he is in my coordinating teacher’s (CT) classroom learning math and science. For the

other half of the day, he is next door learning reading and writing. During my time spent with

Jason, I have noticed that he is very strong in math. However, Jason does need his tests read to

him in every subject. I was able to observe him taking a math and science test so far, and my CT

did read both of them to him. While taking the test he would inform the teacher when he was


ready to move on to the next problem. He did seem to be able to make the connections between

word problems and math equations.

Once a week, my CT meets with all of the students to go over their IRLA progress.

Currently, Jason is a 2B reading level. This means that he is on a first grade reading level;

however, he is close to moving up to a second grade reading level. During his latest IRLA

meeting, he was given a sheet of words that had the au-aw sound in them. He attempted to read

them all and was able to check off which ones he had said right. Jason did pronounce more than

half of the words wrong; however, when the teacher would correct him, he would say it the right

way. Another activity that my CT gave Jason was flashcards with words on them. She had him

practice pronouncing these words on his own. After a week of practice, I went over the words

with him and he did quite well. Furthermore, during some science lessons, the students are

required to write their answers down. His writing is legible, although there are some spelling

errors. During other activities Jason is required to copy what is written on the board; he does not

seem to have difficulty with this.


Since I have not been able to see Jason in reading and writing often, it is hard for me to

see his progress in writing and reading. Eventually, I would like to be able to see some of his

work samples from the other class. With that in mind, I believe that Jason should be exposed to

more word problems in math, that way he is able to practice his reading skills while in math.

Since Jason is his strongest in math, this would make the reading more interesting to him. In

addition, his teacher should have him read the questions to his tests with her. Instead of reading


them to him, the teacher should read the questions with him together so that he has more practice

saying them out loud.

Another thing to consider when integrating literacy into science is that Jason should have

to record his observations more. There have been some activities where they need to record how

their plant has changed from the previous day, or they have to record how much volume is in a

beaker of water. These are just some of the activities that Jason should be partaking in. Writing

down his observations would enhance his writing skills and give him more practice with writing.

In addition, during science lessons, the students should be encouraged to take notes and write

down their ideas about the subjects. For example, KWL charts are a great way to see a student’s

progress throughout a lesson. The amount of reading and writing that a student does is directly

related to how well they read and write. Children should be able to read and write throughout the

day and throughout different subjects instead of having a separate time for reading and writing

(Cunningham & Allington, 2016, p. 9)

Yopp-Singer Test of Phoneme Segmentation


The Yopp-Singer Assessment “measures a child’s ability to separately articulate the

sounds of spoken word in order” (Yopp, 1995, para. 9). The Yopp-Singer assessment is used to

determine a child’s phonemic awareness and to identify if that child may experience difficulty in

spelling and reading. This assessment consists of 22 words that the student should know how to

sound out correctly. For example, one of the words on the assessment is “me,” the student should

sound out the word like /m/-/e/. If the child sounds out most of the words correctly, then they are

considered phonemically aware. Students who score low on this assessment are likely to have


problems with reading and spelling in the future if they do not receive the correct amount of

intervention (Yopp, 1995, para. 15).

In addition, this assessment is best when it is administered to an individual student, as

opposed to the entire class. Also, the Yopp-Singer assessment is intended for primary students

(grades K-2). Before taking the assessment, the child should be given instructions on what they

are supposed to do. For example, the person administering the test would tell them that they were

going to say a word and the child is supposed to break the word apart and tell them each sound in

order. Then the instructor should give them a few examples and practice words before starting

the assessment. The instructor should make the students know that this is not a test. Another

important aspect of this assessment is that the student does not receive partial credit for an

answer, it is all or nothing.


Since I am in a third grade classroom, I had to be assigned to a primary classroom to

administer this assessment. I was paired with another intern in a second grade classroom where

we administered this assessment on Mary (pseudonym). Since the two of us had to administer the

assessment on one student, we broke apart the assessment so that one of us would do the first

part, and the other would finish it. First, the other intern explained the assessment to her by

telling her that we were going to play a word game and break apart the sounds in words. She

went over the three examples with Mary and had her repeat them back to her so she understood

what she was doing. She verified with Mary that she understood what she was supposed to do

before starting the assessment. Next, she went through the first 11 words with her, marking down

any words she got wrong. While she was doing this, I marked down what I heard her say wrong


as well. When they were finished, I went through the remaining words with Mary and marked

down what she said wrong. After we were finished, we went over the ones she sounded out

wrong again and she only corrected herself on one of them. We then thanked her for helping us

and Mary went back to class. During this assessment, Mary was quiet and did not talk much. She

did not seem to be nervous or frustrated when answering the questions. However, the other intern

told me afterwards that she was quieter than normal. This is most likely because I had just met

her and she did not know me.

Summary of Results

Overall, Mary did very well on this assessment. She received 18 out of 22, meaning that

she is on the right track and is phonemically aware. She sounded out the word grew as

/g/-/r/-/u/-/oh/, and the word race as /r/-/ace/. For the word ice she simply repeated the word ice.

