Assessment of Reading and Writing Difficulties: An Interactive Approach, 5th edition

• Teachers get a detailed look at a number of topics critical to reading assessment success, including:
• a detailed focus on assessment in an interactive approach to reading and writing
• an emphasis on classroom-based assessment focusing on word recognition and spelling as well as foundational aspects of phonology, and a focus on vocabulary, comprehension, and composing, as well as the foundational aspects of semantics
• major ideas related to Response to Intervention (RTI)
• coverage of issues related to English language learners
• a section on literature discussion
• analyses of contemporary research
• Readers are prepared to understand the concepts in the book through the knowledge base presented in the first section, “Theory into Practice.”
• Guidance for moving through the rest of the text and beginning the assessment-instruction process by evaluating groups of students and identifying those who need diagnostic assessment is provided in the second section, “Getting Started with the Assessment-Instruction Process.”
• Evaluating the reading/writing context–and valuable tools for accomplishing this–is the focus of the third section, Evaluating the Context.”
• Valuable help and practical tools for collecting critical information about individual students is provided in Section Four, “Evaluating the Learner.”
• Teachers see how assessment and instruction work together in the final section, “Interactions: Assessment as Inquiry.”

Completely updated throughout, this new edition focuses on the most recent thought and practice in the assessment process; includes a new Case Study, new case examples for diagnostic teaching, clear discussion of assessment at the district and classroom levels, an enhanced discussion of progress monitoring, a new diagnostic model, and more; and provides coverage of the Common Core State Standards.

Throughout the text, readers get the most recent thought and practice in a reorientation of the assessment-instruction process to focus on a SYSTEM of assessment that begins with using whole group data for screening to determine who needs additional diagnostic assessment and proceeds to the use of diagnostic information for the purpose of differentiation and intervention.

The authors’ focus on assessment takes into account the role of differentiation and intervention beginning in the classroom, rather than waiting for a specialist’s comprehensive diagnostic work up.

A new Case Study in Chapter 3 and Appendix A aligns with the new orientation of the text.

New assessments and modes of managing data are included in Chapter 10’’s new case examples for diagnostic teaching.

Readers are better able to understand how to identify struggling students and those requiring further assessment with the help of clear discussion of assessment at the district and classroom levels.

Through an enhanced discussion of progress monitoring the authors provide guidelines for effectively using the tools and examples of best practices. (Chapters 7, 8 , 9, 10)

Teachers can better align school-based practices with a diagnostic model included in Chapter 3’s new discussion of the types of assessment.

Guidance for planning assessment and instruction is included in Chapter 6’s discussion of Common Core State Standards, with a focus on Text Complexity.

New Appendices cover a discussion of test concepts and an annotated listing of IRIs.

The flexibility of the material in this abbreviated text makes the information more in line with current university offerings.