Donovan R.

♦ Miscue Analysis (Condensed)

Prepared by Katy Clark

March 17, 2009

Procedure:
I met with Donovan on three separate occasions to listen to him read. He read sections from a science
textbook (Glencoe’s Earth Science). The sections he read were about topics his science class previously
studied this year. Portage Public Schools formerly used this textbook to teach 8th grade science and it is
supposed to be written at a high school reading level.

At our initial session, Donovan answered a brief reading survey. Later, Donovan read from the textbook
as if he were studying for an upcoming test. Afterward, I asked him to tell me about what he read to
check comprehension.

As Donovan read, we digitally recorded his reading. For each session, I marked a typescript of the text
with his miscues as he read and again later by listening to his recordings. I later analyzed his miscues on
a word-by-word level and on the sentence level.

After the reading sessions, I looked at the miscues Donovan made. For each miscue, I asked, “Does what
Donovan read LOOK like what the text says?” “Does what he read SOUND like what the text says?” and
“Does what Donovan read have the same part of speech as what’s given in the text?” Asking these
questions helped me understand what clues Donovan looks for in the text as he reads. I also noted
whether he corrected himself after every miscue. For those that he did not correct himself, I asked, “Does
the sentence, as Donovan read it, sound like Standard English?” “Does it make sense as a sentence the
way he read it?”, and “Does the sentence maintain the author’s meaning the way he read it?” Asking
these questions helped me learn what cues Donovan to self-correct and what signals he uses from the text
to alert him of miscues. The attached table lists my findings for every miscue Donovan made during our
third reading.

Analysis:
Donovan self-corrected just over half his miscues (55%). When he did not self-correct, his miscues
mostly sounded like Standard English (92% of his miscues sounded like Standard English). His miscues
made sense as sentences 85% of the time, and for the most part, kept the author’s meaning (82%). From
this information, I concluded that Donovan understands what to expect from a textbook in terms of syntax
and semantics. He looks for meaning in text, but it seems he sometimes favors speed & fluency over
comprehension. From his reading, it seemed like he valued sounding like a fluent reader over
understanding what he was reading, even after I instructed him to read as if he were studying for a test.
He also skipped over certain headings and captions, which is commonly done when reading aloud in
class, but is useful when reading to learn. His retelling was essentially a list of main ideas, which is a
good start, but may also just have been what he can recall from weeks of class time spent on the
subject(s).

Conclusion:
Donovan already has a variety of strategies and tools that he regularly uses as he reads. At this point,
some instruction on the structure of informative texts could help him use his tools more effectively. Some
of his tools could use some sharpening, such as questioning and predicting. Think aloud activities will
help make the invisible processes of reading comprehension visible to Donovan.
 Miscue Analysis
Donovan, 8th Grade
Word Level Analysis Sentence Level Analysis
Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Q5 Q6 Q7

Does the sentence sound like

Semantic Acceptability: Does

Meaning Maintenance: Does

Grammatical Function? Are

the sentence make sense?

Graphic Similarity: Do they

the sentence maintain the

Sound Similarity: Do they

Syntactic Acceptability:
Did they self correct?
they the same part of

Standard English?

author's meaning?
sound alike?
Sentence #

look alike?
Miscue #

speech?
Reader Text
~~ ~~ ~~~~~ ~~~~~ y/n y/n y/n y/n y/n y/n y/n
1 1 been -- no no no yes Yes Yes Yes
2 5 the -- no no no no Yes Yes Yes
3 6 rock rocks yes yes yes no no no no
4 6 that -- no no no no yes yes yes
5 7 the -- no no no yes yes yes yes
6 7 11 8 no no no yes yes yes yes
7 11 connect connecting no yes no yes yes yes yes
8 14 has is no no yes yes yes yes yes
9 17 and has no no no yes yes yes yes
10 22 -- water no no no yes yes yes yes
11 22 rocks rock yes yes yes no yes yes yes
12 24 -- of no no no no yes yes yes
13 25 the this yes no yes no yes yes yes
14 28 -- of no no no no no no yes
15 33 water well no no yes yes yes yes yes
16 36 that this yes no no no yes no no
17 40 rocks layers no no yes no yes yes no
18 41 slope sloping yes no no yes yes yes yes
19 46 of the and no no no yes yes yes yes
20 47 -- in no no no yes yes yes yes
21 48 water source no no yes yes yes yes yes
22 49 groundwater water no no yes yes yes yes yes
23 51 can come no no yes yes yes yes yes
24 52 -- (caption) no no no no no no no
25 54 the -- no no no no yes yes yes
26 58 There This yes no no yes yes yes yes
27 58 is -- no no no yes yes yes yes
28 58 of off yes yes no yes yes yes yes
29 59 into to no no yes no yes yes yes
30 60 tea…teakle teakettle yes no yes yes yes yes yes
31 61 this the yes no yes no yes yes yes
32 61 four thousand 40 000 yes yes yes yes yes yes yes
33 61 the -- no no no no yes yes no
34 H Deposit Deposition yes no no yes yes yes yes
35 66 undergrounding underground yes yes no yes yes yes yes
36 68 -- (B) no no no no yes yes yes
37 many Figures Figure yes yes yes no yes yes no
8-10, 8-11, 8-12, 8-
38 many 8 through ___ 13A, 8-13B yes no no no yes yes no
TOTAL YES 14 7 14 21 35 34 31
TOTAL YES + NO 38 38 38 38 38 38 38
PERCENTAGE 37% 18% 37% 55% 92% 85% 82%