Running head: CHILD LITERACY CASE STUDY 1

Child Literacy Case Study

Liana Reilly

Towson University
Running head: CHILD LITERACY CASE STUDY 2

Introduction

The child that I am doing my case study on is a first grader at Stevens Forest Elementary

School named Student J. He is six years old, turning seven years old very soon on October 28th.

Stevens Forest Elementary School is a Title I school in Howard County, and most of the students

that attend Stevens Forest live very close to the school. Most of the families walk their children

to school instead of drive. I only get to work with Student J in the afternoons on internship days

for about thirty minutes each time. When I do get to work with him, I pull him to a quiet corner

in the classroom. Sometimes there is a lot going on in the classroom because the students are

always in small groups at this particular time. From what I have observed, Student J is still able

to give me his full attention even if his peers are working near him. He gets really excited to

work with Ms. Reilly.

I wanted to build a relationship with Student J and learn a little more about him before I

began gathering writing samples from him. I first got to know Student J by giving him three

interest inventories. The first one was titled, My Feelings About Reading. I read him the

questions for all of the interest inventories, instead of having him read them, to speed up time.

For the first inventory, he would rate a statement such as, I like to read based on the three

responses of yes, sometimes, and no. From this inventory, I found out that reading was not

hard for him and that he actually enjoyed it. The next inventory that I gave him was the

Elementary Writing Attitude Survey, otherwise known as the Garfield Survey. I crossed out

questions that would not apply to him, such as, How do you feel writing a long story or report

in school. Because he is only in first grade, I had to make sure that the questions that I was

asking him were appropriate for his age and ability. I learned that he likes writing about topics
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that he is interested in and likes improving his writing, but he does not like to go back and edit

his work. The final interest inventory was simply titled, Interest Inventory. From this

inventory, I learned a little more about Student J because his responses were open-ended, such

as, What do you like to do after school? From this inventory, I learned that his favorite book

series was Lego City. This is how I came up with my first prompt for the first writing sample.

Throughout this case study, I will be the one testing and evaluating Student J. I will be

gathering three writing samples, administering the Phonological Awareness Profile, and

administering the Informal Reading Inventory to test and evaluate Student J on his reading and

writing abilities. Afterwards, I will be able to make recommendations for Student J to improve

his literacy skills. This case study will be completed for professional development and to meet

graduation requirements at Towson University. No data collected from this case study should be

used to evaluate Student J in school. To gather the first writing sample, I will prompt Student J

by saying, I know that you really like Lego City, but I know nothing about it! I want you to tell

me a little about Lego City by writing about it so that I can read it later on. I think this will

really spark his interest and encourage him to write because he is naturally interested in reading

and writing. Writing about his favorite book series will be entertaining for him. Now that I have

learned from the interest inventories that he likes writing about what he knows, reading in his

free time, spelling words correctly, and improving his writing, I have a better picture of Student J

as a learner.

Early Writing Sample Analysis

MCCRS Cluster Skills

The first writing sample was taken on September 15, 2016 and the prompt given to the

student was to write about his favorite book. The MCCRS that I focused on with this first grader,
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who I will refer to as Student J, was W2 CCR Anchor Standard: Write informative/explanatory

texts to examine and convey complex ideas and information clearly and accurately through the

effective selection, organization, and analysis of content. The W2 Standard for grade one

students states: Write informative/explanatory texts in which they name a topic, supply some

facts about the topic, and provide some sense of closure. For this assignment, I asked the student

what his favorite book was and he replied that he liked the Lego City series books. I asked him to

write four sentences about the Lego City books that would tell me a little more about them.

Writing Stages

According to The Developmental Stages of Writing by Richard Gentry, Student J is in

between the Initial, Middle, and Final Sounds (Stage 6) and Transitional Phases (Stage 7).

This source states that in Stage 6, children may spell correctly some sight words, siblings names,

and environmental print, but other words are spelled the way they sound. In Stage 7, writing is

interspaced with words that are in standard form and have standard letter patterns. While Student

J was writing his writing sample, I noticed that he put his pointer and middle fingers together

between each word so that he would space them out appropriately. He also knew to capitalize

every first letter of all four sentences and put a period at the end of each one as well. Student J

knew to capitalize I when speaking about himself in his writing. I would say he is halfway

between Stages 6 and 7 because he spelled environmental print, such as Lego City correctly

with appropriate capitalization, and he also spelled words with silent letters correctly, such as

build and have. Student J spelled some words the way that they sound when said out loud,

such as difrint (different) and peple (people). Those were his only spelling mistakes in his

writing sample. Overall, his writing was legible and his words had standard letter patterns.

