Universal Screener: Early Literacy Indicators

Universal Screener: Early Literacy Indicators

Introduction


Performance data for 11 early literacy skills is gathered and reported when a student in kindergarten through third grade completes the Language Arts Universal Screener. This data is included in the Universal Screener Student Summary Report. Brief descriptions of each Early Literacy Indicator and the specific mini-assignments are shown below. The titles of each assignment are listed below each indicator. 

Note: The indicators measured on each form of the screener vary depending on grade level and time of year.

Phonological Memory 

The ability to hold on to speech-based information in short-term memory is called phonological memory. It is distinct from phonological awareness, which only refers to the ability to identify sounds. We rely heavily on our phonological memory when reading and spelling. 
  1. Early Literacy | Phonological Memory - Comparing and Contrasting Phonemes
  2. Early Literacy | Phonological Memory - Manipulating Phonemes

Phonemic Segmentation

The ability to break words down into individual sounds.  For example, a child may break the word “sand” into its component sounds – /sss/, /aaa/, /nnn/, and /d/.
  1. Early Literacy | Phonemic Segmentation - Multisyllabic Words
  2. Early Literacy | Phonemic Segmentation - Single Syllable Words

Phoneme Manipulation Tasks

Phoneme manipulation is the act of rearranging or changing individual sounds (phonemes) in a word to create new words.  This can be done by adding, deleting, or substituting phonemes. For example, a child may change the /s/ in “sat” to /b/ to get “bat”.
  1. Early Literacy | Phoneme Manipulation Tasks - Phoneme Addition, Deletion and Substitution

Alphabetic Knowledge 

The ability to identify letters by name, shape, and sound. Letter naming is recognizing letter shapes and associating them with a letter name. Letter-sound knowledge is determining what sounds are associated with a letter.
  1. Early Literacy | Alphabetic Knowledge - Letter-sound knowledge


Blending 

Decoding is recognizing that each letter makes a specific sound, and blending is putting those sounds together to read the word.
  1. Early Literacy | Blending - Consonant Blends
  2. Early Literacy | Blending - Vowel Digraphs

Onset & Rime 

One process to decode words.  The onset is the part of a single-syllable word before the vowel. The rime is the part of a word including the vowel and the letters that follow.
  1. Early Literacy | Onset & Rime - Decoding Single Syllable Words

Word Identification

The ability to accurately and automatically identify sight words and apply decoding strategies to read unfamiliar words.
  1. Early Literacy | Word Identification - Automatically Identify Words

Word Recognition Fluency 

The cluster of strategies that are used to recognize words in reading, includes the instant recognition of sight words, the interpretation of context clues, and the use of phonics and structural analysis (morphology).
  1. Early Literacy | Word Recognition Fluency - Grapheme Pairs - Phonics
  2. Early Literacy | Word Recognition Fluency - Structural Analysis - Affixes

Oral Vocabulary 

An important focus of literacy refers to the knowledge of words, including their structure (morphology), use (grammar), meanings (semantics), and links to other words (word/semantic relationships).
  1. Early Literacy | Oral Vocabulary - In Context - Word Relationships
  2. Early Literacy | Oral Vocabulary - Structure and Meaning

Semantics

 Semantics refers to understanding the meaning of sentences and the relationship of words within a sentence.   
  1. Early Literacy | Semantics - Meaning of Sentences
  2. Early Literacy | Semantics - Relationship of Words in a Sentence

Basic Text Comprehension

 The ability to read text, process it, and understand its meaning. It relies on two, interconnected abilities: word reading (being able to decode the symbols on the page) and language comprehension (being able to understand the meaning of the words and sentences).
  1. Early Literacy | Basic Text Comprehension - Gain Meaning from Text Structure
  2. Early Literacy | Basic Text Comprehension - Use Tools/Charts to Analyze Meaning of Text

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