Winter FAST - Celebrations and Goals

Last week, teachers at Keystone Elementary sat down with students and administered the winter FAST assessment.  This is the assessment the state uses to determine if students are proficient in reading.  Check out the graphs below to see how your child did on the sight word and fluency portion of the assessment.  Please email me if you need your child's number.  The number has not changed since the last time I shared a similar graph.  Students are in a random order for confidentially reasons.  

Celebrations:

I see many reasons to celebrate after looking at both graphs.  

1. Many students scored at or above the proficiency range for the winter testing period in both areas.  
2. In the area of fluency, 16 students scored above the winter goal (41 words/min). 
3. Also in the area of fluency, 8 students scored above the spring goal (70 words/min). 
4. In the area of sight words, 19 out of 20 students met the winter goal (48 words/min).
5. In the area of sight words, 16 out of 20 students met the spring goal (68 words/min).  This was especially exciting for me!  That is a lot of students who are already where they need to be at the end of the year! 
6. All students have made gains since November.  This assessment is a little different compared the way we had been collecting data in November and December.  The January score is the median score out of three assessments taken back-to-back.  We will be able to see a clearer comparison come February.  

Goals:

There is always room for growth!  As I look over this assessment data, I've also come up with a few goals.  I will use this information to also create individual goals with your student next week. 

1. All students need to read 70 words in one minute by the end of the year.  I ask myself a lot of questions to figure this out and sometimes the answer changes half way through.  What do I need to do to make this happen?  If the student isn't reading fluently, where are the hang ups?  What can I do to ensure the student has tools to use to practice the skills at school and at home?   All might seem like a lofty goal.  I don't have it in me to say that only 80% or 90% will achieve this goal.  If I don't believe they can, they won't.  I believe all students have the ability to learn at high levels, and I want to work with you to make sure that happens!
2. All students need to read a J or above by the end of the year.  This data isn't reflected in either of these graphs but it goes hand-in-hand with this information.  J is a level we use to describe text.  One way we level text is by using the alphabet with A being a book for beginning readers and Z for more advanced readers.  I want to ensure all students can understand what they read at high levels.  We will continue to work on a variety of comprehension skills throughout the year.  Which ones do students need more practice in?  How can I provide prompts in their book baggies to let you know what they need to practice?

Soon, I will be sitting down with your child to create individual goals in the area of reading, math, writing, and behavior.  If you have something specific that you'd like your child and I to discuss, please email me as soon as possible. 

Fluency Graph

Sight Words Graph