In second grade students take weekly reading tests to practice our learning, and formal theme tests at the end of every unit. These tests measure their ability to comprehend a story, use grammar skills, and articulate their understanding of the story based on the comprehension strategy and/or skill of the week. In second grade there is a wide range of reading abilities as it is a transition time. You have students who are still focusing on decoding strategies, while you also have students who have very strong decoding strategies and beautiful fluency. This is a factor of the transition that happens in reading instruction in third grade. The students are beginning to read to learn as compared to simply learning to read. One component of reading that is consistent across all levels though, is the need to comprehend a story. I had students who could read higher level texts, but I continued to read lower levels with them to push and increase their ability to comprehend a story.
Rationale
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On these weekly and theme tests my students struggled with the comprehension style questions. This was determined by doing an item analysis of the students scores. Prior to the item analysis the data from their first theme test showed that two thirds of my class scored in the proficient area, as defined by my district. This surprised me as I knew from my observations in guided reading that comprehension skills was a need in my classroom. I also had taken note on the fact that my students find these tests to be the one part of class that they struggle with. With that knowledge in mind, I did an item
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analysis of the students theme test. I calculated their score simply on the comprehension questions by taking out the grammar questions. This is when I discovered that 44% of my class scored below 50% on the multiple choice comprehension questions. I also saw that 55% of my students scored below 50% on the written portion of their answer. This then made me curious to look at their Accelerated Reader scores. After looking at those, I saw that 61% of my students, on average, score below 80% on their Accelerated Reader comprehension questions.
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I felt that reading comprehension was an important need in my classroom to address because not only were my students not confident in their ability to comprehend what they read, but the data also shows that this was a need. Comprehension is a crucial skill to have and use as you continue in your education. As you get into higher grades you are expected to read information prior to class, in order to participate in class the next day. When you get into a job, no matter what the field is, your boss is going to expect that you can read material and understand and apply the knowledge gained from your reading. By taking the time now to focus and address the need to build comprehension skills in my students I was doing my job as an educator to give them the support that they needed. Then as my students continue into third grade next year and are exposed to more district and state testing, they will have the knowledge that they need to be successful.