In addition, for the word top she said /t/-/op/; however, when we asked her to do this one again at

the end, she sounded it out the correct way. Since Mary is in second grade, it is expected for her

to be around this level of phonemic awareness.


Since Mary answered the majority of the questions right, she is considered phonemically

aware. Even though she received a high score, she should continue to practice her phonemic

awareness. “Phonemic awareness activities can be readily incorporated into pre-school,

kindergarten, and early primary grade classrooms” (Yopp, 1995, p. 26). There are a variety of

different types of activities to promote phonemic awareness. One example is a guessing game

called “What am I thinking of?” In this activity, the teacher picks a category like clothing and

then the teacher would say the sounds of the word; such as /h/-/a/-/t/. After the teacher does this,


the children will try to blend the sounds together to make hat. Activities like this will help Mary

practice sounding out words and enhance her phonemic awareness. “Phonemic awareness should

not be addressed as an abstract isolated skill to be acquired through drill type activity. It can be a

natural, functional part of literacy experiences throughout the day” (Yopp, 1995, p. 27).

Reflection

Overall, this assessment went very well. It has been determined that Mary is

phonemically aware. However, she should still be receiving phonemic awareness instruction

throughout the day. Even though Mary is in second grade, she is still at a first grade reading

level. She is off to a great start with her phonemic awareness and this will help her reading level

increase in the long run. In administering this assessment, I realized that it is a great tool for

teachers to use in determining your students’ phonemic awareness. If their phonemic awareness

is determined at an early stage, then the teacher can determine how much phonemic awareness

practice is needed in the classroom.

Component 3: Word Knowledge: Vocabulary and Word Study

Primary Spelling Inventory


“Spelling Inventories consist of lists of words specially chosen to represent a variety of

spelling features at increasing levels of difficulty” (Bear, Invernizzi, Templeton & Johnston,

2012, p.27). Spelling Inventories are administered a lot like a traditional spelling test; however,

the words are not studied in advance. It is suggested that each student should be given the

Spelling Inventory up to three times a year. The Primary Spelling Inventory consists of 26


words. This assessment is intended for kindergarten through early third grade students. The

Primary Spelling Inventory contains features found in the emergent stage through the within

word pattern stage. The words start off with simple CVC (consonant, vowel, consonant) pattern

and ends with words that have ineffectual endings. If the student taking this assessment receives

20 correct they should move onto the Elementary Spelling Inventory.


For this assessment, I pulled Jason aside to an empty table on one side of the classroom. I

told him that we were going to be spelling some words today. I told him that I was going to be

asking him to spell some words and that some of them might be easy to spell and some might be

more difficult. I reminded him to try his best on them and try sounding out the word if he gets

stuck. I went through each word and repeated it if necessary; however, I did not read the

sentences that had the words in them, I just said the word. Even though Jason was not spelling

the words correctly, he was sounding out each letter that he heard and wrote it down. He did not

become frustrated with this assessment, he even laughed if he did not know how to spell a word.

At the end of the assessment, I thanked him for working with me and he went back to his

classwork.

Summary of Results

For Jason’s total score, he had 20 out of 82. He only spelled two words correctly out of

twenty-six. As far as his feature points, he scored 18 out of 56. This puts Jason in the Letter-

Name Alphabetic Stage. According to the Feature Guide, Jason did very well until he hit the

words with digraphs in them. He struggled with diagraphs and inflected endings and he did not


get any of the words that had blends, common long vowels, or other vowels in them.

Furthermore, Jason did very well with initial and final consonants and short vowels.


An instructional strategy that could help Jason improve his spelling would be studying

word families. “Once students begin the study of word families, they are expected to read and

spell the words they sort” (Bear et al., 2012, p. 189). For an example, the teacher can prepare a

set of cards to be used in a pocket chart. For the at family, you would have cards with b, c, f, b,

m, p, r and s. The students would match the letters to form words for that word family. This type

of activity reinforces the reading and spelling of word families. Since Jason did not get any of the

blends correctly on this assessment, this type of activity would give him practice with blends.

Another idea that would help Jason would be to create a word bank of words that he can take a

close look at and study them out of context. Personal readers are also a great tool for Jason to

have. “Personal readers are collections of dictionaries and other short pieces of text that serve

many purposes, helping students develop a concept of word and concepts about print as well as

sight vocabulary” (Bear et al., 2012, p.181).

Reflection

I think that with the strategies mentioned above, Jason will show more improvements if

he was to take this assessment again at the end of the year. Since I only see Jason for science and

math, I do not get to see what kinds of activities he is doing in the other classroom he is in. From

the class I see him in; I do not see any instructional strategies to assist Jason with his spelling. I

believe that Jason should be receiving these types of instructional strategies several times a

week. These strategies can either be given to the entire class or one-on-one with the teacher.


CORE Vocabulary Screening


The CORE Vocabulary Screening Assessment “measures how well students know the

meaning of grade level words they can read silently” (Milone, 2008, p. 120). In this assessment,

the student will read a word in a box and determine which of the three answer choices means the

same thing as the word in the box. The CORE Vocabulary Screening can help identify students

who are having difficulty in their vocabulary and have lower vocabulary knowledge than their

peers. The Vocabulary Screening consists of 30 words.