Spelling Development
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According to the Spelling Stage PDF on Blackboard, Student J is in the transitional stage

of spelling. This is appropriate because he is a first grader and students in this stage are typically

between the ages of six and eleven. This source states that in the transitional stage, most basic

conventions of English spelling are evident and most common words are known and written

down unerringly. Instead of relying on sound for representing spelling, students in this stage use

visual and morphological information to spell. Student J spelled stuff correctly when a student

in earlier stages of spelling would not know that there are two fs at the end of the word. Before

he wrote the word different, he asked me how to spell it. I replied and told him to spell it the best

that he could. I watched him as he sounded out the word and eventually wrote down the word

difrint. Some people say the word different as a phonetic spelling of dif-rent and some

people say it dif-fer-ent. How a child says a word can affect how they write it because of the

syllabic spelling. The only two words that he spelled wrong were different and people and

the words were right next to one another. For his last sentence, he wrote a simple sentence with

words that he was familiar with. Common English letter strings were definitely evident in his

writing.

Composition Quality

According to Analyzing Primary Learners Writing in the ECED 429 Course Packet,

Student J demonstrates quality writing in many areas. He capitalizes his name and favorite book

title. As stated before, he makes sure that all of his words are two fingers width spaced apart.

Student J uses periods when he ends his sentences and stays on topic from start to finish. From

his writing sample, he does not show that he knows how to write in a beginning, middle, and end

sequence.
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According to Analyzing Primary-Aged Written Expression in the ECED 429 Course

Packet, Student J uses his writing materials correctly with a conventional pencil grip and by

respecting the one-inch margin on the left side of the paper. He also tries to keep his letters

between the lines of his paper. I prompted Student J to write about his favorite book, but he did

not talk freely about it before writing. Instead, he just started to write without any preplanning.

Student J did show that he knew when to use the correct form of the word have by writing both

has and have throughout his writing sample (subject/verb agreement). He stayed on topic

while he wrote and asked me to help him spell the word different, which showed that he asks

for checks about conventional spelling of words.

Handwriting Development

According to Handwriting Formation and Spacing in the ECED 429 Course Packet,

Student J may need extra assistance with learning how to write, but it is not a dire need for him.

For his age, it appears that his writing is developing typically. He could use extra assistance or

practice with spacing his letters so that he does not need to use his two finger width spacing

technique anymore. Overall Student Js handwriting is legible, and he makes an effort to spell

correctly and space out his words appropriately.

Recommendations for Growth

I believe that Student J would benefit from spelling instruction and practicing his

informative writing. According to the Developmental Writing Power Point on Blackboard,

Gentry and Gillett recommend a workshop approach to teaching spelling. Having Student J

select 4-5 words a week and keeping his own record of how he uses those words for the week

will help him with his conventional spelling of words. Student J may keep an individual spelling

log and practice using the words with peers through games and memory practice. According to
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the Great Schools writer, Jessica Kelmon, students in first grade will learn to write opinion,

informative, and narrative writing. The writing sample that I collected from Student J shows that

he needs more practice with organizing his writing thoughts in an informative piece. He wrote

what he was writing about, but did not give very detailed information about his favorite book

series that he decided to write about. A web graphic organizer could help him sort his

information by putting the main topic in the middle and information about that topic in the webs

that branch off of the main topic. Kelmon also discussed having a child work on pre-writing by

thinking, discussing, and then writing a draft. When students learn to write a draft, they learn to

self-correct their mistakes (such as spelling or sequence order) for the second draft.

Writing Sample 2

The second writing sample was taken on October 26, 2016 and the prompt given to the

student was to write about what he was going to do Friday for the Halloween parade. Student Js

writing has not changed much since the last writing sample. His sentences in the second writing

sample were longer than the sentences in the first sample so I was able to see more of what he

was able to do. He is still in the transitional stage of spelling. Most of the words were spelled

correctly; however, when he did not know how to spell a word, he would ask me how to spell it.

When I told him to sound out the words the best that he could, he relied on phonics to help him

write the words that he needed. Student J is still in between stages 6 and 7 of the writing stages.

He continues to capitalize I when writing about himself and begins his sentences with a capital

letter. He also still uses his pointer and middle fingers to help him space out his words. His

handwriting is legible and he still makes an effort to spell words correctly.

