College of Education

Wolfpack Readers Program

Reader Profile Pre-Tutoring Report

Reader: Whitney P. Examiner: Corrie Dobis
(pseudonym) Assessments administered and
interpretations completed by: Corrie Dobis
Grade: 4th

Date of Assessments: 1/21/2020 Date of Report: 2/7/2020

This report was completed by graduate students in the College of Education at NC State
University. The report is primarily intended to inform the intensified reading instruction
provided in the Wolfpack Readers program. You can find more information about this program
at: https://sites.ced.ncsu.edu/the-literacy-space. Questions about this report or the Wolfpack
Readers program can be directed to Dr. Jackie Relyea at jrelyea@ncsu.edu.

1. Reading Interview
Whitney is a 4th grade student at Fosterville Elementary School (pseudonym). During our initial
interview together, Whitney expressed to me that she believes a good reader is someone who
can read fluently, can correct themselves, and continues to go back to reread a passage or
book. When I asked her how she knew she was done reading something for her class, she told
me that she typically looks for ending punctuation such as periods, exclamation marks, and
question marks. I asked her whether readers should read everything at the same speed and she
agreed. When I asked why she thought this, she explained that readers should do this because
if they read everything at the same speed they will understand what they are reading about.
Whitney thinks that if she continued to practice her reading skills at home she would improve
her reading. Some of the reading skills that she uses when something does not make sense are
sounding out unfamiliar words or using context clues to understand unknown vocabulary.
When reading a story, she thinks about what the characters’ next actions will be and the main
idea. While reading informational texts, Whitney begins to think about what information from
the passage will be used on the questions that may be asked afterward.

2. Informal Decoding Inventory

The Informal Decoding Inventory (McKenna & Stahl, 2015) is an assessment of decoding skills,
in the sequential order in which these patterns are typically learned.Each section includes real
words and nonsense words. A student demonstrates mastery of a section by correctly reading
at least 8 of the real words and 7 of the nonsense words. The assessment is discontinued once
the teacher identifies a few key areas where mastery is not achieved.

The results of the inventory are as follows:

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 Assessment Real words Nonsense words Mastery (yes/no)

Short Vowels 10/10 9/10 Yes

Consonant Blends and Digraphs 9/10 7/10 Yes

r-Controlled Vowel Patterns 8/10 10/10 Yes

Vowel Consonant–e 4/10 4/10 No

Vowel Teams 9/10 7/10 Yes

Multisyllabic Words 8/10 N/A Yes

Interpretation:
After reviewing the data, Whitney seems to be very confident in sounding out words with short
vowels, vowel teams, consonant blends, digraphs, and those with r- controlled vowel patterns.
She would benefit from instruction that focuses on words with a vowel consonant -e pattern.
Examples of these words may include: hike, chive, brine, and vane. When reading words with
this pattern, Whitney seems to read the words with a short vowel sound, instead of the long
vowel sound that is caused by the silent -e.

3. Spelling Inventory
The Elementary Spelling Inventory (Bear, Invernizzi, Templeton, & Johnston, 2016) assesses a
student’s ability to spell according to spelling patterns and stages. The child is asked to write a
series of words chosen to display the child’s knowledge and understanding of spelling features
(short vowels, long vowels, blends, etc.). The words gradually become more difficult to spell as
the list progresses. It is administered in a similar fashion as a spelling test, except the child has
not studied these specific words beforehand.

Features Total Correct Mastery yes/no

Initial/Final Consonants 7/7 Yes

Short Vowels 4/4 Yes

Digraphs/Blends 7/8 Yes

Long Vowel Patterns 4/6 No

Other Vowel Patterns 3/6 No

Syllable Junctures & Easy 5/8 No

Prefixes/Suffixes
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 Harder Prefixes/Suffixes & 3/8 No
Unaccented Final Syllables

Reduced & Altered Vowels,Bases 1/5 No

or Roots, & Derivatives

Total Feature Points 34/62

Total Words Spelled Correctly 10/25

Spelling Stage (Middle) Within Word Pattern

Interpretation:
Whitney has mastered the emergent and letter-name stages of spelling. She is able to
successfully identify key sounds for her consonant letters, short vowels, consonant digraphs
and blends. Whitney has demonstrated her ability to identify some words with long vowel
patterns but would benefit from instruction beginning with all long vowel patterns and other
vowel patterns such as oi, ow, & ew. This assessment data shows that Whitney is currently
spelling in the spelling stage called Within Word Pattern. This means that Whitney will be able
to master spelling and reading words with long vowel patterns and move towards other vowel
patterns with instructional support.

