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 Literacy Assessment

 Miscue: a deviation or difference between a reader's production and the text when the reader is reading aloud. Developed by Ken Goodman, miscue anlaysis is based on two major assumptoins:

1. Miscues are not random but have a variety of causes. Result of readers' constructions of the linguistic message based on readers':

  • present oral language development knowledge of the topic of the reading passage
  • purpose for the reading
  • familiarity with the register or genre of the text, etc.
  • affective filter (everybody makes mistakes when they read aloud

2. Miscues reflect how readers are actually using the reading process. Integration of three major cues:

  • graphic cues (graphophonemic): set of relationships between sounds and the written forms to represent those sounds in texts
  • syntactic cues: interrelationships of words, sentences, paragraphs, using the form of the sentences to predict the function of words
  • semantic clues: the meaning of texts, deducing meaning from the possible meanings of the words, depending upon the context.

 Modified Miscue Analysis (MMA): a procedure by which a child's miscues (made while reading a text aloud) are qualitatively and quantitatively assessed to gain insights into the child's reading strategies. Part of the procedure is asking the child to retell the text subsequent to the oral reading.

Selection of Materials

  • Use a piece of literature (avoid basal passages): a story, an informational piece, a magazine article, or chapter book.
  • The selection should be entirely new to the student, but at the same time it should incorporate concepts and situations that the reader can comprehend.
  • The length of the selection should be such that it can be read inten to fifteen minutes.
  • The student should read an entire selection even if onlly a portinon is coded and analyzed.
  • The selection must be difficult or challenging enough for the student so that miscues will be made, but it should not be so difficult that the reader is uncomfortable reading.
  • A selection must generate a minimum of 25 miscues to be used.

 Taping the Oral Reading and Retelling:

  • The child reads from the printed text while the teacher marks on a worksheet
  • The whole session is tape-recorded.
  • Worksheet must be an exact copy of the text (many teachers use photocopies)
  • You should practice in order to maintain the flow of the assessment session without gaps for the reader.

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