Running head: LITERACY PORTFOLIO

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Literacy Portfolio
Rachel Porter
University of South Florida

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Abstract

I have administered three different assessments, the Elementary Reading Attitude Survey, the
Yopp-Singer Test of Phoneme Segmentation, and the Primary Spelling Inventory. These assessments provide a variety of information about a students mastery of specific concepts and the students attitude toward the concepts as well. As a pre-service teacher I intern in a kindergarten
classroom. During regular school hours I was able to assess this student without interrupting instructional time. With each assessment there are instructions provided to administer the test.
Some modifications have been made and are noted in the appropriate sections. The student, Nancy Drew is at grade level for her phoneme segmentation and is above grade level for spelling.
There are many different strategies to use to continue to foster her success in literacy. With continued instruction this student is on track for meeting all the necessary standards at the end of the
school year.

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Introduction

Literacy Portfolio
This Literacy Portfolio includes three assessments administered to one specific focus student. The assessments are thoroughly explained from how they were administrated to how they
can be analyzed and measured. The purpose of this portfolio is to compile this students literacy
data that indicates their specific literacy stage. This assessment information can also provide insight to whether or not the student is at grade level. Also included are several strategies based off
of the results to further improve this students literacy. Lastly, I have reflected on the administration of the assessments and the effectiveness of the assessments themselves.
School Introduction
I intern at Maniscalco Elementary School. There is a total of 1,226 students and the race
of 55% of students is caucasian while the other races in descending order include: Hispanic,
African American, Multi-racial, Asian, and lastly Indian (Maniscalco 2015). The school offers an
English for Speakers of Other Languages program and has three teachers on staff to provide individualized services. The school has one assistant principal and a guidance counselor, however,
the school does not have a psychologist on campus.
Classroom Description
The classroom I am in is a part of a kindergarten pod. The wall between us and the classroom next door is rather thin and everyone can often hear the music and instruction from next
door. The children are seated at tables together in teams of three to four children. The class-

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room nearly always has a productive hum and the students transition well from one activity to
the next. The alphabet and sight words are posted around the classroom as visual aids, and the
teacher points them out daily. The students also have their names labeled on everything from
their desks to reading baskets. There are 19 students in the class, 9 female and 10 male. The race
of children range from white (11 students) to multiracial (6 students), and the minority in the
class are the few Hispanic children (2 students). There is one English Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) student and two students with an Individualized Education Plan (IEP). The class
as a whole is above the average kindergarten level. They are well behaved and self-regulate very
well.
Description of Student
The student I have chosen to focus on is Nancy Drew (pseudonym). Nancy is five years
old; she loves to run and play and help others complete simple tasks that she has mastered. These
may include, but are not limited to cutting and pasting objects or putting away backpacks. She
lives with her parents, younger brother, and uncle. Her parents read with her at night but she has
stated how little her uncle reads to her or on his own. Nancy is very helpful and seeks to assist
classmates everyday. Nancys strengths include math and writing. She quickly follows directions
often without needing the teacher to repeat them. Nancy could improve on her involvement in
class during whole group activities, but it is clear that she is comfortable in smaller group settings such as one on one. Nancy could also improve her reading skills by practicing reading
aloud to those at home.

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Component 1: Attitude Towards Reading
Elementary Reading Attitude Survey

Description of Assessment
The Elementary Reading Attitude Survey (ERAS) is comprised of twenty questions and
measures a students overall attitude about recreational and academic reading. This specific assessment was introduced and graded based on McKenna and Kears article, Measuring Attitude
Toward Reading: A New Tool for Teachers (McKenna & Kear 1990). An example question is,
How do you feel about getting a book for a present?. This measures the students attitude by
having the student circle one of four clip art expressions of Garfield the cat. They are to match
their attitude about the question with Garfields expression. The very happy Garfield is given a
number four, the slightly or kind of happy Garfield equates a three, slightly upset Garfield is a
two, and finally the very upset Garfield receives a one. The highest possible composite score on
the survey is 80 points. The first ten questions examine recreational reading and the last ten questions cover academic reading. Each section can be graded separately and analyzed by percentile
rankings as well as the composite score. As a conclusion to the assessment, the administrator is
to interview the student with approximately three to four questions to further understanding.
Administering the Assessment
The kindergarten pod is small enough that we could hear the singing from the classroom
next door. The other students were either completing the Letter and Sound assessment with the
teacher or working with Play Dough to improve fine motor skills. Nancy seemed nervous at first,

