Printing Time

The summer has been ticking by and I've been trying to get a head start on few things I need to prepare for the new school year.

I'm starting by making copies of my Monthly Printing Assessment Journal.

I use my Assessment Journal to keep track of my students fine motor and printing skills each month.  Since most of my students have speech and language disabilities, I find that fine motor difficulties are more likely to be an issue when they come to school. 

I start by getting the children to color the front cover.

They then put their name on the front.  

I sometimes get children who can't print their name when they get to school and these are kids that show the most progress.

Each month I get them to fill out the appropriate pages.

I usually take a small group at a time and I guide them through each section.   I find this keeps me accountable because we don't want to miss a month.

It's amazing to see the progress as the months go by.  I also love to have the book handy for parent interviews.  It's also a wonderful keepsake at the end of the year for parents to keep.

Testing Tuesday - Printing

Today's testing Tuesday is about printing skills.

I like to keep track of the children's printing skills throughout the year.  

Since a lot of my students have speech as their primary goal, most of my students come in with some printing skills but I do have children each year that have fine motor issues and we spend a lot of time working to improve their skills.

I needed a way to keep track of their progress and I came up with this little booklet.

This is a wonderful tool to show to parents.  

It really is amazing to see how far the children come.

Each year I have children who can't even print their name when they arrive and others who are already printing letters and drawing detailed pictures.

This book keeps everything in place and keeps me accountable each month.

I start by having the children colour in their title page. I have girl and boy covers and have ones that are already coloured in.

In the first week of school I have the children fill out each section of the month sheet.  

They print their name.

The numbers 0 to 10.

A self-portrait.

And the alphabet.

For some children, I want to know what they know, and I have them print from memory. 

For other children, I have them copy what I put on the board.

You can jot a little note on the page if you want to remember if you had them copy.

At some point during the first week of each month, I have them fill out their book again.  

I often do this in a small group setting.

As the months progress, I have them print some words, and even a sentence if they can.

It's all kept in one nice little booklet.  During parent/teacher interviews, I can pull them out and parents can see their child's progress.

Testing Tuesday - Fine Motor

Whenever you are doing an assessment, you need to ask yourself "What am I testing?"

This is especially true for children with fine motor problems.

Children with fine motor problems often have trouble with pencil and paper tests.  Their printing skills are often not legible enough to read or is so labour intensive that it would take them a long time to finish a test.

Children with fine motor issues need a different way to show their learning.

One way to show learning is by doing cut and paste activities.  If their cutting skills are not good, make sure the pieces they need are already cut for them.

Remember, the skill you are assessing.

  

In this case, it's the beginning blend, bl.  Can they find words that start with the sound?   You are not assessing their cutting or pasting skills.

In this case, the skill being assessed is whether or not the child can count a certain number of items.  It doesn't matter how well the shamrocks are coloured in.  If the child can't colour at all, use a bingo dabber and have the child dab the correct number of items.

Here we want to know if the child can count the objects and put the correct number beside it.  This activity does not require the child to be able to print the number.   Remember, we are testing whether they know how to count how many items there are and if they can identify the correct number.  We are not testing if they know how to "print" a particular number.

 This activity shows us if they know what number is missing in a given sequence.  Again, no printing required.

This is an excellent activity for a bingo dabber.  Dab the correct answer to show mastery of the skill.

Cut and paste activities can take many forms and can cover a wide variety of skills.

Using manipulatives are also useful when testing children.  In this activity, the children are showing they can count by two's without having to print the numbers.  Velcro helps keep the tiles in place.

Use cubes or other manipulates to show number concepts.  They are easier to pick up.

Add cubes to paper type games so the children have something to hold on to when picking them up.  Papers that are flat on the table can be hard to grasp. 

I hope I've given you few ideas about how you can remove fine motor problems from your testing situations.

Testing Tuesday - Pre-Primer words and e-tran board

It's Tuesday again and time for another testing tip.

Last week was about letters.

This week I thought I would show you how I test my non-verbal students that use eye gaze.

This is a home made e-tran board.

