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Christina Stokes ELD 307 Dr. Casey October 27, 2013 Miscue Analysis Assessment In early literacy development, it is important for teachers to assess students in reading and writing. The miscue analysis method is used to determine a students reading level. Teachers can teach students how to be good readers, but teachers have to collect data to create effective lesson plans to teach students to use different reading strategies. Teachers can use the method to choose books for each students independent reading level. The purpose of this assessment is to analyze the oral reading of an individual student and to understand how miscue analysis can help teachers to approach class instructions. In my field class, I was able to observe a students oral reading with my cooperating teacher in a first grade. The teacher decided to choose one of her students named Nevaeh to determine her reading level. For the last couple of weeks, I have learned some of the students learning styles in reading and writing. I have observed how Nevaeh reads independently during silent time and she has developed good reading skills. My cooperating teacher pulled Nevaeh outside of the classroom to show the process of the miscue analysis assessment. Overall, it was an interesting experience to observe how a child reads and the strategies the student used to construct the meaning of a written text.

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For this assessment, I used my observations to learn how a teacher uses the miscue analysis method to determine a students reading level. It was interesting to see how Nevaeh read independently to construct the meaning of a text. The student read two books for the miscue analysis assessment. The first book was a nonfiction book called Shopping which was in the level C range. The book was about a boy helping his mother shop for food in the market. There were 95 words in the passage and the student only had 1 error. While observing the student, I noticed that she used the pictures to determine the meaning of the words and used her finger to read each word. Nevaehs accuracy rate was 99% which is her independent reading level. At the end of the reading, the teacher asked her questions about the book and she was able to answer them with supporting details from the text. Overall, Nevaeh was able to read the book without any sign of difficulty and the teacher realized she could read books in the level C range independently. The teacher gave a second book for the student to read. Nevaeh read a fiction book called The Nice Little House which was in the level D range. The book was about different animals entering inside a little house and each animal kept repeating the same phrase. I noticed that Nevaeh used the pictures to figure out the text, but made pauses throughout her reading. She inserted words that were not found in the text and reversed a few words. However, she noticed a pattern and self-corrected herself while reading. Even though she made a few errors, it was fascinating how she able to answer the teachers questions about the book. Nevaehs accuracy rate for this book was 93% and the teacher was finally able to determine her instructional reading level. In the future, I plan to use these findings to assess my students in their reading. The miscue analysis will definitely help me to determine book selection for the classroom library or to create

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lesson plans that will support the instructional reading level for students with similar reading issues. It is important to know that every student will be on different reading levels and the teacher need to find ways to help students in their literacy development. Through my observations and findings, it is evident that the miscue analysis is a great method to use to collect data and to determine a students reading level for any grade.