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perhaps because she was the only student that day to come back and work with me. With time
and encouragement from me, she calmed down and focused on the ERAS. Miss Drew and I were
sitting at a small table in the back of the classroom side by side during the assessment. Since
children often look towards the administrator for the correct answer I was conscious of my tone
of voice and facial expressions, making sure to verbally state that there was not a right or wrong
answer to any of these questions. I made many modifications. I could not access the fourth page
and therefore questions thirteen through sixteen were not answered. Also, Nancy did not know
what a dictionary was when I asked, so question 19 was also not answered. These questions were
all in the academic reading section and the lack of answers are reflected in the score. I repeated
the different options or answers three or four times at the beginning of the assessment to assure
her comprehension of the options.Another modification made was teaching Nancy to answer one
question then move down to the next section before answering the second question.
Results
Nancy scored a 28/40 on recreational reading attitude. Her answers varied greatly, most
of her answers were either three or fours, but four answers were either one or twos. Based off of
which questions she answered with lower numbers, Nancy seems to enjoy the social interaction
that comes with reading. She does not enjoy spending time reading when she could be playing
with others or doing something that may be more active. She finds receiving a book, visiting a
bookstore, and discussing books with others very enjoyable. Nancys academic scores were
16/40. She enjoys the assessment activities in her class, but does not like reading aloud. I believe
her answers reaffirm that she enjoys interacting with others when reading.

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During my assessment Nancy was distracted by the rising noise level in the classroom
and was anxious to get back to her seat to play with the Play Dough. I think that she was not only
getting bored but also wanted to be involved with the same activity as her classmates. Most of
the answers I received were short, as she craned her head to view her desk.
During my interview with Nancy, I asked her a few questions. Do you read at home and
whom do you read with? To which she said she reads nightly at home with her parents and siblings. Her uncle does not read with or to her, though he does live with her family. When asked
what kind of books do you like to read? She said she prefers to read fantasy picture books such
as Disneys Descendants. Do you like to write? Nancy stated that she likes writing and would
rather write than read during free time or school hours. The students in the room were speaking
louder and Nancy became more distracted. So I thanked her for coming back and taking the
ERAS then sent her back to her seat.
Informing Instruction
In response to this assessment I have found that students focus better in a quiet environment since Nancy became more distracted as the noise level in the room increased. Also, when
students are given the opportunity to work together they may succeed more, because they prefer
it. Most students at this grade level enjoy talking to each other, working collaboratively, and
helping each other. My instruction will include both reading and writing activities to foster a love
of both. I will also incorporate activities where students could practice reading aloud in pairs,
similar to the Daily 5 activity, read to someone. In the future, I will survey my entire class and
take their results into consideration when teaching. This information is to be used to improve

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their learning environment. Lastly if I as the teacher show enthusiasm for reading then my students will learn to love literacy as well.
Reflection
Administering this assessment helped me to get to know Nancy better. I was able to not
only get a glimpse at how involved her family is in her education but also her preferences. Nancy
has since become more confident in responding to me, so her comfort with me as the administrator may have affected her score or interview. Nancy might have given me more information had
she been accustomed to my presence in the classroom. In the future, I want to make sure students
understand that there is no wrong or right answers to the survey so that their answers would not
be influenced by pressure to perform. In the future I hope to administer this survey to a whole
class in a group setting. Next time I will spend more time emphasizing the structure of the survey
and the answers possible. Students could also ask their siblings or parents to fill out a survey to
inform the teacher on how literacy is appreciated in the home.