4. Informal Reading Inventory

The Qualitative Reading Inventory (QRI; Leslie & Caldwell, 2017) is an informal reading
inventory used to estimate the child’s instructional reading level. The child is presented with a
series of texts, increasing in difficulty. The assessment continues until the examiner identifies
the highest level at which the child meets the instructional level criteria. The instructional level
is defined as the highest-grade level at which the child can successfully read with sufficient
word reading and comprehension accuracy to meaningfully learn from the text.

Passage Name/Level Word Recognition Level (percent Comprehension Level (total

(e.g., Lexile) of words read accurately) correct/total # of questions)

Passage Title: Where Do 98 % 100 %

People Live? Circle one: Circle one:
o Frustrational (75%-) o Frustrational (75%-)
Level: 3rd Grade
o Instructional (75.1%-89.9%) o Instructional (75.1%-89.9%)
Lexile: 500
o Independent (90%+) o Independent (90%+)

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 Passage Title: Tomie 96 % 75 %
dePaola Circle one: Circle one:
o Frustrational (75%-) o Frustrational (75%-)
Level: 4th Grade
o Instructional (75.1%-89.9%) o Instructional (75.1%-89.9%)
Lexile: 910
o Independent (90%+) o Independent (90%+)

Interpretation:
Whitney is able to independently read at the 3rd grade level. This means that she is able to read
this text without the support of a teacher and she can accurately comprehend what she is
reading. Whitney’s estimated instructional reading level is 4th grade leveled texts. The
instructional level of reading is where students are able to read and comprehend a text with
teacher support. In both the third and fourth grade level text, Whitney repeated word phrases
or added on inflectional endings to words. Whitney will benefit from support in decoding and
word recognition to help with her overall reading fluency. Whitney is able to recall some details
from the text at her instructional level to help support her answers to both implicit and explicit
comprehension questions. It will be beneficial for Whitney to receive reading comprehension
instruction.

5. Listening Comprehension
A text aligned with the frustrational level, which is one level above the student’s determined
instructional level, (from the QRI, above) was used in this assessment. The text was read aloud
to the student. This assessment helps us determine if she can comprehend more accurately
when she does not have to decode the text.

Passage Name How Does Your Body Take in Oxygen?

Passage Level 5th grade

Comprehension Level 100 %

Circle one:
o Frustrational (75%-)

o Instructional (75.1%-89.9%)

o Independent (90%+)

Interpretation:
After listening to the 5th grade level passage, Whitney was able to accurately answer all eight of
the comprehension questions. This assessment shows that Whitney is able to concentrate fully
on the meaning of a text when it is read aloud and when she does not have to decode it.
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6. Oral Reading Fluency
Reading fluency is characterized by three criteria: accuracy, rate, and expression. The reader’s
fluency was assessed using multiple texts levels, including: 1) a lower level text from the
Wolfpack Readers fluency passages on the topic the child selected, 2) the text at the reader’s
instructional level (from the QRI, above), and 3) the remaining texts that were read during the
ARI. Accuracy was scored using the ARI guidelines. We scored reading rate using the words
correct per minute (WCPM) score, which was interpreted using published oral reading fluency
norms (Hasbrouk & Tindal, 2017). In order to score aspects of fluency related to expressive
reading, we used the Multidimensional Fluency Scale (Zutell & Rasinksi, 1991; adapted by
McKenna & Stahl, 2015).

Text 1: QRI text at Independent level

Passage Name (3rd grade level) Expository Text
Where Do People Live?

Words Correct Per Minute 91 words

percentile
Word Recognition Accuracy Level 98 %
Fluency Rubric Ratings
Expression and Volume 3/4
Phrasing 2/4
Smoothness 2/4
Pace 2/4
Total Score on Multidimensional Fluency Rubric 9/16

Text 2: Instructional level text from QRI

Passage Name ( 4th grade level) Narrative Text

Tomie dePaola
Words Correct Per Minute 69 words
percentile

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 Word Recognition Accuracy Level 96 %
Fluency Rubric Ratings
Expression and Volume 3/4
Phrasing 1/4
Smoothness 2/4
Pace 1/4
Total Score on Multidimensional Fluency Rubric 7/16

Interpretation:
According to oral reading fluency norms, a student in the middle of 4th grade should be able to
accurately read 120 words correctly per minute. Whitney does not currently meet this criterion.
She is currently reading 69 words correctly per minute in texts at the 4th grade level. Whitney is
reading 51 words below the 50th percentile for 4th grade according to the Multidimensional
fluency rubric and will benefit from explicit fluency instruction to practice reading words with
expression in more challenging texts, phrasing groups of words together, and reading at a pace
that is smooth without frequent breaks.