For this assessment, I pulled Jason to the same area where we did the Primary Spelling

Inventory. I told him that we were going to work on vocabulary today. Since Jason has a lower

reading level, I chose to read the questions out loud to him. I explained what was required of him

by telling him that I will read the word in the box to him and then the three answer choices. After

I read them out loud, he is to circle the option that he thinks has the same meaning as the one in

the box. I went over the sample question with him and asked him if he understood what he was

supposed to do. Jason responded with a yes and we began the assessment. During the

assessment, Jason knew most of the answers and quickly circled each one. He did not hesitate

too much with answering the questions. After going through all 30 words, I went back over all of

the answers and talked out the ones that he got wrong.

Summary of Results


For this assessment, Jason did very well. He scored 23 out of 30. This means that he is at

the benchmark level and has adequate vocabulary knowledge for typical reading. After going

back over the ones he got wrong at the end, he realized the correct answer when we were going

over them. For example, when I said the word “rinse” again, he automatically said “ohh” and

pointed to “wash”. However, there were a few that he did not know what they meant at all, like

“distant,” “glistening,” and “entire.”


“Vocabulary knowledge is critical to understanding grade-appropriate text” (Milone,

2008, p. 120). Vocabulary instruction may be improved by direct instruction and practice;

however, the greatest gains will be the result of oral interaction and reading material with rich

vocabulary. I think that it would help Jason if he knew how to find the definition of words he

does not know. His teacher should remind the students that they can use dictionaries, context

clues, and breaking the words apart to figure out the meaning (Baumann, Ware, & Edwards,

2007). My CT has worked with Jason a little bit on prefixes and suffixes; however, it is only

once a week, if that. In addition, my CT pulls Jason aside during their IRLA reading time and

works with him one on one. Last week, she gave him a list of words and had him try and

pronounce them. She made flashcards for the words that he could not pronounce. This is a great

start to helping Jason; however, she never asked him to talk about what the words meant. I think

that an activity like this would benefit Jason more if he was learning what these words meant as

well. I watched Jason pull out the flashcards during class and he practiced saying them to himself

without anyone asking him to. This is a great thing for Jason to do on his own because you can

see that he did want to know how to say the words; however, the teacher could have written what

they meant on the back so he could practice both at the same time.


Another thing that would be helpful for Jason would be to learn root meanings and

affixes (Goodwin, Lipsky, & Ahn, 2012). Jason has had some practice with affixes, as mentioned

above; however, he should have more continuous practice with them. He should be practicing

these more often than once a week. While Jason is reading, he should write down words that he

did not know and look them up or ask someone what they mean. Instead of just skipping the

word, he should discover the meaning of the word. He can keep an ongoing record of all of the

words that he learned from reading.

Reflection

All in all, I think that Jason is off to the right start with his vocabulary. He has adequate

knowledge of vocabulary for typical reading and is completing some instructional strategies

already for vocabulary. With the improvements to his current instructional strategies (mentioned

above), I think that Jason will only improve from here on out. Jason needs to spend more time

practicing vocabulary and reading vocabulary rich texts so that he can further his vocabulary

knowledge.

English Language Learners

For English Language Learners, it is extremely important that they receive a lot of visual

examples and representations during their learning process. Using concrete objects and

experiences help ELL's build meaning to their vocabulary. Another way to help English

Language Learners is to have pictures representing the words they are learning. This will help

them visually see the object and they will be able to easily identify the word. In addition, "using

concrete words, alphabet picture books, and actions will help all of your students learn letter

names and sounds" (Cunningham & Allington, 2016, p. 43).


References

Baumann, J.F., Ware, D. & Edwards, E.C. (2007). Bumping into spicy, tasty words that catch

your tounge: A formative experiment on vocabulary instruction. The Reading Teacher,

61(2), 108-122. doi: 10.1598/RT.61.2.1

Cunningham, P. M., & Allington, R. L. (2016). Classrooms that work: They can all read and

write. New York: Longman.

Goodwin, A.P. & Perkins, J. (2015). Word detectives: Morphological instruction that supports

academic language. The Reading Teacher, 68(7), 510-523. doi:10.1002/trtr.1342

Mckenna, M. C., & Kear, D. J. (1990). Measuring attitude toward reading: A new tool for

teachers. The Reading Teacher SELECTIONS, 43(8), 626-639. doi:10.1598/rt.43.8.3

Milone, M. (2008). CORE vocabulary screening. California: Academic Therapy Publications.

Paired (or Partner) Reading. (n.d.). Retrieved September 29, 2016, from

http://www.readingrockets.org/strategies/paired_reading

Yopp, H. K. (1995). A Test for Assessing Phonemic Awareness in Young Children. The Reading

Teacher SELECTIONS, 49(1), 20-30. doi:10.1598/rt.49.1.3

Bear, D. R., Johnston, F. R., Invernizzi, M., & Templeton, S. (2010). Words their way: Letter

and picture sorts for emergent spellers (2nd ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ:

Pearson/Merrill/Prentice Hall.

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