SPED Project Assignment

1. Community-Based
Measurement: Maze Passage
Fluency Assessment
Veronica Kay Freeman
SPED 460

2. Academic Area Being Assessed is Reading
 What is reading comprehension and why is it important?
 It’s the act of understanding what you are reading.
 It is not simple to teach, learn or practice.
 It is an intentional, active, interactive complex learning process that occurs before,
during and after a person reads a particular piece of writing.
 It’s one of the pillars of the act of reading.
 It’s simultaneously using one’s awareness and understanding the following;
 phonemes (individual sound “pieces” in language),
 phonics (connection between letters and sounds and the relationship between sounds,
letters and words) and
 ability to comprehend or construct meaning from the text.
http://www.k12reader.com/what-is-reading-comprehension/

3. Why Test for Reading Comprehension?
 A student's ability to comprehend text requires the presence of a bundle of
component reading skills, including strong reading vocabulary, fluent decoding,
and use of efficient and effective 'fix-up' strategies when encountering unknown
words (National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, 2000).
 Teachers need a simple, time-efficient method to screen students for reading-
comprehension understanding
 Teachers need to monitor the progress of any student who is receiving an
academic intervention to improve text comprehension

4. CBM-Maze: Directions for Administration (adapted from Sarasti, 2009)
1. The examiner distributes copies of CBM Maze probes to all the students in the group.
2. The examiner says: "When I say 'begin', start reading the story silently. Wherever you come to a group of
(3) word-choices, circle the word that makes sense. Work as fast as you can but do your best work. If you
finish the first page, go to the next page and continue working until I tell you to stop."
3. The examiner says: "Ready? Begin" and starts the stopwatch.
4. After 3 minutes, the examiner stops the stopwatch and says: "Stop! Pencils down".
5. These directions are repeated for each Maze passage administered in a session. The examiner then
collects and scores the passages.
6. Initial Assessment: If the examiner is assessing the student for the first time, the examiner administers a
total of (3) Maze probes during the session, using the above procedures and takes the median (middle)
score as the best estimate of the student's reading-comprehension skills.
7. Progress-Monitoring: If the examiner is monitoring student growth in computation (and has previously
collected Maze data), only one Maze probe is given in the session.

5. Why is Curriculum-
Based Measurement
Maze Needed?
• It’s a tool ideally suited to assess student reading
comprehension (Parker, Hasbrouck, & Tindal, 1992).
• The student is given a sample of text with (3) random
choices from which they must chose correctly

6. Community-Based Measurement (CBM)
Maze: Description
 CBM-Maze passages are timed (3-minute) reading comprehension assessments
with a multiple-choice response
 Samples should be at least 300 words in length
 First sentence is left intact, but afterward every 7th word is selected to be
included in a 3 item choice randomly arranged
 Each student reads and completes the passage silently
 CBM-Maze can be administered to a single student, a small group, or an entire
class (Espin et al., 2010).

7. CBM-Maze: Materials
 The following materials are
needed to administer CBM-
Maze passages:
 Student and examiner copies
of three CBM Maze passages
 Stopwatch
 Pencils for students
Class # Words Total
Test A 35 300
Test B 55 405
Test C 58 433

8. Characteristics of Students
 The three students I selected are all American Indian female elementary and
middle school students ranging from 3rd to 8th grade
 They haven’t been diagnosed with learning disabilities
 They make above average grades and tend to perform satisfactorily on tests
 They have no observable behavioral problems
 They have good academic, social and financial supports
 They live in a rural community and participate in afterschool tutoring programs
 They have a strong influential home life with both parents living in the home

9. How to Assess Reading Comprehension with CBM:
Maze Passages
Step 1 Generate
Test and Answers
• Use free online
application
• Copy and paste
passage
• Print test
• Print Answer Key
Step 2
Administer Test
• Distribute copies
• Rehearse directions
• Measure 3 minute
test time intervals
Step 3 Score Test
• Record the number
of correct and
incorrect responses
• Add up totals
• Mark scores on test
Step 4 Compare
Results
• Compare results
with research-based
norms
• Describe outcomes
• Explain details

