Sandy Luc

EDUC5509

2053 0304

Report
Students name: C

Students year level: 4

Literacy
Writing
Six Traits writing rubric results
Criteria
Stage

Ideas and Organisation

content
Developing Developing

Voice
Proficient

Word
choice
Proficient

Sentence Conventions
fluency
Developing Proficient

Analysis of C's writing using the Six Traits writing rubric suggests that she is working at the
developing stage (level 3) whilst beginning to exhibit some techniques from the proficient
stage (level 4). There is evidence of a main idea being developed with supporting detail,
however there is a lack of structure to the story without an introduction and conclusion. A
particular area of strength is the effectiveness of C's word choices in her story. They
successfully project vivid imagery due to the usage of words such as 'medieval', 'evil' and
'stumpy legs', which are all functional and appropriate terms that correlate to her story topic.
Whilst her sentence construction lacks variety, she has a good grasp of conventions such as
spelling, capitalisation and grammar, with only minor punctuation errors that do not impede
on readability.
Reading
Elementary Reading Attitude Survey results
Combined score
(recreational and
academic)
46

Recreational

Percentile rank
Academic

Overall

29th

16th

18th

C has a combined raw score of 46 in the Reading Attitude survey, which positions her in the
18th percentile rank. Both her individual scores of 26 and 20 for recreational and academic
reading respectively are lower than the mean scores for grade 4 children, however it is
evident that she displays a greater interest in recreational reading than reading for academic
purposes.
Her results in the Woodcock Reading Mastery test also demonstrate that she is reading at
levels lower than her age of 10, particularly in the area of comprehension for which she is at a

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0.3 percentile rank. C also has a below average composite score for phonological awareness
in the CTOPP, which may explain her poor reading ability.
Spelling
Administration of Words their Way spelling inventory show that C's spelling ability is at the
middle to late Syllables and Affixes stage. She makes some errors spelling words containing
unaccented final syllables, suggesting she is at an instructional level where she is using but
confusing certain spelling features.
Numeracy
Early
number
learning
area

Counting
strategies

Numeral
identification

Counting
by 10s
and 100s

Combining
and
partitioning

Place
value

Multiplication
and division

Area
multiplication

Level

Stage 3

Level 4

Level 2

Level 2

Level 1

Level 2

Not attempted

Results from C's SENA 2 suggests she is working at an average of level 2 in the areas of
early number learning. C displays strength in the areas of numeral identification and
partitioning, which is evident in her ability to provide standard and non-standard number
combinations in both the SENA and WALNA tests. Place value and multiplication and
division however, appear to be areas of weakness for C.
There are inconsistencies in the strategies she uses as she fluctuates between skip counting or
counting in multiples to counting by ones. Although C is not yet capable of exhibiting
consistent strategies, she shows signs of beginning to transition from unitary (counting by
ones) strategies to more sophisticated strategies to answer mathematical questions.
Social/behavioural traits
Based on available information, C appears to display different and contrasting behaviours
depending on whether she is in the school or home environment. Whilst her mother identifies
C to display performance-related anxiety and social issues, she does not seem to exhibit the
same behavioural patterns at school.
Another prominent difference in observed behaviour is that C's defiant behaviour that her
mother identifies is not evident in the classroom setting. She is described as being assertive,
cooperative and attentive, traits that are drastically different to those observed by Cosima. C's

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differing behaviour may possibly be explained by various reasons related to experiences in

her childhood. Factors such as growing up in an impoverished environment, having a
different cultural and language background and having experienced bullying may all be
grounds to justify C's social and behavioural attributes.
Affective/interests
Taking both observations made at school and what C's mother describes of her, C attitude at
school does not seem as expressive than she is at home. The indifferent attitude she displays
may also suggest that she lacks interest towards school because she is said to show little
emotion.
C seems to take an interest to activities that are unrelated to schoolwork. It can be deduced
that she is an active and playful character from Cosima's description that C enjoys rough and
tumble, as well as sports. Another prominent interest is her love of animals and her
'connectedness' to them. There appears to be a sense of familiarity that C has with animals, as
she is only comforted by cuddling her plush toy dog, which seems to have a calming,
soothing effect on her otherwise extreme display of behaviour.
Learning profile/intellectual
C initially displays an aptitude for learning as she is said to have quickly become relatively
fluent in English despite speaking Hindi as her first language; however, Cosima's descriptions
coupled with results from tests administered for C suggest that she struggles with learning at
school. She receives individualised support in the classroom in the areas of reading and maths
and is reported to have taken extensive time to learn to read and do maths. This limited ability
to read proficiently may explain her word finding and vocabulary problems as indicated by
her mother.
Results from the WISC-IV test, such as her below-average working memory score,
corresponds with Cosima's description of C having 'memory issues'. The test also reveals C to
possess low average to borderline cognitive abilities, implying that she will experience
difficulty with working out grade appropriate problems.
Further tests/assessments
Analysis of C's writing sample indicates that she is beginning to use writing conventions
within the proficient stage. It might be beneficial to administer the Elementary Writing

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Attitudes survey to C to gain an understanding of C's interest for writing, in addition to

finding out more about her interests in general in order to create interesting writing tasks to
motivate C.
Additionally, it may be useful to administer an Informal Prose Inventory to gauge C's
decoding skills, as well as her ability to use syntax, semantic and visual cues to guide her
reading. By having a deeper understanding of her reading accuracy, retelling and
comprehension skills, more individualised instruction can be planned to best support her
literacy development.
Areas of strength and needs; teaching recommendations
C seems to be exhibit strengths in the area of numeral identification and number partitioning
within mathematics, however she shows a weakness in other concepts such as multiplication
and division. In terms of spelling, C's spelling stage reflects a level of development that is
characteristic of learners of her age category. Another identifiable area of weakness is C's
reading, comprehension and phonological skills. Her borderline cognitive abilities may also
hinder her learning as she is said to be slow to answer questions and process information.
Information about her weaknesses and strengths forms the basis for decisions to be made
about areas to prioritise for teaching C. Her writing sample is comparable to what the
Australian Curriculum classifies as a below-average writing portfolio for a grade 4 student in
terms of writing structure. Although she shows control of standard writing conventions, a
wide range is not demonstrated through her writing. The implications this has for teaching is
to provide opportunities for practice and modelling good writing practice through analysing
examples, guided writing as well as teaching editing strategies.
As C has indicated a relatively higher interest for recreational reading than academic reading,
it would be beneficial to make tactful observations of her reading habits and identify areas of
interest to make leisure and instructional reading an attractive activity for C. Guided reading
of a range of text types related to her interests could be an effective way to increase C's
interest towards developing her reading skills. Her weakness with phonological processing
skills may also warrant action on the teacher to provide explicit teaching instruction in
phonological awareness to improve her ability to read and decode unfamiliar vocabulary.
Mathematics appears to be an area of particular need for C to improve on. Whilst diagnostic
tests and observations can provide teachers with a sense of how and what students are

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thinking, there should be ample opportunity for students to demonstrate and verbalise their
understanding and strategies used to solve mathematical problems. C appears to require
explicit teaching in basic concepts such as place value, multiplication and division operations
and counting in multiples, to comprehend worded mathematical problems and develop
appropriate and consistent strategies to solve them.
C's spelling development stage of Syllables and Affixes suggests that she has typically
mastered the spelling of most single syllable, short and long vowel words and has adequate
understanding of word features that precede the unaccented final syllables spelling feature.
This is where the introduction of common affixes and syllabication may be useful to allow C
to draw on her knowledge of single syllabic word patterns to learn new spelling features
which she is using but confusing.