In the first writing sample, Student J only had two spelling errors. His second writing

sample was longer, but he had four spelling errors. One was a spacing error, writing alot
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instead of the correct way a lot. The other three spelling errors surprised me. He spelled poot

for put, presint for present, and ove for of. Although he had these spelling errors, it is evident

that Student Js writing has standard letter patterns and that he is attempting to spell out words

the way that they sound. He also wrote in between the lines better on the first writing sample. On

the second writing sample, Student J started to write diagonally for every line of writing after the

first two lines.

I think that Student J would benefit from being reminded to keep his writing straight and

on the lines. If he needed additional assistance with staying on the lines, he could highlight the

lines of the paper before he began writing so that they would stick out to him while he was

writing. From the second writing sample, it is evident that Student J needs to practice his sight

words through his misspellings of put and of. It is understandable that he spelled of as

ove with a /v/ because that is the sound that the f makes in that word. Given the word of on a

flashcard, Student J would be able to read it perfectly. He just needs to keep practicing his sight

words until he becomes very familiar with them. I would recommend that the teacher help him

make flashcards with different sight words on each card. The teacher could quiz him on the

words as she flipped through the deck. Afterwards, Student J would pick five cards/words to

practice writing on a piece of paper without looking at the word. The teacher would read the five

words to him and he would have to write them down on paper. Finally, I would still like to

recommend pre-writing strategies for Student J. Before starting this writing sample, he was

really excited to tell me about Halloween and his birthday coming up in two days, which was the

same day as the school Halloween parade. I think that by talking a little about what he was going

to write before actually starting to write helped him sort out his thoughts and have more to write

about. Student J also likes to get off topic and tell me all about his life. It is honestly such a good
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time, but sometimes he forgets what he is writing about and I have to constantly remind him and

bring him back to focus. He would benefit from organizing a list of ideas to write about, talking

about those ideas with a teacher or a friend, and then putting them down on paper.

Writing Sample 3

The third writing sample was taken on November 17, 2016 and the prompt given to the

student was to write about his favorite food, which ended up being ice cream. For this writing

sample, he first drew and labeled a picture of ice cream and then started writing about it

afterwards. I believe that Student J is still in the transitional stage of spelling. I believe that he

will be in this stage for some time because the average age range for this stage is between six and

eleven years of age. He is still spelling a lot of words phonetically, which is normal for a seven

year old child. I believe that he is officially in stage 7, the transitional phase, of the writing

stages. His writing is legible and he is attempting to approach conventional spelling. Although he

still relies on spelling words that he does not know phonetically, the sounds are all there and

correct. He has also stopped using his pointer and middle fingers to guide him in spacing his

words appropriately. He now spaces his words naturally on his own.

After two months of collecting writing samples, Student J still has quite a few misspelled

words in his writing. He spelled fairvrit for favorite, choclit for chocolate, flavier for

flavor, disert for dessert, and lik for like. Something that stood out to me was that he did not

capitalize I the two times that he used it in this writing sample. Student J has been consistently

capitalizing I when talking about himself in the previous two writing samples when using it as

the first word in his sentence. For this writing sample, he used i as the first word in two of his

sentences. Maybe he was rushing to get the writing sample finished, but that was something that

was not consistent with his previous writing samples. He kept his writing on the lines better this
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time, only writing diagonally a tiny bit at the end of each line. Student J is also able to write

faster now than he was able to two months ago. In September, he would have to focus more on

what he was writing. Now, his writing is starting to look more natural and he is starting to look

more fluent when doing it.

After collecting this last writing sample, I really believe that Student J would benefit

from raised line paper. The raised lines would give him tactile cues that would help define his

work space for writing. The tactile cues would remind him of where to start and end his letter

formations. When I had Student J read Level 1 and Level 2 stories out loud, he was able to

fluently read the Level 1 and could sound out every word of the Level 2. He is able to recognize

many difficult words when he is reading, but is not able to recall them when writing. I want to

recommend more reading outside of school for Student J. After he reads, he should write a few

sentences about what he read while using the text as a reference to spell words correctly. He

needs to practice his writing and begin using more challenging words that he is able to read in his

writing. Again, I want to recommend pre-writing strategies for Student J. Because we have a

limited amount of time to work together, it is sometimes hard for me to get Student J to focus on

what he is writing about because he wants to tell me so much about his life. He should plan what

