The purpose of this book is to assist teachers as they work with emergent readers and writers--children who are in the early stages of reading and writing development, typically in preschool through grade 2. Section 1 of the book presents an overview of emergent literacy. Section 2 consists of a group of 15 informal early literacy pretests. The…

Comprehension tests are often used interchangeably, suggesting an implicit assumption that they are all measuring the same thing. We examine the validity of this assumption by comparing some of the most popular reading comprehension measures used in research and clinical practice in the United States: the Gray Oral Reading Test (GORT), the two…

Alternatives to traditional testing techniques are proposed for use in the adult English as a second language classroom. It is argued that traditional testing does not place responsibility for achievement on the learner as is appropriate with adult students. The suggested alternative methods are: the language experience approach, sustained silent…

Noting that traditional measures of textbook difficulty and traditional measures of student reading ability suffer from a lack of correspondence, this booklet deals with the problems of (1) identifying the levels of conceptual difficulty of text materials, (2) identifying students' abilities to understand text materials, (3) matching the…

This literature review examines use of the cloze procedure for assessing reading and language competence and for planning individualized reading curricula. The first half of the paper describes studies performed with non-hearing-impaired students, discussing validation of the cloze procedure, establishment of criterion test scores, and the…

Presents ways a classroom teacher can welcome new students to class, properly place them for instruction, and make them feel at home in a new group. (FL)

To help teachers, policy analysts, and others understand the 1994 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) Assessment in Reading, this journal issue presents the objectives and examples of how students in grades 4, 8, and 12 will be assessed. The issue discusses NAEP's view of reading; key features of the assessment; reading purposes;…

Suggests techniques for teaching students to comprehend test questions in a manner that requires them to think about both what is in the question and what could be in the passage. (HOD)

Cautions against using standardized tests to make simplistic judgments about students' reading comprehension. Suggests two approaches to testing that teachers might use to devise testing procedures that represent their own views of the important reading strategies and skills that students need to acquire. (AEA)

The guide, entirely in French, is intended as a resource for regular elementary and early secondary school classroom teachers of reading to both native speakers of French and French immersion students in Canada. An introductory chapter describes the guide's organization, gives background information on its approach to reading instruction, links…

Tells how children's performances on informal spelling and writing tasks can be analyzed to develop appropriate instructional activities. Argues that the real utility of assessment procedures comes from the qualitative interpretation that a sensitive diagnostician makes, based on a knowledge of the student and of the process of reading. (AEA)

Explains how a microcomputer can save a classroom reading teacher's time by producing, administering, and scoring cloze tests. (AEA)

Suggests that teacher observations form a valid and integral part of student assessment and that, in addition to standardized tests and informal tests, this "inner-ocular technique" is an important means for assessing the effectiveness of reading instruction. (MKM)

This guide lists 64 commercially prepared English language arts inventories to assist educators in attaining results as stated in the Illinois Right to Read Initiative Best Practice #2: Assessment to Inform Instruction. The inventories in this guide are offered as another resource and are not meant to take the place of ongoing classroom assessment…

Suggests five criteria for teachers to keep in mind when choosing passages for the cloze procedure. (MKM)