The Developmental Reading Assessment (DRA)



The Developmental Reading Assessment (DRA)

The Developmental Reading Assessment was developed in 1986 by a group of educators to assess students reading levels. “It is a tool to be used by instructors to identify a students reading level, accuracy, fluency, and comprehension. Once levels are identified, an instructor can use this information for instructional planning purposes.” (Assess DRA Reading Levels) The DRA process tests the student’s reading behaviors and errors, as they read stories aloud to the teacher. After the Developmental Reading Assessment is complete, the teacher will be able to assign each student with a reading level. These reading levels are commonly numbered and color coded on each book to ensure the students are choosing the “just right” book.

Background

The teacher has the ability to allow the student to choose a book or may choose one for them. The book should contain at least one hundred words for the student to read aloud. During the DRA preformed on 9/30/2013 to Melissa McAfee, predetermined reading material was already selected. Melissa is a third grader at Mountain View Elementary. She has a fourteen year old brother who has excelled throughout his educational career, a mother who is a college professor at SBU Mountain View, and a father who is a computer technician at Mountain View Elementary School. She has been on the honor roll all four years that she has attended elementary school and stated that she loves completing school work. Recently, she has finished reading three books; Crop Circles, Magic Tree House, and Silly Sally. She is currently reading the book Ghost in the House at school and Dairy of a Wimpy Kid at home. When asked to name three things that she does well as a reader, she responded with “pronouncing out words, reading fast, and taking tests over books.” There were also three things she stated that she would like to work on as a reader including; “reading longer books, reading the Bible, and reading more chapter books.” Melissa was very cooperative and engaged during her Developmental Reading Assessment.

The Assessment

During the Developmental Reading Assessment, Melissa read; You Don’t Look Beautiful to Me, Tiger’s Whirlwind Day, and The Mystery at the Mays’ House. The process started with the story, You Don’t Look Beautiful to Me level 28. Her reading engagement was 6/8, oral reading fluency was 11/16, and her comprehension level was 25/28. She read the story, which contained 176 words in one minute and thirty-two seconds. She made two mistakes, with one being self-corrected. It was determined that this story is at her independent reading level.

The next story was Tiger’s Whirlwind Day level 30. Before reading the story, Melissa was asked to think about the title and pictures. Then she was asked to describe what she knew about Karla and Tiger, the characters in the story. Melissa stated that, “Looks like she is having a hard time. Karla loves Tiger and wants to take care of it. Looks like he is trying to tap the trashcan, looks like he would listen to Karla because he cares about her too.” She was also asked to name three things that might happen in the rest of the story. Melissa explained that they “Might be in the house and Karla would talk to the cat and say, you almost blew away out there and got me worried. They would be checking outside to take things in.” Her reading engagement level was 6/8, her oral reading fluency was 12/16, and her comprehension level was 26/28. She read the story, which contained 228 words in two minutes and seven seconds. She made three mistakes, all being mispronunciation errors. It was determined that this story was at her independent reading level. After reading the story, Melissa was asked to summarize the story. She wrote, “There was a whirlwind storm and Karla and her father had to pick up everything in the yard. Karla was out looking for tiger. The lights went out. The front door opened and she got tiger away. tiger was gone karla looked in the hours but he was nowear. She wanted to go outside and look for him but she coulden’t. The story was over and she and her family went outside karla yelled for tiger al last he came out.”

The third and final story that Melissa read was, The Mystery at the Mays’ House level 34. Her engagement level was 6/8, her oral reading fluency was 12/16, and her comprehension level was 26/28. She read the story, which contained 216 words in one minute and forty-five seconds. She made four mistakes with one being self-corrected. It was determined that this story was at her independent reading level.

Reading Levels

To determine the reading levels, one must “calculate the percentage of miscues by dividing the number of miscues by the total number of words read.” (Literacy for the 21st Century pg 463) If the mistakes total 5% or less, the book is at the student’s independent level. This was the case in all three stories read by Melissa. “When there are 6-10% errors, the books is at the student’s instructional level, and when there are more that 10% errors, the book is too difficult- the student’s frustration level.” (Literacy for the 21st Century pg 463)

Recommendations for Instruction

After a Developmental Reading Assessment is complete, the teacher can use the information obtained for future instruction. If the student is lacking comprehension skills, the teacher may focus on teaching “the structure of stories, including plot and setting, and help him use semantic cues to support the visual ones.” (Literacy for the 21st Century pg 71) If the student is having problems with fluency, the teacher could focus on teaching “high-frequency words that the student doesn’t know.” (Literacy for the 21st Century pg 7) If engagement is the issue, the teacher may decide to let the student choose the reading material based on desired topics. The Developmental Reading Assessment is a great way to evaluate students reading levels. It helps teachers understand their student’s abilities and can be very beneficial for their future instructional planning.



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