he is going to write about before beginning to write about it. For this writing sample, we were

able to do that a little bit because he drew a picture of his favorite food first. Then we were able

to talk about ice cream. I was able to ask him questions such as what his favorite flavor was and

where he got his ice cream from. That seemed to help him a little bit with staying on topic. I

think Student J would still benefit from organizing a list of topics to write about, discussing them

with a friend, and then starting to write after the first steps had been completed. He could also be

given a visual cheat sheet with reminders about his writing process. There could be a light bulb
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to remind him to plan ideas to write about, a picture of two friends talking to represent sharing

his ideas with a friend, and then a student writing to remind him to put those ideas into words on

paper.

Phonological Awareness Profile

For the students privacy, I will refer to him as Student J throughout this analysis.

Student J has mastered discrimination in rhyming. He has nearly mastered production of

rhyming. He produced four rhyming words correctly, but when he was given the word wrinkle,

he replied, jinkle, which is not a word. He knew how to rhyme the correct sounds together, but

did not give a valid word for that answer.

Student J has mastered segmentation of syllables and 2 and 3-phoneme words. He has

nearly mastered segmentation of sentences. He clapped the words for the first four sentences

correctly, but for question five, Sit in your chair, he only clapped once for your chair instead

of clapping the two words separately. He has nearly mastered segmentation of compound words.

He was able to segment the first four compound words correctly, but he clapped the three

syllables for grasshopper instead of clapping twice for grass and hopper.

Student Js manipulation of 4 and 5-phoneme words is emerging. When given the word

plop, Student J separated the sounds /p/ /l/ /op/ instead of identifying the four phonemes in the

word. When given the word seashell, Student J separated the phonemes by saying sea

shell. When given the word plant, Student J separated the phonemes as /p/ /l/ /ant/. Because

Student J needs assistance with segmenting phonemes in a word, I would recommend that he

practice using Elkonin boxes. This would be beneficial for him because he could stretch 4- and

5-phoneme words into their different sounds. As he slowly spoke a word out loud, he would be

able to manipulate tokens into a box for each sound that he heard. He would start with 4-
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phoneme words such as plop, placing a token into each of the four boxes as he heard the four

sounds /p/ /l/ /o/ /p/. Then he would move on to 5-phoneme words such as plant, placing a token

into each of the five boxes as he heard the five sounds /p/ /l/ /a/ /n/ /t/. Elkonin boxes are easy to

make so it would not be hard for the teacher to add a box to the Elkonin box when the student

was ready for 5-phoneme words.

Student J has mastered isolation of initial phonemes and medial phonemes in a word. He

has nearly mastered isolation of final phonemes. When asked to give the final sound in the word

bring, he replied ing instead of /g/. He gave the correct final sounds for the other four words

given.

Student J has mastered deletion in compounds/syllables and in initial, medial, and final

phonemes; substitution with manipulatives and without manipulatives for initial, final, and

medial phonemes; and blending with compound words, syllables, and phonemes.

Student J has mastered 95% of consonant graphemes. The only consonant that he gave

the wrong sound for was r, saying ra instead of /r/. He has also mastered graphemes of short

vowels, diphthongs, R-controlled vowels, and consonant digraphs. Student J was not able to give

any correct long vowel graphemes. A teacher or parent could help him learn long vowels by

telling him that a long vowel says their name! He could use a picture card appropriate for each

vowel. For long A, the card would have a picture of an acorn, apple, and arm. He would say each

word out loud and could take a clothespin and place it on the correct picture with the long A

sound (acorn). Four more picture cards would have to be made for long E, long I, long O, and

long U.

Student J was only able to give one correct answer for a vowel digraph, which was the

sound for ai. An example of an incorrect vowel digraph was when he said oy for the vowel
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digraph, oe. A teacher could work with Student J to understand vowel digraphs by explaining

that in a vowel digraph, two vowels come together to make one single sound. An activity to

practice understanding vowel digraphs would be to play 3x3 vowel digraphs bingo. The teacher

would have a pre-made 3x3 board for the student with different words representing the five

vowel digraphs ee, ea, oe, oa, and ai. The teacher would say a word with a vowel digraph, such

as sail, and the student would have to find a word on their board that had the same vowel

digraph, such as tail. Once the student got three words in a row, they would win! The game

could start again by using a different pre-made board. With practice, the student could be given a

blank 3x3 board and fill in their own vowel digraph words before playing.