7. Academic Vocabulary Familiarity and Knowledge

Familiarity ratings: (Chosen topic = Weird Animals )

Rating Number of words Percentage
I have never seen or heard this word 6/ 15 40%

I have seen or heard this word but I 1/15 7%

don’t know what it means
I know a little bit about this word 3/ 15 20%
I know a lot about this word 5 / 15 33%

Knowledge:
Correct meaning in the sentence
Incorrect meaning = 0/ 15 words
Partial meaning = 1/ 15 words
Word was used with correct structure (part
of speech and grammar) in the sentence
No = 1 / 15 words
Yes = 7/ 15 words

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 Correct meaning = 7/ 15 words
Score = 8 out of 30 possible points Score = 7 out of 15 possible points

Interpretation:
Whitney recognizes some of the academic vocabulary related to the topic. In tutoring, Whitney
will gain more knowledge of these academic vocabulary words through reading and discussing
multiple texts on the chosen topic. At the end of tutoring, we will re-administer this inventory
to track changes in knowledge of these words.

8. Morphology
We administered the derivational morphology decomposition task (Kieffer & Lesaux, 2008) to
assess the student’s ability to use common word endings to transform words. This serves as a
measure of morphology and vocabulary depth and helps identify students who need additional
support with word endings or language structure. Students are given a word and asked to
provide the correct form of the word to complete a sentence. For example, when given the
word driver, the student has to complete the sentence: Children are too young to ____. The
correct answer for this item is drive. The assessment is administered verbally and does not
require the child to write the words.

Results are as follows:

Number of items answered correctly 20 / 25 = 80 %

Interpretation:
Whitney does not demonstrate a need for additional support with word endings and word
structure as a component of her vocabulary instruction. Overall, Whitney has a good
understanding of derivational morphological awareness in listening and speaking.

Summary and Interpretation of Results

After analyzing the Qualitative Reading Inventory data, Whitney’s estimated instructional
reading level is at the fourth grade level. In order to help Whitney gain more meaning from the
texts she reads, future instruction should include fluency and comprehension intervention.
With explicit and systematic comprehension support, Whitney will be able to accurately retell
events/details that occur in the text, and infer deeper meanings that come from text structures
and vocabulary. According to the oral reading fluency norms, Whitney is able to accurately
read most words but needs support with her expression, phrasing, and pace while reading. The
results from the Informal Decoding Inventory show that she has mastered her recognition of
words containing short vowels consonant blends/digraphs, and r-controlled vowel patterns.
Areas for support that Whitney will benefit from include phonics based instruction beginning
with vowel consonant-e words (Ex. five, chive, same) and words including vowel patterns of
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-oa, -ow and -ew. Additionally, Whitney needs more support in the Within-Word Spelling stage,
specifically with vowel teams and easy prefixes and suffixes. Whitney has a strength in
academic vocabulary and word meaning, according to the Morphology Decomposition Task.
Further supporting Whitney in her academic vocabulary and background knowledge will ensure
she is successfully and fluently comprehending a text.

Instructional Recommendations

The Wolfpack Readers program is organized around multiple instructional segments. Here we
detail the instructional recommendations for Whitney, based on the assessment data, for each
segment that she will complete.

Scaffolded reading and discussion with feedback

During the assessment session, Whitney indicated an interest in the topic titled: Weird Animals.
She will read books, websites, and other authentic texts on this topic with instructional support
from a tutor.

Depending on the difficulty of the text being read, the tutor will use a variety of reading
scaffolds to help Whitney successfully comprehend and learn new information from these texts,
including read alouds, echo reading, repeated reading, and choral reading. The text will be
broken down into short chunks (e.g., 1-2 paragraphs). After each chunk is read, the tutor and
reader will engage in a structured discussion using Reciprocal Teaching (Palincsar & Brown,
1984), a research-based method for text-based discussion that focuses on helping children
learn to monitor and repair comprehension difficulties. For each chunk of text, the tutor and
reader will take turns doing the following: 1) paraphrasing what they learned in their own
words; 2) asking each other questions about the text; 3) monitoring and repairing their
understanding of challenging concepts or ideas; and 4) predicting what they might learn in the
next chunk. These are strategies that Whitney will learn to use with increasing independence
during the 10-week session. Whitney will keep an inquiry journal where she will write about
what she learns from each text. Based on these notes, Whitney will give a short informal
presentation on the last night of tutoring, explaining what she learned about Weird Animals.

