Running Records

After considering my blog comments from last week, I decided to complete running record with my students using a fresh text. Prior to this they have only done running records with their sight word readers that they have practiced. I wanted to do these with books they have not seen before to see if their sight word instruction has helped them be able to recognize these words in context. Can they recognize sight words in a book they have not practiced reading? The book they read was called, A Hat for Kim and it was an grade level text. It was slightly more difficult for my focal group, however, I wanted to see their progress so far. I want to push them a little more because I think they can meet this challenge. Below is what I noticed with my student Ellen.

I called Ellen to my U-table to complete the running record. She skips over and smiles. She is always happy to sit beside me and loves practicing her reading. I pulled out the book and laid it in front of her. Prior to reading, Ellen and I take a picture walk and discuss what we think is happening in the story. Ellen has many speech difficulties and goes to speech class several times a week. Although she is improving she is still very hard to understand. I have gotten better at understanding her, but sometimes I have to ask her to repeat herself. During the picture walk I had to stop twice to ask her again what she said about two of the pictures. She doesn't seem to ever get frustrated and continued to tell me what was happening in each picture. After the picture walk, Ellen reads the title correctly and turns to the first page. The first page read, "Mom had a hat for Kim". Ellen read, "Mom gave a hat for Kim". She misread the word had calling it gave. However, she correctly read the sight words a and for. As she continued to read she did miss many unfamiliar words that she could not use picture clues to read and some of the characters names. However, she read every sight word that she has been introduced to during our small groups correctly. This was very enlightening for me because it showed me that Ellen is learning to recognize sight words in context and read them correctly. She is making progress! After reading the rest of the book, Ellen was so proud of herself. I gave her a sticker for doing such a great job and she beamed from ear to ear. I can tell by the way she is reading more fluently that she is becoming a more confident reader.

This week and next week I will be completing the Literacy First Phonics Assessment and the Developmental Reading Assessment. I am looking forward to seeing each focal students progress in the areas of phonics, phonemic awareness, comprehension, fluency, and sight words. This will help me get a better idea of how sight word instruction affects students in other areas within a balanced literacy approach.