Student J was only able to give the correct sounds for 75% of the consonant blends given,

therefore consonant blends are an emerging skill. Examples of incorrect answers were when he

answered curr for cr, purr for phr, and /s/ /ch/ for sch. Student J could practice his consonant

blends by making flashcards with each consonant blend on an individual card. When a card

would be flashed, he would have to give a word with that same consonant blend in it. For

example, if the teacher showed him the card with cr, he could give crown or cry as an example.

Student J has mastered decoding of VC words, CVC words, consonant blends, vowel

digraphs, R-controlled vowels, and consonant digraphs. He has nearly mastered CVCe words,

reading four nonsense words correctly, but reading tede as ted. He has also nearly mastered

diphthongs, reading four nonsense words correctly, but reading nowl as newell.

Student J is in the representational stage of spelling, using his knowledge of sounds to

show most sounds logically represented in his spelling. For the word unicycle, he spelled it

unysicle. He spelled dream, matter, moth, hole, trucks, singing, and flowers correctly. He did

not spell shepherd or squish correctly, but he was still able to demonstrate his knowledge of sh
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digraphs by spelling sheperhd and sqish. His spelling demonstrated mastery in initial sounds,

final sounds, short vowels, long vowels, consonant digraphs, consonant blends, vowel

diphthongs, diphthongs, R-controlled vowels, and plurals (/s/ and /z/). He showed his spelling of

ng ending sounds correctly by spelling singing correctly. He needs to work on his past tense

ending sounds, ed(t) and ed(d). He spelled peckt for pecked and cald for called. A strategy to

help him with these past tense ending sounds would be to play a game to decipher ed(t) from

ed(d). Because he was able to identify the correct ending sound but not the ed spelling, he

would do an activity to change a word to its past tense. The student would be given a chart and

would start with a base word, change it to the past tense by adding ed, and verbally say the

word out loud to determine if it had the ed(t) or ed(d) ending. For an ed(t) example, the student

would be given the word laugh, change it to laughed on the chart, and say it out loud laugh/t/.

For an ed(d) example, the student would be given the word dream, change it to dreamed on the

chart, and say it out loud dream/d/. The students focus would be on recognizing that the past

tense of a word requires the ed at the end. The ending may make a /t/ or /d/ sound, but it should

be spelled correctly.

Overall, Student Js test results show that he has acquired knowledge of phonological

awareness. During testing, he would say, This is exactly like chunky monkey! Chunky monkey

is what he does in his reading group when he is pulled from class to work on breaking apart and

putting sounds back together. Because he was eager to participate during testing and demonstrate

what he learned, the interactive activities that were recommended for him would benefit him in

the areas that he struggled with.

IRI Analysis
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To gain a better understanding of words that Student J was able to read, I administered

Primer, First, Second, and Third Grade Level word lists. I wanted to start at a level below

Student Js grade level, but once he started reading the Primer word list I knew it was way too

easy for him. He scored 100% on total correct automatic for the Primer word list. For the First

Grade word list, he scored 100% on total number correct, but hesitated on the word enough.

For the Second Grade word list, he read 14/20 automatically correct words and 1/20 correctly

identified words for a total of 15/20 words correct. For the Third Grade word list, he read 9/20

automatically correct words and 6/20 correctly identified words for a total of 15/20 words

correct. The IRI lists below 14 words correct as a frustration level, but Student J was having to

sound out more words to identify what they were instead of knowing them automatically during

the Third Grade word list. I decided to end the word lists at Third Grade and move on to

choosing appropriate stories for him to read based on his ability to decode words in isolation.

I first started with The Surprise, which is a Level One diagnostic passage. Before

reading, I had him answer three concept questions to assess what he knew before reading. He

scored a 55% on the concept questions because he could identify what a puppy and treasure hunt

were, but did not know what an animal care center was. Next, I had him read the story out loud

to me. He read with 99% accuracy at 46 WCPM. The highest rate at which he could have been

reading this passage in 264 seconds was 47 WPM, so he was pretty close to achieving that goal.

He had two miscues while reading, which were an insertion and a substitution. He inserted

money at the end of the sentence, But that also cost too much. He also substituted the word

pup for puppy when the father thought, Ok, little pup, Ill take you home. Student J read

this passage with prosody on 3, which means that he read primarily in three- or four-word phrase

groups with little or no expressive interpretation. When I asked him to tell me what happened in
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the story after he read it, he was only able to recall five key details from the text. Two out of five

of those details were recalled from the setting background and two more out of five of those

details were recalled from the goal. He kept saying, I dont know when I would ask him if he

remembered anything else from the story. Student J was able to answer three correct explicit

questions and one correct implicit question based on the story, which put him at an instructional

level on this Level One diagnostic passage.