Repeated reading for fluency

In this segment, Whitney will read short texts on the topic of Weird Animals. These leveled
texts provide practice with high-accuracy reading of controlled texts. The tutors will use a
repeated reading approach (McKenna & Stahl, 2015) that consists of the following flexible
steps: 1) the reader reads a new text with minimal assistance (a “cold” read); 2) the tutor
provides feedback on the accuracy and expression of the child’s reading (e.g., helps with any
words that were misread; models a few sentences that were challenging); 3) the tutor and
reader collaboratively set a goal for the next reading of the text (i.e., increase number of words,
accuracy, and expression); and 4) the reader re-reads the text, trying to incorporate the tutor’s
feedback. This cycle continues multiple times until the reader is able to comfortably read the

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text with accuracy, appropriate rate, and expression. The tutor will use various techniques to
support the student’s fluent reading and to provide explicit feedback on word reading accuracy,
including echo reading, choral reading, alternated reading, and modeling of code-based word
attack strategies.

Systematic decoding/encoding through interactive word work

Using an explicit and systematic approach to decoding and encoding (spelling) instruction,
Whitney will practice the following sound-spelling patterns in this segment:
● Vowel consonant-e (Ex. five, chive, same)
● Vowel patterns - oa, -ow and- ew
She will learn these patterns to mastery using an approach that includes four parts: 1) Using
letter tiles to build, manipulate and analyze words that include these patterns; 2) sorting words
based on their sounds and spellings; 3) writing words; 4) and reading lists of words that
represent the patterns being studied. These activities are designed to promote the
development of high-quality lexical representations (memory) of words that include these
target spelling patterns so that Whitney can read them with automaticity in texts and spell
them correctly and efficiently in her own writing.

Structural analysis and syllabication of academic words

The tutor will help Whitney read and write complex words (with two or more syllables) by
analyzing their structure through a process of graphosyllabic analysis (Bhattacharya & Ehri,
2004). This includes breaking multisyllabic words into pronounceable parts by learning about
syllable types. This also includes learning to recognize common prefixes and suffixes and using
this knowledge to break apart and understand multisyllabic words (Rasinski et al., 2011). She
will learn about these word parts while also learning to analyze academic words found in texts
on the selected inquiry topic.

References

Bear, D.R., Invernizzi, M., Templeton, S., & Johnston, F. (2016). Words their way: Word study for
phonics, vocabulary, and spelling instruction. Boston, MA: Pearson.

Bhattacharya, A., & Ehri, L. C. (2004). Graphosyllabic analysis helps adolescent struggling
readers read and spell words. Journal of Learning Disabilities, 37(4), 331-348.

Cooter, R.B., Flynt, E.S., & Cooter, K.S. (2013). The Flynt/Cooter comprehensive reading
inventory-2. Boston, MA: Pearson.

Hasbrouck, J. & Tindal, G. (2017). An update to compiled ORF norms (Technical Report No.
1702). Eugene, OR, Behavioral Research and Teaching, University of Oregon. 

Kieffer, M. J., & Lesaux, N. K. (2008). The role of derivational morphology in the reading
comprehension of Spanish-speaking English language learners. Reading and Writing, 21(8), 783-
804.

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Leslie, L., & Caldwell, J.S. (2017). Qualitative reading inventory-6. Boston, MA: Pearson.

McKenna, M.C., & Stahl, K.A.D. (2015). Assessment for reading instruction (3rd edition). Guilford:
New York.

Palincsar, A.S., & Brown, A.L. (1984). Reciprocal teaching of comprehension-fostering and
comprehension-monitoring activities. Cognition and Instruction, 1(2), 117-175.

Rasinski, T. V., Padak, N., Newton, J., & Newton, E. (2011). The Latin–Greek Connection. The
Reading Teacher, 65(2), 133-141.

Roswell, F. G., Chall. J. S., Curtis, M. E., & Kearns G. (2005). Diagnostic Assessments of Reading
(DAR)(2nd ed.). Itasca, IL: Riverside Publishing.

Zutell, J., & Rasinski, T. V. (1991). Training teachers to attend to their students’ oral reading
fluency. Theory Into Practice, 30(3), 211-217.

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