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Kelsey Olson
Formal and Informal Assessment
April 1, 2014
Assessment Observation and Narrative
I observed a tri-annual assessment for a 5th grade boy. He is currently in a 4th/5th grade
special education classroom for about 70% of the time. The main areas he needs help with
according to his teacher and IEP are Decoding and Writing. The student was very excited to
begin the assessment process. His teacher arranged it so that he was missing music, which is not
a favorite subject of his. The assessment took place on a rectangular table in the back of the
classroom after all the other students left for either music or science. The student sat at the
shorter end of the table and the teacher sat on the other side of the corner with the assessment
flipbook in-between them. The teacher had the protocol behind the flipbook out of the students
eyesight and made a mark for every answered question. I sat across from the teacher and also
was given a protocol and student response book to follow along with, although I did not mark in
it. Before we began the teacher asked the student if it was ok that I observe. The student said that
he did not care at all. He was very eager to get started and asked the teacher if he could work on
math after he was done. The teacher seemed surprised and told him that he certainly could, but
he could also choose to play on the computers instead since that is what she normally lets
students do afterwards as a reward for doing assessments. This seemed to make the student even
more excited to get started. Overall the assessment atmosphere was very light and un-stressful.
The student seemed very comfortable with the teacher and the concept of assessment.
The assessment instrument that was used was the Woodcock Johnson III. The LetterWord Identification section was the first to be administered. They began on question 10 and the
basal was established by question 15. The teacher complemented the students effort after most
finished pages by saying things like youre doing so good. When the student said that he didnt

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know one, the teacher responded, Ok, try the next one. After the student had missed four in a
row the teacher said, Ok, try a couple more. I thought that this was a good way to motivate the
student to finish the section and let them know that they are almost done. This student had
previously almost reached the ceiling (6 incorrect), but got one right after missing four. The
words were clearly difficult for the student and he was showing signs of frustration (twisting
arms and hands while thinking about the answers). While the fact that he did get one right after it
appeared that he had already hit the limit shows the importance of waiting until 6 are missed, it
still seems a bit excessive, especially when the student is getting answers correct after quite a
struggle. After this section the students mood level was a little lower than it was at the
beginning, although he was still interested in continuing.
The next section assessed was Reading Fluency. For this section the student uses the
student response book and is supposed to circle either Y or N depending on whether the read
statement is correct or not. For the first sample question, the student being assessed wrote out the
full word yes rather than circling Y. The teacher stops him and explains that because the
answer is yes, he needs to circle the Y. The student then continues with the actual assessment
beginning at number 1. After the time is up for the Reading Fluency portion, the student
expresses his desire to start the math assessment section. At this point the music class next door
had gotten quite loud. The student says it is not distracting to him at all, but the teacher decides
to just give the Math Calculation assessment and wait until later to give the timed Math Fluency
assessment section. The teacher later tells me that for most other students she probably would
have forgone assessing that day during music, but she knew the student well enough to know that
he was not distracted by the noise. The student being assessed took the Math Calculation very
seriously and made a clear effort to get as many questions correct as he can. He did not show any

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frustration during this section, unlike previous sections where it was apparent when he was
approaching a needed stopping point.
After Math Calculation, the student did two more sections: Spelling and Writing Fluency.
He began the spelling section at question 12. Instead of writing the letter U he wrote the word
You. The teacher prompts him to write the letter and he then changes his answer to Y. The
teacher continues with question number 13. During the assessment, the teacher writes each
incorrect spelling on her scoring sheet on writes 1 for correct words. By the end of the Spelling
assessment, the student seemed a little tired. After going over the sample items for the Writing
Fluency assessment, the teacher asked if he was ready to do one last one for today and he
immediately starts working on question 1 without verbally responding. After completing the first
four questions, the student begins sighing at the start of each question and then writing a
response. When the timer goes off at the end of seven minutes and the teacher says that it is time
to stop, the student does not immediately stop writing. The teacher touches his hand that is
writing and repeats that he needs to stop. When the pencil is down, she then tells him that he did
an amazing job today and he can now go play on the computer until lunchtime.
While observing this assessment, I really tried to focus on how the teacher juggled
reading the prompts in the book, observing the student, and keeping track of everything in the
protocol. Observing all of the important information that needs to be observed and writing it
down was a bit of a struggle when I did my own assessment. I also noticed how the positive
relationship between the student and the teacher made the whole process a pleasant one overall.
Even though the student got a little frustrated at times, he still seemed confident most of the way
through and the teacher was very good at providing encouragement as needed. This really
highlighted how important the assessment environment is for getting through the process.

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