Writing Assessment: Student Analysis

Student Introduction:

KP, the student I have selected, is a kindergarten student at William Allen White

Elementary School. I would consider KP to be a higher-ability student. He excels in most all

subjects and has a great interest in learning. Most generally, he solves his own problems by

exploring, asking questions, and using tools around the classroom. When he does not know the

answer to something, it is almost guaranteed that he will ask or find the answer himself. As for

attitude, he is relatively positive when it comes to academics. He shows happiness when he

knows the answer or understands. When he comes across something he does not know or

understand, it peaks his curiosity rather than making him upset. He is meticulous with his work,

especially writing. He takes longer than the other students to complete work, writing or drawing

slowly to ensure he does not make a mistake. If he does make a mistake, he is agitated and will

start over. For example, the students were asked to reflect on the trip to the pumpkin patch by

drawing a picture with details they saw. He spent the entire time drawing, not easily distracted by

fellow students. When it was time to pick up, he refused to move on because he wasn’t finished.

The next day, there was time to finish the picture. He looked at his writing piece and noticed he

forgot to draw the school bus that picked him up. He threw away his picture, which he had spent

over an hour’s time time, and began to start over. This attention to detail is shown throughout all

of KP’s work. The student’s early work showed only pictures. As Mrs. Dalton introduced the

alphabet, his worked displayed letter strings. Now that the class is working on sight words, KP

often writes sight words he has memorized into his pieces of writing. When asked what his

favorite part of the day was, he confidently answered “journal time!”

Writing Samples:

(early sample)

This was a sample from the student within the first week of school beginning. While it

may look like a lot of scribbles, this does depict a story. KP’s writing shows detail but at this

time does not show any conventional letters or signs of pretending to write letters or sentences.

(recent sample)

This sample was taken weeks later, after the alphabet had been introduced. The class had

been working on saying the alphabet, knowing each letter, and slowing introducing letter sounds.

Unprompted, the student used journal time to write letters he knew. As you can see, a letter

string was written. Letters are identifiable and sizable when compared to each other. A mixture

of both capitalized and lower case letters were used. When asked about what he had drawn, his

letter string directly correlated with his picture. In this sample, he pretended to write sentences

and give a caption for his picture.

Troll Assessment:

30/32

38/42

18/24

38/42

30/32

86/98

Troll Assessment Analysis:

While I knew the student’s ability level was higher achieving, completing the TROLL

assessment and observing the student showed promising growth for the student’s writing

progress. The student scored an 86/98, placing KP in the 90th percentile rank. According to the

article Teacher Rating of Oral Language and Literacy (TROLL): Individuating early literacy

instruction with a standards-based rating tool, scoring in the 90th percentile suggests that the

“child should be encouraged to read and write at advanced levels in school and at home.” I

would have to agree, with diligent work from parental figures and the teacher, the student is fully

capable of advancing well past his current grade-level expectations.

During the TROLL assessment, some categories needed no observation. The student is

incredibly verbal, leaving quite the unforgettable impression. With that being said, I knew the

student confidently starts many conversations with both peers and adults. He often tells of home

experiences and always has something to share during “good things” in the morning. At times,

his shared stories/experiences are slightly unclear because he leaves out small details that make

them truly understandable. However, he does fill in the missing gaps when asked to clarify. As I

mentioned, the student has strong verbal skills. His strengths range from a wide vocabulary and

appropriately expresses curiosity. His reading skills are at about the same level, scoring a 38/42.

He expresses interest in reading, and is skilled at identifying words familiar words. He easily

memorizes new words and can sound out one syllable words without much assistance. Being that

he is newly introduced to technical writing, he is highly engaged in learning how to write. He has

begun with conventional letters, and repetitively writes what he has been taught thus far. He has

yet to explore a more creative form of writing, such as signs, labels, stories, songs, and poems. I

have no doubt that he will begin soon. Overall, the TROLL assessment accurately identifies is

oral, reading, and writing skills.