  You can buy commercial ones but they can be expensive.  If you don't need a large one, you can make one quite easily.  I decided to make a simple one out of laminating pouches.

Once the laminating pouches were heated, I cut a square out of the middle.

I added Velcro to each of the corners and on the back of the words.  You can put Velcro wherever you need too.  Some children make better choices along the top, or along the bottom, or one side or the other.  Put Velcro where you need to or put Velcro along the whole square, if you are still trying out locations to determine the best spots.

Once you have your words where you want them, hold the board up in front of your face.  My son volunteered to be the model for this demonstration.  The hole in the middle is important so that the child can hear what you are asking.  The board needs to be clear so that you can see where they are looking.

Here is an example of what I would say to a child that is just beginning to scan and use eye gaze.

"I have 4 words here.  I want you to show me with your eyes the word I ask you for.  I'm going to point to each one first to make sure you look at each one before picking.  I want to look for the word "big"."

"Look at this one"

"Look at this one"

"Look at this one"

 "Look at this one"

"Now look at the word "big"."

Because the board is clear, I can easily see where the child is looking.

Depending on how experienced your child is with eye-gaze will depend on how you accept an answer.

More experienced users may be able to hold their eyes on a choice while other children may only quickly glance at their answer.

Some children may be able to confirm their answer with a "yes"/"no" if they have that skill.

For my children that have the ability to point and can handle a larger number of choices, I use a full page of words and a highlighter.  As they demonstrate knowledge of the word, I have them highlight the word.  The goal is to have the whole page highlighted.

I keep track of both types of assessment on my recording page.  I can easily see what words they know and what words we still need to work on.

You can grab me Pre-Primer pack here for free.  I comes with instructions for assessing non-verbal children.

Testing Tuesday - Letters

One of the many things I get asked, is how to test challenging students.

How to do test children who can't give you a verbal answer?

Today's Testing Tuesday is centering around testing the letters of the alphabet.

I printed out 2 copies of the alphabet (the freebie is at the end of the post), cut out one, and Velcroed it on top of the other one.  I can keep this in a binder and when I need it, it's ready for me to grab.

If a child is non-verbal and has very little fine motor control (they can't point to a choice), we often use eye gaze to determine answers.  Since I often work with beginning users, we start with a choice of 2.  The easiest way to do this is to pick two letters and hold one in each hand beside your head.  This way, you can easily see where they are looking.   I will ask the child "I want to look at the "f ".  Where is the "f"? "

I want to make sure that they have looked at each letter.  So I move each one forward saying "Is it this one?" (ensuring eye contact).

"Or this one?" (ensuring eye contact). "Which one is the "f"?"  Depending on the ability of your student to hold their eye gaze,  you may require them to hold their gaze on a choice for a few seconds or you may take the first one they look at.  Avoid repeatedly asking "Was it this one? Or this one?" Just take their first answer.  Otherwise we are telling them:

1. I didn't understand you.
2. I don't believe your first answer.
3. I'm not listening.

If I have students that are able to point to, or pull off answers but are still non-verbal, I use a board like this.  It's just a piece of fiber board with a strip of Velcro through the center.  It's perfect for holding up in front of children in wheelchairs so they can reach the answers.  Some children prefer to reach for answers even through they can still look at their answers.

Decide how many choices you want to give the child between 2 and 4 and space them out.

Ask the child to point to a certain letter or to pull it off and give it to you.

I've included a recording sheet in the freebie so you can keep track of what the child does.  Are they mixing up letters like "b" "p" and "d"?  Are they able to get the letters in their name?

For my students with speech disabilities that can handle more letters per pages, I use this sheet.  Starting at the top, I point to each letter and ask them to tell me what it is.  If they know it, they can highlight it with a highlighter.  If they miss more than 3 or 4, I ask them to point and tell me any letter on the page.  Again, they highlight the ones they know.  I ask them the letters everyday and they highlight them as they get them.

I keep track on my tracking sheet which ones they know.  It's easy to see at a glace what we need to work on.  It's also easy to grab if admin want data, as it's all on one page, and it's easy to see their progress.

You can grab my Letter Assessment for free by clicking on the picture below.