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

Yopp-Sioger Test of Phoneme Segmentation
Description of Assessment
The Yopp-Singer Test of Phoneme Segmentation is a twenty-two item assessment (YoppSinger, 1998). It measures a students ability to separate words phonemically or to articulate the
smallest sounds of a spoken word. For example, given the word cup the students should answer
with the three separate sounds: /c/-/u/-/p/. The sounds, not the letter names, are the correct re-

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sponse. Each word is comprised of two to three phonemes. Some words do include the soft c
and digraphs which the administrator has to be aware of. This test is given orally; at no point
should the student have any materials before him or her. The student responds orally as the administrator checks off and writes what sounds the student says correctly and incorrectly as well
as the type of error (ex. digraph error). The assessment is graded on each word correctly segmented into the appropriate phonemes. The entire word must be articulated correctly, no partial
credit is given. The highest score possible is twenty-two and the lowest is zero (Yopp-Singer
1998). When a student scores few to none (0-6 words correct), they are not considered phonemically aware. Students who score some items (7-16 items) are showing emerging phonemic
awareness. Lastly, students who segment all or most items correctly (17-22 words correct) are
considered phonemically aware (Yopp-Singer 1998).
Administering the Assessment
The other students were having their quiet time. I asked Nancy to work with me again at
the back table. This time she was more comfortable with sitting next to me, as this was at a later
date than my ERAS. I was going to say a word, and she would break it apart for me. I emphasized that she was not to say the letter name, but the letter sounds that she heard in the word. I
used the word old as an example to show her the desired response. Afterwards, we practiced together with the words: ride, go, and man. I was able to administer the assessment fairly quick.
Nancy occasionally answered quietly, so the only modification I made was to ask her to repeat
her answer approximately three separate times in order to hear her response. Since it was quiet
time, I can assume that the reason for her whispered answer was to not disturb her classmates in
contrast to being uncomfortable, because her body language was open and welcoming. After

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completing this assessment as well as Words their Ways Print Concepts and Words their Ways
Primary Spelling Inventory, I praised her for working hard and helping me with the assessments.
Results
Since the assessment is graded based on total words segmented correctly, Nancy answered 10/22 correct. According to the Yopp-Singer article, this indicates that Nancy displays
emerging phonemic awareness (Yopp-Singer, 1998). Miss Drew often added letter sounds to the
items, doing so six different times resulting in the item being marked incorrect. Blends and digraphs were also a source of incorrect answers, either were spoken with an additional phoneme
or replaced with another. As a first-semester kindergartener, this result would place Miss Drew at
or above grade level as indicated in the Yopp article (Yopp, 1995, p. 23). Her segmentation of the
items presented was very thorough, and she took time to think on the word before responding
with an answer. She repeated the word back to me then took a few seconds before responding.
Informing Instruction
This assessment is simple, administered quickly, and would be easy to give to an entire
class. My Collaborating Teacher (CT) actively uses multiple strategies to improve students phonemic awareness. One such strategy she uses is to play specific songs and having the students
stand up and sing along. This requires the students to move about and expel energy as well as
sing to a melody whose lyrics goes through the vowels (each short and long vowel sounds) as
well as an example word. This strategy helps students memorize the information. However, the
students mainly regurgitate the lyrics without processing the information. This is evident by their
lack of response when asked What sound does ___ vowel make? My suggestion for instruction

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after administering this assessment is to begin emphasizing and reviewing digraphs and blends.
Since Nancy confused the digraphs in the Yopp-Singer Assessment, I suggest using word sorts to
help her visually identify digraphs and work with her on auditory recognition. An example would
be to sort different blends such as, th, ch, and sh.The students could match the sorts with vowels
or two letter endings to make the words, the, this, that, chat, and she. This can be done as part of
a group since other students will most likely require assistance in this area also, and ensures that
Nancy does not feel singled out. I also suggest working with Nancy on clarity of speech, since
she added phonemes to a few words, by using this assessment as an activity to see how many
words she can segment without adding any extra sounds. She will work towards getting a certain
number correct and earn an extra book in her book basket. During the activity, I will also provide
scaffolding. I will model the word sort process, practice with small groups of students, allow
them to then work in pairs, and finally do complete the sort independently.
Reflection
I really enjoyed this assessment. Administering this assessment gave insight as to whether
or not students can segment words and identify the phonemes. The results of this assessment may
indicate why a student is at a specific reading or writing level. If a student is unable to segment
the word then they may not be able to write the word if it is not common in their vocabulary. Using the answer key to grade the student during the assessment is very helpful. I was able to check
off the correct phonemes and quickly note the incorrect ones without stopping to write out each
phoneme out of the twenty-two items. This led to a quick assessment, which prevented Nancy
from becoming distracted. Similar to the Letter and Sound Test, this assessment would be simple
to administer to a whole class during Respond To Intervention time and could be completed

