DIBELS Assessment of a Sixth-Grade Reader: Fluency & Comprehension
This paper presents a DIBELS (Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills) assessment conducted with a sixth-grade student in a home setting. The assessment evaluated oral reading fluency and retell fluency across three passages. While the student met benchmark criteria for both fluency and comprehension, his reading speed was notably slow, and his retell performance varied with interest level and prior knowledge. The paper discusses the testing environment, score interpretation, and practical recommendations — including fluency-building strategies, comprehension instruction, and self-selected reading — to support the student's academic growth as he advances through school.
- Overview of DIBELS and the Student: Introduction to DIBELS and student background
- Testing Environment and Administration: Description of home testing setting and conditions
- Oral Reading Fluency Results: ORF scores, error rates, and reading speed findings
- Retell Fluency Results and Analysis: RTF scores and role of interest and prior knowledge
- Recommendations for Improving Reading Fluency: Strategies to address slow reading pace
- Recommendations for Comprehension Strategies: Comprehension instruction and self-selected reading advice
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What makes this paper effective
- The paper grounds its analysis in specific, quantitative DIBELS data — error rates, words per minute, and retell scores — giving its conclusions an evidence-based foundation rather than relying on impressionistic observation.
- It connects assessment findings directly to actionable recommendations, moving logically from scores to instructional implications such as fluency instruction, comprehension strategy use, and self-selected reading.
- The author demonstrates reflective practice by acknowledging what could be improved in the testing process itself, such as time of day and potential fatigue effects.
Key academic technique demonstrated
The paper exemplifies criterion-referenced interpretation of assessment data. Rather than simply reporting raw scores, the author compares the student's performance against established DIBELS benchmarks and explains what those benchmarks mean for future academic success — a technique central to formative assessment practice in education.
Structure breakdown
The paper opens with background on DIBELS and the student, then describes the testing setting and administration procedures. It reports and interprets ORF scores, followed by RTF scores, noting how interest and prior knowledge affected performance. The final two sections shift from diagnosis to prescription, offering concrete strategies for fluency and comprehension development drawn from cited research.
Overview of DIBELS and the Student
The Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills (DIBELS) are a set of procedures and measures designed to assess the acquisition of early literacy skills from kindergarten through sixth grade. As emphasized by Kaminski, Cummings, Powell-Smith, and Good (2008), DIBELS is a generic indicator and represents a broader sequence of skills to be taught. I approached family friends about using DIBELS to test their younger son, a sixth-grade student. He is a high achiever with very good grades and a positive attitude about school. His best subject is math. His parents have been worried about his reading skills. Although he was previously tutored in reading, his parents still do not believe he has attained the proficiency of which they believe he is capable. I hoped DIBELS would demonstrate his reading strengths and weaknesses.
In talking with the student, I discovered he has a more extensive vocabulary than many of his sixth-grade peers. The household is multilingual and, in addition to English, two other languages are spoken at home. He attends evening classes twice a week, learning to read and write both Greek and Albanian.
Testing Environment and Administration
The testing took place in the family's home office. The room was comfortably warm, well lit, and painted in a light color — a good setting in which the student could focus on testing. He was prepared for the testing and was cooperative throughout, although he did not seem particularly enthusiastic about the process.
References
DIBELS Data System. (n.d.). University of Oregon. Retrieved from
Kaminski, R., Cummings, K. D., Powell-Smith, K. A., & Good, R. H. III (2008). Best practices in using Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills for formative assessment and evaluation. In A. Thomas & J. Grimes (Eds.), Best practices in school psychology V. Bethesda, MD: National Association of School Psychologists. Cited by DIBELS Data System. Retrieved from
Schorzman, E. M., & Cheek, E. H., Jr. (2004). Structured strategy instruction: Investigating an intervention for improving sixth graders' reading comprehension. Reading Psychology, 25(1), pp. 37–60. doi:10.1080/02702710490271459
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