CALT Formal and Informal Assessment for Dyslexia 4 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: A CALT uses curriculum-based measurement (CBM) oral reading fluency probes with a student. What is the PRIMARY purpose of this informal assessment technique?
- To diagnose dyslexia definitively
- To monitor progress and evaluate instructional effectiveness over time (Correct answer)
- To determine eligibility for special education services
- To measure phonological awareness skills in isolation
Correct answer: To monitor progress and evaluate instructional effectiveness over time
CBM oral reading fluency probes are used as a progress-monitoring tool to evaluate whether instruction is working and to guide instructional decisions.
Question 2: When interpreting a student's score on the Comprehensive Test of Phonological Processing (CTOPP-2), a CALT notes a Core Phonological Index score of 72. What does this indicate?
- Performance is average for the student's age
- Performance falls significantly below average, suggesting phonological processing deficits (Correct answer)
- Performance is slightly above average
- The score is invalid and the test must be readministered
Correct answer: Performance falls significantly below average, suggesting phonological processing deficits
A standard score of 72 falls approximately two standard deviations below the mean of 100, indicating significant below-average phonological processing.
Question 3: A CALT conducts an error analysis on a student's oral reading and notices consistent substitution of short vowel sounds (e.g., reading 'bit' as 'bet'). This pattern MOST likely reflects a deficit in:
- Phonemic decoding of multisyllabic words
- Vowel discrimination and phoneme-grapheme correspondence for short vowels (Correct answer)
- Sight word recognition of high-frequency words
- Prosody and reading rate
Correct answer: Vowel discrimination and phoneme-grapheme correspondence for short vowels
Consistent short vowel substitution errors indicate a specific gap in the phoneme-grapheme correspondence knowledge for short vowel sounds.
Question 4: Which of the following BEST describes the role of a spelling inventory (e.g., Words Their Way Elementary Spelling Inventory) in dyslexia assessment?
- It provides a normed standard score for eligibility determination
- It identifies the student's developmental spelling stage to guide word study instruction (Correct answer)
- It measures phonological awareness without any orthographic component
- It assesses reading comprehension through written responses
Correct answer: It identifies the student's developmental spelling stage to guide word study instruction
Spelling inventories are informal tools that reveal a student's orthographic knowledge and developmental spelling stage, directly informing instructional planning.
Question 5: A CALT is evaluating a 4th-grade student for dyslexia. The student reads connected text at a 2nd-grade level but scores in the average range on listening comprehension. This discrepancy MOST strongly supports which conclusion?
- The student has a primary language disorder affecting both modalities
- The reading difficulty is likely specific to the decoding/print-access level rather than a comprehension language deficit (Correct answer)
- The listening comprehension score invalidates the reading data
- The student requires assessment for intellectual disability
Correct answer: The reading difficulty is likely specific to the decoding/print-access level rather than a comprehension language deficit
Average listening comprehension with significantly below-grade-level reading suggests the deficit is specific to decoding and print access, which is characteristic of dyslexia.
Question 6: During a nonsense word reading task, a student correctly reads 'vint' and 'strom' but consistently misreads multisyllabic nonsense words like 'tormastic.' This pattern MOST likely reflects a weakness in:
- Basic phoneme-grapheme correspondence for consonants
- Syllabication strategies and decoding of multisyllabic words (Correct answer)
- Sight word automaticity
- Rapid automatized naming speed
Correct answer: Syllabication strategies and decoding of multisyllabic words
Successfully decoding CVC and CCVC nonsense words but failing on multisyllabic items indicates difficulty applying syllabication and morphemic analysis strategies.
Question 7: A CALT administers the Gray Oral Reading Tests (GORT-5) and calculates an Oral Reading Index. Which TWO subtests are combined to generate this composite score?
- Rate and Comprehension
- Accuracy and Fluency (Correct answer)
- Rate and Accuracy
- Fluency and Comprehension
Correct answer: Accuracy and Fluency
The GORT-5 Oral Reading Index is a composite of the Accuracy and Fluency scaled scores, providing an overall measure of oral reading ability.
CALT Formal and Informal Assessment for Dyslexia 4
A CALT uses curriculum-based measurement (CBM) oral reading fluency probes with a student.
What is the PRIMARY purpose of this informal assessment technique?