Week #9

A QRI is an informal reading inventory and is used to assess readers’ levels. Teachers provide students with word lists of their grade level. The teacher uses the results of these word lists to assess students’ levels. With the results, the teacher can group students according to level, know what to teach, help the students, or go on with the QRI to read a short paragraph of the student’s correct level. The teacher has the students read a paragraph while she does a running record. Then, the teacher asks the students to retell the story. The results of the QRI can be used by teachers to determine, reading groups, books for individual use or literature circles, class books, and student growth.

DIBELS is an assessment used to check if students are on par with their grade level. DIBELS include a number of mini-assessments. The student does a few tasks while the teacher times the student and stops him after a minute (or more in some cases). DIBELS assesses phonemic awareness, comprehension, vocabulary, and fluency.

DIBELS are used to assess students at-risk for literacy problems so that they can be provided with proper instruction, and for teachers to see which issues to address.

The QRI 5 and DIBELS are similar in that they are both reading assessments used to help students. However, they are very different. In the QRI 5 there are steps to doing the assessment. First the word list is administered. If it is not on the student’s level, then the teacher may go down levels until it is at student’s instructional level. Then the teacher chooses the paragraph based on that level. In the DIBELS assessments there are no stages. There are just assessments to administer based on age. The assessments are unrelated to the outcomes of the other sections of assessments. Also, the DIBELS has a stop-watch. The student is tested on how much he gets in one minute (or more in some cases). The QRI 5 is more relaxed in this sense, as there is no stopwatch. (However, the student can be timed to see WCPM.)