Running Records (entry #8)

I conducted running records on two of my ELL students.  The first is a native Spanish speaker, but does not read or write in Spanish.  When assessing the running record, he read with 89% accuracy on the first test, which made it a "frustrational" level, so I dropped down a level.  Then, the next level down was too easy, scoring with 95% accuracy.  Therefore, on this running record, there was not an ideal instructional level.  I chose to analyze the test on which he scored 89% because it provided more meaningful data than the other. 

 
Based on the above running record, I noticed that this student uses visual cues frequently when reading.  Most of his errors were made based on how the word looked.  In particular, he uses the initial sound to help him figure out the rest of the word.  Unfortunately, he often neglects the end of the word in his decoding.  Once he recognizes the initial sounds, he then uses the meaning of the sentence to guess at the word.  When analyzing this running record, I repeatedly saw that he uses meaning and visual cues, but I rarely saw errors based on syntax.  This made me wonder, how often do ELLs make syntactic errors?  Are most ELL reading errors based on visual cues because that is what they understand and recognize best?

I would like to move forward with this student by explicitly teaching the skill of decoding the entire word, rather than the initial sound and guessing at the rest.  Although I did not recognize any errors that came specifically from being a native-Spanish speaker, I did notice behaviors that may be due to being an ELL student.  This student was obviously rushed in his reading.  He was nervous and seemed to try to read as quickly as possible.  This may be because he knows he is below grade level and is not confident in his abilities.  I would like to work on building his confidence by providing him with more opportunities to read one-on-one with me from texts at his independent level, so he will begin to view himself as a reader of English.  Finally, I think he would benefit from listening to a recording of his own reading.  Out of 15 errors, he only self-corrected 4.  This student needs to listen to himself read and begin to self-monitor his errors.  He speaks and listens to English with greater accuracy and ability than his reading.  When listening to his reading, I believe this student would immediately recognize his mistakes.  He would hear that some of his errors do not match the text.  The goal is for him to begin to self-correct those mistakes while he is reading, not after.

The second student I assessed is a new student to my class but has been in the country for about a year and a half.  He is a native Arabic speaker.  He scored lower on the running record than I had initially expected.  He read with 88% accuracy on a Level A assessment.  Although it is only 41 words, this assessment provides important information for how to move forward with this student.

This running record shows the student's knowledge of many sight words (I, go, to, the, room, zoo, sleep, my, park).  He did not need to decode these words, he recognized them immediately.  However, as soon as he came to an unknown word, this student lacked any strategies to solve the word.  For example, when he reached "ice cream shop", the student was stuck.  He paused for several seconds, and then just skipped it and moved on.  Similarly, on the words "library" and "movies", he began to decode them using the initial sound he recognized, and then guessed at the remainder of the word.  He does not seem to have enough understanding of English language phonics to be able to decode.  Additionally, because he is early in his language acquisition, this student is not able to use meaning to accurately read.  He simply does not have enough vocabulary to fill the gaps created by his lack of decoding skills.  Moving forward, this student will benefit from direct phonics instruction.  Because English and Arabic do not use a common alphabet, acquiring the letter/sound relationships may take extensive one-on-one instruction.  In addition, opposite of English, Arabic is written from right-to-left.  This may cause further confusion for the student.  However, because this student has a strong vocabulary in his native language, he will most likely progress quickly once he understands the fundamentals.

Both of these students are eager and enthusiastic learners.  As they work to build their language skills, they will need sheltered instruction in order to not be left behind in the content areas.