This short guide will help you with where to begin identifying children’s reading skills using the Phonics Advantage Reading Assessment (PARA).
- Review your classroom chart in Progress Monitor to identify where a child ended in the previous year. The chart will display the scores from last year in light grey numbers.
- For children that have no scores from the previous year, please start with Challenge 1.
- For children that do have scores, identify the last two Challenges assessed. We recommend you start assessing from the second to last Challenge.
For example, in the image below, Natalie scored 3 and 2 points on the last two Challenges assessed, 6 and 7. In this case, start assessing Natalie from Challenge 6. If she gets 3 or 4 points, assess the next Challenge (Challenge 7) and continue according to the stop rule. The scores recorded in this session will be the baseline for Natalie, which you then enter in Progress Monitor.
If the child scores 1 or 2 on the penultimate Challenge, go back another Challenge until you reach a Challenge the child completes with a score of 3 or 4. The intention is to identify the last mastered skill and use that as the baseline of the current school year.
Let’s imagine that Natalie got 2 points in Challenge 6 (see the image below). In this case, you would assess with Challenge 5. If she also gets 2 points here, go back one more and try Challenge 4. In other words, go back one Challenge until she gets 3 or 4 points. The score of the Challenge mastered will be the baseline for Natalie. Please register only this score in Progress Monitor.
If a child was at the start of Phase 2 last year, do I need to go back to Phase 1?
Please follow the placement protocol as described above. The student should begin with the penultimate Challenge, whether this is in Phase 1 or Phase 2.
What about a child that completed Phase 2?
Please follow the placement protocol above and begin assessing with the penultimate Challenge (e.g., Challenge 24) to ensure that the student is included in the baseline data set.
What if the second to last Challenge is in the middle of a passage-based Challenge (e.g., Challenges 14-16 & 23-25)?
In this case, we recommend going back to the beginning of the passage-based Challenges: Challenge 14 or 23.
If you have any questions, please contact us at cl-support@thelearningbar.com or call 1-877-840-2424.