10. How Will the
Assessment Results be
Used?

11. Assessment Results
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
40
Test A Test B Test C
Student Test Scores
Page Haley Malea

12. Assessment Results Utilization
• Schools that administer
these tests use the results to
inform teachers about
student progress and skills
that need to be re-taught
• Teachers use the results to
help them make decisions
regarding lesson planning,
grouping and differentiated
instruction.
 Teachers get results quickly, and they can
establish reading groups based on the
abilities and needs of each student.
 Teachers use these results to determine
whether students are improving and
showing growth. If they aren't, teachers
adjust their instruction. For example,
maybe they need to focus on phonics
instead of comprehension, or they need
to emphasize oral reading and retelling.

13. Curriculum-Based Measurement
(CBM) Graph
 Setting up the graph
 At the top of the graph, fill out the student’s name, his or her classroom and/or grade, and
information about the level at which the student is being monitored with CBM.
 After you have collected baseline CBM information, fill out the start date and end date in the
Baseline date section for the time span during which you collected baseline data (Figure 1).
 Then decide how many instructional weeks that you plan to monitor the student’s progress.
 Fill out the start date (Monday) and end date (Friday) in the Monitoring date section for each
instructional week during which monitoring will take place (Figure 1).
 If possible, you should try to collect at least one CBM observation per week for your target
student. It is a good idea to fill in the weekly start- and end-dates in advance to give yourself
an incentive to stay up-to-date on your CBM monitoring.

14. Obtaining Free Maze Passages
 Schools can obtain free Maze passages and Maze benchmarks for grades 2-6
from the DIBELS Next website: http://dibels.org/next.html
 Schools can also obtain their own CBM Maze passages in PDF format based on
text typed in by the user by accessing the Maze Passage Generator, a free online
application:
 http://www.interventioncentral.org/teacher-resources/test-of-reading-
comprehension

15. Strategies to Improve
Assessment Scores

16. Academic Strategies for Direct Instruction of CBM
1. “Show them!”: The teacher
demonstrates to students
how to use the skill.
2. “Watch them & praise
them!”: Students practice the
skill under teacher
supervision.
3. “Make them use it!”:
Students employ the skill
independently in real
academic situations.
4. “Expand their horizons!”:
Students use the strategy in
all appropriate settings or
situations.

17. How to Monitor Progress in Reading
• Utilize technology to
maintain results and
compare data
• Use creative methods to
measure results
• Create reports that record
data collection and
demonstrate progress and
growth potential

18. Limitations of the Research Norms
 Norms generated from small-scale research studies--like those used here-- provide
estimates of student academic performance based on a sampling from only one or two
points in time, rather than a more comprehensive sampling across separate fall, winter,
and spring screenings.
 These norms also have been compiled from a relatively small student sample that is not
fully representative of a diverse 'national' population.
 Nonetheless, norms such as these are often the best information that is publicly available
for basic academic skills and therefore do have a definite place in classroom instruction
decision-making.
 These norms can be useful in general education for setting student performance
outcome goals for core instruction and/or any level of academic intervention.

19. Ask-Read-Tell: How to Boost Reading Comprehension Video

20. Resources
 http://www.interventioncentral.org/curriculum-based-measurement-reading-math-
assesment-tests
 http://www.k5learning.com/reading-comprehension-worksheets/fifth-grade-5
 http://www.jimwrightonline.com/mixed_files/lansing_IL/_Lansing_IL_Aug_2013/3_CBA_Maz
e_Directions.pdf
 https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Revelation+5&version=KJV
 http://www.k12reader.com/what-is-reading-comprehension/
 http://www.brtprojects.org/publications/dl/51/
 http://www.jimwrightonline.com/pdfdocs/brouge/rdngManual.PDF
 http://education.seattlepi.com/teachers-students-dibels-reading-assessment-results-
2932.html