Early+Years+Readers

__Introduction__ In our sample class of six, we conducted interviews to investigate our students reading interests, fluency and comprehension levels. The students ranged from prep to grade 2, and as expected showed a range of abilities and interests.

__Reading Interests__ The reading interviews showed that most of the children like to read, and some think they are are quite good at reading, however others were not quite as confident in their ability. It also showed that all the children, bar one, like to read at home, and particularly enjoy being read to. The genres that the children like to read were mostly narrative fictional books, both chapter and short stories, with a range of themes from adventurous science fiction to feel good picture story books and those comic by nature. Some of the strategies that the children were able to identify when attempting a tricky word include, sounding it out and looking at the pictures to make sense of it. Responses as to why the children think that people read included, because they like to, to get better at writing, to learn more words, or because it is interesting and exciting.

__Identifying suitable texts__ One method of identifying a suitable text for an early years reader, is to use the ‘Five Finger Rule’ (W.P.S 2011). To use this as a guide, the child selects a book they would like to read, and turns to a page in the middle. They then begin to read with a clenched fist, and each time they come across a word they do not know, or cannot pronounce properly, they put up one finger. By the end of the page, if the child has no fingers up, the book is too easy, if they have 4-5 fingers up it is too hard, and if they are reading the ideal book, the child should have 2-3 fingers up. So, you want the book to have a few challenging words, but not so many that the child becomes frustrated with reading and fails to comprehend what has been read (W.P.S, 2011).

Table 1: Defining Key Terms.
 * Phrase || Definition ||
 * __Reading Fluency__ || Reading 'fluency permits the reader to grasp larger units and even phrases with immediate recognition.' (Ferrara, 2005 p. 215) ‘Fluency is important because it frees the child to concentrate on the meaning of the text. Less fluent readers focus their attention on decoding the individual words and they have little attention left for comprehending the text.’ (CIERA 2001) ||
 * __Reading Comprehension__ || 'Comprehension is understanding the meaning of what is read from the print, illustrations, layout and design.'(Hill, 2006 p.190) ||

__Assessing Fluency__ In order to assess the six children's reading fluency levels, we used Hill's Reading Fluency Rubric (Hill, 2006 p. 170 figure 7.21). This rubric allowed us to assess each child's level based on their reading rate, phrasing, pausing, emphasis and use of expression. Table 2 below is a summary of each child's fluency results.

Table 2: Summary of children's fluency level according to Hill (2006, p170)
 * Student || Rate || Phrasing || Pausing || Stress || Emphasis ||
 * A || 1 || 2 || 2 || 2 || 2 ||
 * B || 3 || 3 || 3 || 2 || 3 ||
 * C || 1 || 2 || 1 || 1 || 2 ||
 * D || 2 || 2 || 2 || 2 || 2 ||
 * E || 2 || 2 || 1 || 1 || 1 ||
 * F || 1 || 1 || 2 || 1 || 1 ||

As visible from the table, there is a quite a large range from the highest achieving student to the lowest achieving. The implications this presents to a teacher is that each child needs to have an individualised learning plan. For example the lowest achieving student may have to have a lot more face time with the teacher in such activities as guided and shared reading on lower level texts, however the highest achiever cannot be left behind, they too must be pushed with more difficult texts and comprehension activities.

__Assessing Comprehension__ To assess the children's comprehension, the children were presented with a text they have not read before. After completing the book, the children were then presented with a number of questions about the book and the events within. In order to effectively assess comprehension there are three types of questions needed. The three levels of comprehension questions are, literal, interpretive and inferential. Literal questions are right in front of the reader, only requiring a recall of information. Interpretive questions challenge the reader to think beyond the obvious, the answer should still be there, but it requires more than just a recall. Finally Inferential questions prompt the reader to think and 'provide a critical or creative response.' (Hill, 2006 p. 194) Another way of assessing comprehension is through the Torch Test. Although we did not use this form of assessment, it can be easily implemented to assess multiple children at once. Every child is given the same short story, and is given ample time to read through it. Having read the text the children must then fill in the blanks on a work sheet that has re-written elements of the original text. The results from this test give each child an approximate reading age. From the data we have gathered all of the children were able to satisfactorily answer the literal questions, which means that they were able to retain the main ideas of the story. The interpretive questions were also answered acceptably, displaying the children's ability to read further into the book. However when it came to the inferential questions, child C and D really struggled to negotiate the questions, and lacked a creative response. The table below indicates each child's VELS reading level.

Table 3: Children's VELS Reading Levels.
 * Student || VELS Level ||
 * Child A || 1.25 ||
 * Child B || 1.5 ||
 * Child C || Working towards level 1 ||
 * Child D || 1.25 ||
 * Child E || 1.25 ||
 * Child F || Working towards level 1 ||

__Implications For Teaching__ As clearly visible from above, the six children in our class are at varied stages of reading development. This therefore strengthens the importance of individual goal setting and program implementation to assist each child to reach their full potential. Because the children are spread across 4 VELS progression points – 0.5 to 1.5 – this also further supports the need for individual based learning.