Danielle Koncius Oral Language Assessment Dr.

Casey- ELD 307

The purpose of the oral language assessment is to evaluate and measure the language skills of a group of students throughout the school day. In order to effectively define the communication skills and oral language of the students, I observed them in various circumstances such as, one-to-one with an adult, self-chosen peer groups, small instructional groups, and their play settings. By the end my observation, it is expected that the students oral language skills is accurately and explicitly recorded and defined clearly in this oral language assessment. The assessment of oral language is most effective when the student is being assessed in a natural, open classroom environment. This provides the observer with an opportunity to monitor the students language skills most accurately. An oral language assessment will be useful to take the necessary steps in determining the progress of a student and the possibility of providing the student with either challenging. This informations purpose is also necessary to have when a student seems to be progressing irregularly. In other words, by creating an oral assessment for a child who is progressing slowly, the teacher may realize that this student needs to be assessed by a specific therapist such as a speech pathologist in order for them to reach their academic potential. The goals of oral language assessments are to make sure that classroom talk is used as a tool for children to express knowledge and that students are facing new challenges. In order to effectively conduct my oral language assessment, I prepared a checklist of aspects to look for in the children and recorded the specific details of when these behaviors or actions occurred. For example, when I observed the children during recess in order to witness their language in their play setting, I recorded the details of how the children were playing and how they were communicating with each other outside of the classroom.

When performing an oral language assessment, it is important to remember that it should be performed in a proper setting in which the child will feel comfortable displaying their skill level. The classroom in which I observed has a very warm and welcoming environment. At first glance, the general setting of the classroom strongly encourages learning and growth among the students and has an enriching atmosphere. There are many informational pictures and posters around the room for the children to refer to at any time necessary. The students sit at tables that can fit four to five children; this allows for plenty of communication among the students. There is a carpet area for the children to gather on when they are doing their morning meeting and other activities such as story time. The students, as a whole, are very talkative and involve themselves in quite a lot of communication and socialization, even if they are asked to sit silently. This made my assessment rather interesting because I was able to see the students communication in many different situations such as with one partner, a small group of children, or the whole class. The students are six years old and there is about an even amount of boys and girls. To my delight, the boys and girls did often communicate with each other and I witnessed many mixed gender groups during partner reading. The students enjoy participating in discussions and showing their classmates their knowledge and skills. Throughout my assessment I looked into detail many different conditions in which the students would display their communication skills and oral language. For example, when the children first enter the classroom in the beginning of the school day, they are to complete their journal entry which consists of a sentence and a picture that the teacher asks them to write about. On this day the students were asked to write the sentence, My favorite food is and finish the sentence with their favorite food. While observing the students during this activity, I noticed many students were partaking in self-talk while trying to figure out how to spell a word. I could see many students sounding out the words out loud and then writing down what they were thinking. In many cases the words were not spelt correctly, but at this age what is important is that they were sounding out the letters and trying their best to spell

the words. Also, I was lucky enough to be observing on a day that the teacher was conducting one of her monthly assessments on the students. This assessment was to evaluate the students progress on reading sight words. I was able to see first-hand how the students responded to a one-to-one with their teacher. Many of the students looked to Mrs. Roth for assurance if they were unsure of a word. They spoke quietly when reading a word they did not know and read the words loudly that they did know. It was clear that it is important for the students to please the adult figure in the classroom. When the students worked one-to-one with a classmate of their choice during partner reading, they enjoyed sharing the stories with their classmates. For example, two students that always work together, Michelle and Anthony (the names have been changed for the confidentiality of the children), picked a story that they knew would be a slight challenge for them. They took turns reading the pages and helped each other with the words that the other had a problem with. The communication between these two students is very impressive and they showed a great level of communication skills not only with each other but in reading the story out loud with such enthusiasm. During an activity in which the teacher chose the peer groups it was clear that the students in one group were put together because they are very vocal and talk often. They were quite persistent about getting their ideas for the poster known to the rest of the group and they all attempted to take social action and leadership above the others. They did try to plan what to do on the poster but the communication was not very organized and the students got very little work done. I stepped in and told them to take turns drawing a picture on the poster. After I intervened, things seemed to run more smoothly among this group. Later on, the class as a whole sat in the carpet area for the teacher to read a story. This story, A Bad Case of Stripes, is about standing up for what you believe and for who you are. Before the teacher began reading the story, she asked for the students opinion on why it is important to stand up for yourself. All of the students are very eager to participate and communicate their ideas to the rest of the class. Many students seem to raise their hands and speak before they fully have their

thoughts together or even having an answer to the question. Although many of the students did not answer the questions properly, I was very impressed with the oral language of the students and their ability to express their thoughts so confidently to the class. The group as a whole is very eager about communication among their peers and to the adults in the class. Finally, I observed the students during their recess time in order to get an idea of the use of their communication skills outside of the classroom, when they are not being assessed in any way. The children, to my surprise, did play a lot with both genders and communicated very politely with each other. The children were running around the jungle gym for the most part but the communication that I did witness consisted of asking the other children what activities they would like to do or something along these lines. The boys were definitely more active than the girls were in their play setting. There were many oral language functions that I noticed the children engaging in during my observation. For example, during sharing time when the students were asked to share a story of a family vacation, the students were very enthusiastic about sharing stories with their classmates and with the adults in the room. Their way of communicating these stories is not very gathered and smooth, but the excitement in their oral language is very enlightening and appropriate for their age. It is very common for this age group for students to not be able to gather their thoughts together and verbalize them in a proper manor. The students were able to express language and literacy knowledge when they verbalized their intake on the story that was just read to them and used words that were in the story such as, impress. As mentioned, the students are very eager to share their point of view, take leadership, and ask plenty of questions. During my oral language assessment I have observed that these students are a very enthusiastic and vocal group of children. They enjoy communicating with each other and expressing their oral language skills to their teacher.

Due to my detailed observation, I have taken in a lot of information that would help me determine the best method to teach this group of students based on these findings. If I were to teach this class I would be sure to frequently ask for the students input and opinions and create activities that require communication and leadership skills. The students seem to get restless and very talkative during any quiet activity so I would allow the students to place themselves where they are most comfortable and would stay focused while sitting silently. During independent reading, for example, the students would be allowed to spread themselves out around the room in order to avoid too much conversation that would inevitably occur if they were to be sitting at their tables. Also, after a guided reading, I would give the students the opportunity to display their thoughts by writing and drawing their views on a question such as, What do you think the boy should do if the bully confronts him again? This will allow the students to place their opinion without spending too much time talking about it after the story. By using what I have observed and perceived of this particular group of students, I am able to determine the most appropriate methods of instruction that the children will learn and develop from most effectively. I have learned a lot about this age group and I am looking forward to seeing their communication skills and oral language grow throughout the semester.