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within a week. In the future, since not all kindergarten students can segment all portions of a
word, I will first ask the student to tell me the initial sound in the first five words and afterwards
asking the student to try segmenting the rest of the word on the remaining items. This would
provide more practice for students who may not comprehend the directions. Nancy did not require this modification, but I can see how several of her classmates might. I will administer this
assessment again in the Spring and document her improvement.
Component 3: Word Knowledge: Word Study
Words Their Way Primary Spelling Inventory
Description of Assessment
There are four spelling inventories: the Kindergarten Spelling Inventory, Primary Spelling Inventory, Elementary Spelling Inventory, and Upper-Level Spelling Inventory (Bear, Invernizzi, Templeton, & Johnston, 2012). The Kindergarten Spelling Inventory is used for beginning kindergarten students, however the Primary Spelling Inventory may be used instead as it
spans kindergarten to third grade. The Elementary Spelling Inventory spans second to fifth grade.
Finally, the Upper-Level Spelling Inventory assesses the middle school grades, sixth through
eighth. Once a student spells twenty or more words correct they may move on to the higher leveled inventory. The inventory I used was the Primary Spelling Inventory (PSI). There are twentysix words in total that are ordered by difficulty. The words given measure the students knowledge
of consonant sounds, digraphs, common long vowels, inflected endings and other features of beginner spelling. The PSI is given orally, the student must have their paper numbered or the administrator can provide a numbered paper. The students are not allowed to study these words be-

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forehand, and are to spell the words as best they can, by writing as many sounds as they hear.
Sentences are provided to use as examples to ensure the students understand the exact word and
are not confused with homophones. The student being tested must have at least five words incorrect before the administrator stops calling out words.
This assessment is graded by total words spelled correctly. The PSI also includes a Feature Guide to assist grading and analysis of results. This Feature Guide splits words by spelling
feature for example, the word fan is shown in three places: initial and final consonants and short
vowels. For consonants, there are two sections: initial and final which includes f and n. Then
there is a section for short vowels where the letter a is found. Graders must be aware that students may add letters to a word changing the sound that other vowels make. This changes the
result and the word spelled, therefore the vowel would be counted wrong. Even though a student
may have all the components correct (initial and final consonants and short vowels) they still
may not have spelled the word correctly (Bear, et al., 2012).
Administering the Assessment
The other students were having their quiet time, and Nancy already had ten minutes of
resting. The classroom was quiet with soft music playing which meant our conversation did not
interrupt the class. I again asked Nancy to come to the back table. Here I assessed her phonemic
awareness, concepts of print, and spelling inventory. As suggested in the instructions, I gave
Nancy a paper numbered one through six on the same writing paper her class regularly uses. The
instructions suggested that administrators do so for kindergarten students in order to save time. I
decided to I told her that I was going to say a word and she needed to spell it as best as she could.

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She needed to write down all the sounds she heard. I enunciated and repeated each word two to
three times. We quickly finished this assessment when I thanked her for all her help that day.
Then I told her she could go and pack up her resting mat, as the rest of her class had begun to do.
Results
Per the PSI instructions, administrators of the assessment are to call out words until the
student spells at least five words incorrectly (Bear, et al., 2012). I interpreted this as to five words
total incorrect, but it may also be interpreted as five consecutive words. Therefore while testing
Nancy I only called out six words. She spelled the first two incorrectly, the third correct, and the
final three incorrect again. Nancys score is 1/26 correct. She identified the initial consonants, f,
p, d, and w. She also identified several final consonants such as t, g, b, and p. She identified three
out of four short vowels including: e, i, and o. Though she completed each feature with a nearperfect score, she did add a few extra letters, both consonants and vowels, to the words she was
misspelling. One reason she may have spelled the word rob incorrectly was because when she
repeated the word after my initial instruction she said wob mixing the /r/ and /w/ sounds, and
did so again after I repeated the word rob, then ended up spelling the word wob. This seems to
be a one time occurrence, as I have never heard her mix up the /r/ and /w/ sounds in her speech
before. Also during the letters and sounds test, Nancy identified and gave the correct sound for
both letters.
From her results I can conclude that she struggles with middle letters and adding more
vowels than necessary. I would place her at the Late Emergent speller to early Letter Name-Alphabetic speller stage according to the PSI Feature Guide. Nancy got most sections of the fea-

