Reading Skills Snapshots

Happy Saturday! I know it’s been a while, but I wanted to drop in quickly to share a resource you can use to communicate with parents. These Reading Skills Snapshots are informal assessments that I use during small group instruction.

reading assessment

I use these as a communication tool for parents. I’ve used them during conferences and as something I send home each month. You could also use them for your own personal files to keep track of student growth over the year.

Editable Reading “Snapshot” Assessments

This file is an editable template, so you can type in specific skills that you are working on with each reading group. You decide how often you send them (weekly, monthly, every other week, or quarterly.) Below I have some examples filled with skills that I have typed in (the actual file only has the headings for each category and then space for you to type in the skills.)

Here is an example for kindergarten:

reading assessment

Type in the skills that you are focusing on for your reading groups. Then you can save them from year to year and just tweak them as needed.

reading assessment

Click here to find these FREE Editable Reading Skills Snapshots

You can find these two HERE.

More Assessments

Looking for more rubrics? I got you covered! Click HERE to see writing, reading response, and math rubrics.

writing assessment

Looking for phonics assessments for multiple skills? Check out my Phonics Quick Checks.

Click here to see this Phonics Assessment.

Want to read more about Reading Intervention? Click here!

« Phonics Intervention

Phonics Assessments »

Sarah's First Grade Snippets

2 hours ago

One of the things we love about studying bases is how many opportunities it creates to revisit prefixes and suffixes!We absolutely believe in explicitly teaching affixes, but we are also all about that base! Plus students also need lots of opportunities to practice applying what they’ve learned.When we explore a base and its word family, students encounter familiar prefixes and suffixes in new combinations. They revisit their meanings, see how they work with different bases, and make connections to previous learning.And here’s another benefit! Students don’t have to wait for an explicit affix lesson to begin exploring that affix. They can encounter it in a word family, discuss how it contributes to meaning, and begin building familiarity with it. When it’s time for explicit instruction, they already have some experience with it!Over time, studying different bases gives students repeated opportunities to revisit both familiar and newer affixes. Instead of learning each affix in isolation and moving on, students keep coming back to them in meaningful ways.This is one reason we love making base exploration a regular part of morphology instruction. When we talk about base exploration we mean free bases like the ones here (bases that can also be stand alone words) and bound bases (bases that are not words on their own). We have developed lessons for free and bound bases as well as prefix and suffix lessons. Comment BEYOND to learn more. ...

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Sarah's First Grade Snippets

5 days ago

This is really at the heart of what we believe about teaching literacy.Think about everything we teach: phonics, spelling, vocabulary, grammar, and comprehension. We know they’re all important, but so often, they’re taught in their own little silos.One of the things we love most about morphology is that it gives us a way to connect all those pieces!When we explore how words are built, we’re doing so much more than teaching prefixes, suffixes, and bases.We’re helping students understand how words are pronounced, how they’re spelled, what they mean, and how they work in sentences.And those connections matter!We’re not saying morphology replaces explicit instruction in any of these areas. But we believe it can help bring them together in meaningful ways.That’s what we’re working toward at Logos Literacy Academy. We want to help teachers move beyond teaching word parts in isolation and use morphology to build a deeper understanding of language.Because to us, morphology isn’t just about building words. It’s about building language. ❤️Are you interested in learning more? Comment BEYOND. ...

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Sarah's First Grade Snippets

2 weeks ago

Happy Halloween! 🎃👻 Let’s talk about something that’s been haunting English spelling for centuries… GHOST LETTERS!Did you know that many of the letters we call silent today weren’t always silent?Long ago, the k in knee, the w in write, the g in gnaw, and the b in lamb were actually pronounced! Over time, pronunciation changed, but the spellings stayed. Those letters are like little ghosts of sounds from the past! 👻Some of these spelling patterns have fascinating connections to meaning.👻 kn: Notice how words like knee, knuckle, knit, and knife relate to joints or sharpness. 👻 wr: Many words beginning with wr involve twisting, turning, or bending. Think about how wrist, wring, writhe, wrench, and wreath relate to twisting.)👻 gn: Words like gnaw and gnash share a connection to biting or grinding. Even a gnat is an insect that bites! 👻 mb: These words have another interesting story! While the b in lamb was once pronounced, the b in words like thumb and numb was added to the spelling later, likely because of the influence of other words. (Source: etymonline.com)Of course, these aren’t “rules” that we should apply to every word. They’re fascinating patterns and interesting tidbits though! So these sounds may be gone, but the letters are still haunting our spelling! 👻Happy Halloween! 🎃If you’re interested in learning more about words and how to integrate morphology, phonics, vocabulary, and grammar, comment BEYOND. ...

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Sarah's First Grade Snippets

2 weeks ago

When we teach spelling, are we just teaching students to put letters in the right order? There’s so much more to it! English spelling is influenced by both sound and meaningful structure. Words are made up of meaningful parts called morphemes. And when students begin to recognize those parts, they start to understand WHY words are spelled the way they are.One way we can help students notice this is by “spelling out” a word. When we spell a word aloud, we can help students notice how that word is built. Instead of just naming each letter, we say the letters in a way that highlights the word’s structure. (Check out the examples on the slide.)Michelle and I are so passionate about bringing morphology into our literacy instruction. 💗 That’s exactly the kind of teaching we explore inside our Beyond Phonics Club.We created this community to help teachers connect the pieces of literacy instruction, from phonics and spelling to morphology, vocabulary, and beyond. We have videos, a growing library of lessons and student materials, and monthly community calls. Teaching reading doesn’t stop at phonics, and neither should our professional learning!💗 Want to join us? Comment BEYOND and we’ll send you the details! ...

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Sarah's First Grade Snippets

4 weeks ago

When you think of dyslexia, what comes to mind? 🤔A common misconception is that it’s mixing up letters or reading words backward. But those aren’t the signs we should be looking for!There are signs we might notice in a student’s reading, spelling, writing, and even before they start learning to read.And dyslexia doesn’t look the same in every child! It exists on a continuum, with varying degrees of difficulty and different patterns of strengths and weaknesses.So what should we do when we notice these signs?Screeners like DIBELS and Acadience can help us identify students who may be at risk for reading difficulties. From there, we can dig deeper to understand exactly where a student is struggling and what instruction they need.And remember, we don’t need to wait for a dyslexia diagnosis to begin providing targeted intervention!The more we understand what dyslexia can look like, the better equipped we are to recognize students who may need extra support. 💗Save this one to refer back to! Want a copy? Comment DYSLEXIA and I’ll send the link to this free download along with a few others. ...

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