I decided to go up a grade level, so I moved on to Fathers New Game, which is a

Level Two diagnostic passage. He scored a 44% on the concept questions because he did not

know what a repairman was, and gave vague answers when asked what a treasure hunt was and

what it is like inside a refrigerator. Then, I had him read this story out loud to me. He read with

98% accuracy at 44 WCPM. The highest rate at which he could have been reading this passage

in 396 seconds was 45 WPM, so he was reading close to this goal. He had three miscues while

reading. He mispronounced Susan as sue-sun, read the word read as a present tense when

it was supposed to be read in the past tense, and substituted of in place of the word for.

Student J read this passage with prosody on 3, which means that he was still reading primarily in

three- or four- word phrase groups. Again, he showed little expressive interpretation of text while

reading aloud. His voice did not go up and down with expression and at times he read as if many

of the sentences were combined, not acknowledging the punctuation marks. When I asked him to

tell me what happened in the story, he was only able to recall 2 events from the story. Student J

was able to correctly answer two explicit questions and one implicit question based on the story,

which put him at frustration level on this Level Two diagnostic passage.

After speaking with Student Js general education teacher, it is evident that he is a

talented word reader. His weaknesses fall in comprehension. From administering these IRIs, it is
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evident that Student J struggles to recall information from the text. The general education teacher

has not been able to move him up a reading benchmark level because he cannot answer the

comprehension questions that correspond with his level reading. He is able to read all the words

of the book, but cannot retain the details from the story. He is also able to read in moderately

large phrase groups, but he does not read them with expressive interpretation. This could be a

factor as to why it is difficult for him to recall events from the story because he is not

understanding the characters spoken meaning. When words are in isolation, Student J can read

Grade Three words without much difficulty. Decoding words is a huge strength for Student J. He

needs supports that will help him retain the large amounts of words that he is able to read.

With both passages, Student J was able to answer explicit questions more easily than he

was able to answer implicit questions. If he did not know the answer to a question, he would

simply state that he did not know the answer instead of trying to think about it. The implicit

questions were more difficult for Student J because they required him to first remember details

from the story and then infer meaning from them. I believe that based on comprehension,

Student J is at Level One for comprehension. He should continue to focus on recalling main

ideas from grade-level texts. When he is able to recall events from his readings, he will be able to

retain more information in every content area.

Recommendations

Student J is functioning at the beginning stages of reading. This is typical for his age at

seven years old. He is able to read many words in isolation and in context above grade level,

relying more on print than on illustrations. He is just beginning to understand basic punctuation

when reading aloud. He only had two miscues in his Level One reading passage and only three

miscues in his Level Two reading passage. Even though he is able to read higher level passages
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and word lists, he is not able to recall many events from the stories or comprehend questions

based on events from the stories.

There are many strategies that Student Js teachers and family can use to improve his

reading comprehension. Student J should be encouraged to read aloud daily in order to improve

his reading fluency. This can be done one-on-one with a teacher or parent or in a small group

activity, such as Readers Theatre. In Readers Theatre, students are assigned a role in a play and

must read from a script. This would allow Student J to practice reading with expressive

interpretation. Teachers should encourage Student J to make connections as he reads. He can

practice doing this by reading a few sentences and then connecting what he just read to his own

life. The teacher can give him a prompt card that says, That reminds me of or, I read

another book that so that he has ideas for how to connect his thoughts. Another activity

Student J could do after he reads is fill out a story map based on events that happened in the

story. The teacher could print picture cards based on events in the story and Student J could place

them in the correct order. After pictures, he could move on to writing his own words on the story

map to recall events from the story. This would help him determine importance from the story.

Another strategy that could be implemented with Student J would be to have him ask questions

before, during, and after he reads to better understand the meaning of the text. Student J and the

teacher could create a list of before reading questions, during reading questions, and after reading

questions together that he would be able to use on a daily basis. Eventually, Student J would

become so familiar with the lists of questions that he would memorize them and it would become

routine for him to ask questions before, during, and after he reads. One more strategy that could

be implemented with Student J to increase his reading comprehension would be to give him

riddles. He would have to read the riddles and infer their meaning. This would help with his
Running head: CHILD LITERACY CASE STUDY 19

overall inferencing skills because the teacher could reference the riddles and thinking about

meaning while Student J is reading any type of text.