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tures correct on the final consonant and short vowel sections, which would place her in the earlymiddle Letter Name-Alphabet stage had she not gotten two features incorrect in the Late Emergent speller stage. This means she has not mastered spelling by oral instruction especially when
identifying beginning consonants (Bear, et al., 2012). The modifications I made were to only call
out six words and write numbers one through six on Nancys paper.
Informing Instruction
Nancy Drews teacher encourages the students to spell phonetically, which in turn means
that words will not always be spelled correctly, but it will help students learn to break apart
words and put them back together. This strategy has helped Nancy in her identification of consonants however decoding the middle letters in a word has not yet been covered thoroughly by her
teacher. From this assessment, as well as the Yopp-Singer Test of Phoneme Segmentation, explained in Component 2, it is clear that Nancy adds phonemes when sounding out words which
may result in adding letters when spelling (Yopp, 1995). This is my speculation about the correlation between the results from both assessments.
Overall, Nancy spells very well and does understand the initial and final consonants, so
emphasis would be on listening for, and spelling middle letters correctly. Again, this deals with
digraphs and blends such as /an/ and /ai/. This could eventually include a word sort with words
such as sail, wait, pail, aim, hail, and stain, or another with pan, man, can, and tan. My suggestion is to work on identifying consonant-vowel-consonant (CVC) words audibly with an emphasis on short vowels. Using word sorts beginning with short a and short o CVC words, moving on
to short e and short u CVC words, then short a, i, and o CVC words. Finally completing a sort

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using all short vowels in CVC words. In time, I would have Nancy work on spelling words with
cards with a partner so that both could check their work against one another.

Another activ-

ity that students could work on as partners or alone is making words with cubes. This activity
would require three to four wooden cubes with all vowels written on one cube, and a variety of
single consonants or blends on the remaining cubes. To start students could try to find all the
words with the short a by keeping the A side up and rolling the remaining cubes, then progress
through the other vowels, and finally roll all the cubes to use a different vowel during each turn
(Bear et. all., 2012, p. 194).
Reflection
The PSI is a great tool when determining a specific students spelling stage. The PSI
seemed rather daunting at first, but was simple to administer and analyze. I really appreciated the
Feature Guide as it was helpful in analyzing Nancys results. It was simple to follow and check
off what features Nancy got correct and what she needs to improve. I can see how this guide
would be beneficial to a teacher assessing the whole class, as it would be far less time consuming
than going through each test and looking for the different features.
I would definitely use this assessment again, as it really helps a teacher understand if the
students have mastered a spelling concept or not. This assessment can be easily used for a variety
of grades and is versatile with the many different inventories available. As a pre-service teacher,
I will use the results to inform my instruction. During pull-out groups, I will know whether to
focus my instruction on digraphs or inflected endings based on the scores of my students on the
Feature Guide. When administering this assessment again I will ask the student to spell words

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until they misspell five consecutively. For Nancy this practice would give me a better understanding of her mastery of short vowels. As for other students, I will be able to analyze more
spelling features as one spelling feature wrong does not equate a student struggling. By requiring
students to spell more words I will be able to identify trends among the class. This can inform
my instruction to the whole group and individualized instruction. As the school year progresses, I
hope to be able to test Nancy again and analyze her knowledge of digraphs and blends as they
are introduced in her classroom.

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References

Bear, D.R., Invernizzi, M., Templeton, S., & Johnston, F. (2012). Words their way: Word study
for phonics, vocabulary, and spelling instruction. (5th edition). Boston, MA: Pearson.
Maniscalco Elementary School. (2015) About our School. http://maniscalco.mysdhc.org/
School_Information
McKenna, M.C., & Kear, D.J. (1990, May). Measuring attitude toward reading: A new tool for
teachers. The Reading Teacher, 43(8, 626-639. http://dx.doi.org/10.1598/RT.43.8.3
Yopp, H.K. (1995). A Test for Assessing Phonemic Awareness in Young Children. The Reading
Teacher, p. 20-29

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Appendix B

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