A LOOK AT THE DATA......SO FAR.

As of August 16, five students have had their six-year-net survey completed.  It was interesting to me, as I began collating their data, that the difference in actual weeks at school for those five students, at the date of testing, varies from 31 weeks to 42 weeks.  

On checking through the TKI website, I found that this particular test is  '...best used after one year of school instruction.'  and wonder if we should be actually testing at 40 weeks of schooling, not on the 6th birthday.  (Just a thought).

Anyway….back to my data.

Spelling tests began in term two.  Not all students got ‘on board’ with the learning and testing.  In fact, it is only in the last week that almost all students are making progress to new lists of words.

Students A and E were tested two and four weeks later.  Neither student had strong letter/sound knowledge, and were reading at Level 1.  Consequently the results of these two students has not been great.

Student C’s ability to hear and record sounds was 0, but he could write 6 words – his name and five HFW.  While student D could identify 52/54 letters, she was unable to associate any sounds to the letters.  It was purely ‘letter ID’.  This supports what our team has become aware of – letter sounds are far more important than the letter names.  In our team we have begun to only letter sounds, and once these are known, then we are introducing the letter names.

Comparing reading levels, Student D was reading at level 6, while student B was reading at level 3, yet student B wrote 2 more words than student D (and he recorded more letter sounds).  It could be that student D doesn’t cope with being tested, or maybe wasn’t feeling 100% that day.  It’s just interesting.

I look forward to seeing the results for students  J to N, as they will have the longest time to work at the spelling programme I’ve begun.

WOS At test		Gender	Writing Vocab		Words Written		Hearing & Recording Sounds
			5 wk	6 yr net
	N	M	5
	M	M	6
	L	F	1
	K	F	5
	J	M	3
	I	M	0
	H	M	0
	G	F	3
	F	F	1
31	E	M	0	0	-		0
42	D	F	3	7	to, the, like, Im, me, a, is,		16
40	C	M	0	6	Name, the, I, a, is, to		0
39	B	M	1	9	Name, mum, to, I, the, a, like, too, is		19
40	A	F	0	2	Name, the		10

Meanwhile, I will continue with the weekly spelling tests – working on HFW, and developing letter, blend and chunk, sounds to aid thoughtful attempts at more difficult words.  I may, at the beginning of term 4 check what words students A – E are able to write.