I would recommend many books from the Lego series for Student J to read because he is

so interested and willing to read them. Some books that I would recommend for Student J based

on his LEGO interests and comprehension abilities would be Trouble at the Bridge by DK, Fire

Truck to the Rescue by Sonia Sander, and all five books in the LEGO Ninjago pack. All of these

books are Level One books and could easily be read by Student J independently. What he would

have to focus on is recalling events from the story after he reads and making connections to the

text. I would also recommend that he read If You Give a Mouse a Cookie by Laura Numeroff and

The True Story of the 3 Little Pigs by Jon Scieszka because they are classic, entertaining books

that Student J would be interested in. These books also have many events that happen throughout

the story, so Student J would have more opportunities to recall a few events from the story.

Two internet sources that could assist Student J with his comprehension are

readingrockets.org and scholastic.com. Reading Rockets revolves around helping students

improve their abilities in reading. Scholastics mission is to cultivate students minds to utmost

capacity. Both websites provide all types of reading strategies varying between grade levels and

abilities. Reading Rockets provides strategies to help close the gap between what parents are

seeing at home and what teachers are seeing at school by encouraging both parties to have the

child make connections as they read, read material in short sections, ask open-ended questions,

and so much more. Scholastic provides strategies for parents and teachers to use at home and

school as well. It also provides them with ample research-based resources to increase

comprehension. Student Js word processing ability is above grade level, but implementing
Running head: CHILD LITERACY CASE STUDY 20

information from these two websites would make him an overall well-rounded reader when

decoding and comprehending in conjunction with one another.

Final Recommendations

Student J is a proficient reader for his age. He can read Level Three word lists at an

instructional level and is able to read Level Two diagnostic passages with only two miscues.

Student J needs assistance with strengthening his comprehension skills. Student J should practice

pulling out key details from any story that he reads independently or in a group. He can use a

graphic organizer designed to help students list main ideas from the text, or he can verbally tell a

teacher or parent what he has just read about. Practicing recalling events from the stories he

reads will help him start to do it naturally. Another strategy that could help him would be to

highlight main events in a story as he reads. He could use a real highlighter if it is his book or the

story is copied onto paper for him, or he can use highlighter tape if it is the teacher or librarys

book. It will teach him how to pull important information out of text and separate it from fluff

information. Student J should also read out loud daily so that he begins to pay attention to

punctuation and begins to read with expressive interpretation. Practicing reading out loud could

really enhance his verbal reading skills. Also, I would really recommend that a prewriting

strategy be implemented with Student J. When he has to write on the fly, he gets easily

distracted and cannot focus on what he is writing about. If he uses a graphic organizer or simply

lists his writing ideas before starting to write, it could help him organize his thoughts onto paper.

Finally, I believe that Student J would benefit from raised line paper so that his sentences do not

start to go below the lines towards the end of the lines. This would make him more aware of his

writing space.

Reflection
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I have learned how to identify the stages of writing and oral reading that students are

currently in. I now know how to take a childs writing sample and analyze it. Before this case

study I would just take a childs writing and think it was cute, not paying any attention to the

details. After collecting three writing samples, I can see how a childs writing improves and how

important it is to continually prompt young writers as they begin to write. I have also learned so

much more about what phonological awareness consists of. By administering the Phonological

Awareness Profile, I saw how important it is for children to recognize how to identify and

manipulate sounds. English is not an easy language to learn, so these little kiddos are amazing

me every day with what they already know. Finally, I learned what QRI is and how to analyze

data from it. It is so interesting that Student J is able to read higher level vocabulary, but he is not

able to recall much information from the text. Now I know that even if a student is reading at a

high level, it might not mean that they are ready to be reading at that level if they cannot retain

the information. Sometimes teachers need to take a step back and figure out what it is exactly

that a specific child needs to do in order to succeed. This literacy case study has improved my

skills as a future teacher tremendously and I am excited for my future students!

Citations

Hill, B. (2008). Supporting readers and writers at home (prek-grade 8).

Steele, B. (n.d.). ECED 429 assessment, observation, and evaluation in early childhood

education.

Frogmore Infant School. (n.d.) Guidelines for the teaching of phonics.