During the assessment, he thoroughly enjoyed the extra attention. While the TROLL

assessment requires more observation than questioning the student, he is clever enough to know

when I’m taking interest in his activities. Compared to what I’ve noticed in class, I have had to

take note of details to find his strengths and weaknesses. I expected the student to excel in this

particular topic area, but the TROLL assessment fine-tuned the strengths I would not have

noticed. For example, I hadn’t noticed whether or not he dabbled in creative writing. The

TROLL assessment revealed that he has not yet attempted this form of writing. Also, I didn’t

know how much he had paid attention to classmate’s names. We haven’t taken time to formally

teach other student’s names, I wasn’t sure if he would be able to identify them. To test his

abilities, there are job jugs in the room with each student’s name on them. I asked the student to

get me “so and so’s” job jug. To my surprise, he correctly identified his classmate’s names on

the job jugs. To conclude, I would say the assessment precisely identified the student’s skills.

More so, if I didn’t know his capabilities at the top of my head, using the assessment assisted me

in identifying his potential.

Writing Analysis Tools:1. Developmental Writing Analysis

Reasoning: As I was comparing the stages, I was primarily analyzing the first two stages to see where

the student would be placed. Ultimately, I decided to place the student in the preconventional

stage. The student primarily uses pictures to convey meaning. While KP may add letter strings

for detail, the source of writer to reader communication stems from drawn images. Secondly,

when compared to the requirements from the emerging stage, the student does not add words to

support the picture and does not add labels, signs, names etc. However, the student does write

their own name on pictures and understands that the picture is meant to convey meaning.

A large factor used for a writing continuum placement was in the emerging stage, stating

“uses beginning consonants to make words” and “uses beginning and ending consonant to make

words.” At this time, the student has yet to use his letter knowledge to make words for his

pictures. Occasionally when the student learns a new sight word, he may choose to incorporate

the word into his picture somehow. Although, I would not consider this to be significant enough

to place him in the emerging stage. For these reasons, I have confidently placed the student in the

preconventional stage.

2. Developmental Spelling Analysis

Reasoning: Again, to determine the appropriate stage of spelling development for the student, I

compared the most likely stages. The pre-communicative stage seemed far too facile, the student

is well past using scribbles, is capable of writing all letters and shapes, and understands a

letter/sound connection. For these reasons, I have determined the pre-communicative stage to be

entirely too simple. Moving two stages forward, the phonetic stage has requirements that would

be difficult for the student. For instance, the student has yet to venture into developing words

based on sounds they know; nor is the student ready for tricky vowel usage.

This brings me to the semiphonetic stage, a suitable stage for the student. In the

semiphonetic stage, students begin to understand letters have sounds, grasp left to right letter

arrangement, and know letter names and formation. These are skills the student at hand is

capable of doing. Additionally, the student can identify beginning and ending sounds. Having

met these requirements, I would categorize the student in the semiphonetic stage.

Summary/Reflection

Taking a closer look at the student’s writing samples, it is clear to see the student is in the

beginning stages of writing. Comparing the two student samples, one could see progression

between the two. The first has an obvious story to it, especially for a kindergartener’s beginning

work. He relies deeply on images, connecting the two with lines and direction. At this time, he

was not able to express the meaning of letters but could affectively explain his image in thorough

detail. Moving onto the later sample, or sample two, the work relies far less on images and more

on newly learned letters. In fact, he had specific reasons for placing the letters next to each other.

He used “child spelling,” but spelling nonetheless.

The tools previously listed were vital to the analyzing process, they guided me through

the process with the actual paper copies and the observation process. I’m not sure I would have

noticed the child’s right to left writing if it were not for the guidance of the tools. Needless to

say, the student shows promising potential in many aspects of writing. His progression between

the short time the samples were taken were immense, growing from vague pictures to formal

letter strings. With due time, I suspect the student will excel because of the enjoyment he gets

from learning how and what to write. With this all being said, the student was an absolute joy to

analyze and I will continue to watch his progression during my time with the student.