Transitioning to Kindergarten

The Get Ready to Read! Screening Tool

The Get Ready to Read! screening tool is a 20-item early literacy screening tool for young children in the year before kindergarten. It was developed in conjunction with the National Center for Learning Disabilities by some of the countrys top reading researchers, and is available in English and Spanish. The Get Ready to Read! screening tool takes about 10 minutes to administer, and was designed to provide early childhood professionals and parents with a snapshot of where a child is on the path to developing important early literacy skills. The screening tool is NOT a formal assessment or a way to identify disabilities. However, it can give you important information about a childs skills that can help inform what you do in the classroom. The Get Ready to Read! screening tool is typically administered in the fall of the year before a child starts kindergarten, again in the spring before kindergarten starts, and occasionally one additional time in between. However, you can get useful information about a childs skills anytime during the year before kindergarten, and use that information to help inform classroom and home activities. The skill-building activities included in this section are a good starting point. There are also special activity cards for parents to use with their children in the parent section of this toolkit. This section includes a guide to using the Get Ready to Read! screening tool with the children in your care, and also a guide to scoring and interpreting the screening tool. The items on the Get Ready to Read! screening tool are based on skills that many years of research have shown to be especially important for a you ng child to be ready to learn to read. These skills include:

To date, an estimated 345,000 4-year-olds have been screened using the tool.

Transitioning to Kindergarten

The Get Ready to Read! Screening Tool

Print knowledge:
and words. Skills include:

a childs understanding of books, printed letters,

Differentiating print from pictures Functions of print Book rules Print components Rules of print Naming letters

Linguistic awareness: a childs understanding of how words and language works. Skills include: Active listening Vocabulary Rhyming words Segmenting sentences Segmenting words Phonemic awareness

Emergent writing: a childs first efforts to create and use print in a

Transitioning to Kindergarten

The Get Ready to Read! Screening Tool: How to Use

How to Use the Get Ready to Read! Screening Tool

1.

Look through the screening tool. It helps to read through

2. 3. 4. 5.

Find a quiet place to work with one child at a time. Find a place where you will be able to sit next to, not across from, the
child at a table, on a couch or on the floor. It helps to have a flat surface like a small table in front of you on which you can show the screening items. The child does not have to be removed from the classroom or home setting. You can use a quiet corner where there wont be a lot of distractions. You will need about 10 minutes to complete the screening with a child.

Plan ahead to make the screening process run smoothly. If you are in a classroom, family child care home or other
group setting, you may want to tell the children who will be screened that they are all going to have a chance to do this special activity. Select an easy going, interested child to screen first or ask for volunteers. Be encouraging. Approach the child individually and take him or her to the screening area.

Prepare the screening area and gather the materials that you
will need: the screening tool, a separate answer sheet labeled with the childs name, and a pencil or pen.

Complete the information about the child at the top of the answer sheet. Be sure that you also fill in the date and
which screening this will be for the child (e.g., first, second).

6.

Place the screening booklet directly in front of the child. The child should have a straight and direct view of the screening tool
items. Be sure to only show the child one page at a time, by folding the booklet back, as you administer the 20 items of the screening tool.

Transitioning to Kindergarten

The Get Ready to Read! Screening Tool: How to Use

7.

Start with the sample item.

The purpose of the sample item

is to make sure that the child understands what to do. When you are ready to begin the screening with a child, you will open the booklet to page 9 and fold the page back to show just the sample item. Place the booklet directly in front of the child and put the copy of the answer sheet in front of you. First, introduce the activity to the child: Lets look at some pictures. [Point to the pictures in the sample item.] I will ask you a question about them and you put your finger on the picture that is the best answer to the question. Lets try one. Then, read aloud the sample item on page 9 using the exact words that are in the screening tool.

8.

On the sample item you may give hints and feedback to make sure that the child understands the instructions. You may not do this on the 20 items in
the tool. Give the child general praise after he or she completes the sample item. Say something like this: Youve got the idea! Now I am going to ask you some more questions. Each time I ask a question, you choose the picture that is the best answer. Just look carefully at the pictures and pick the one you think is right. Once the child has selected an answer on each item, mark the childs choice directly on the answer sheet by circling the answer that the child has chosen.

9.

Then, proceed with the 20 items of the screening tool, one by one, in the order in which they appear in the manual. Ask each question exactly how it is worded
in the screening tool. Be sure to show the child just one item at a time by folding the page back. Circle the answer that the child has chosen for each item as soon as the child selects it. Do not worry at this time about checking to see if it is the correct answer.

Transitioning to Kindergarten

The Get Ready to Read! Screening Tool: How to Score

How to Score the Get Ready to Read! Screening Tool

1.

As you are administering the tool, circle the childs answer for each item. You should NOT decide whether the answer is correct or incorrect at this point because you will want to move on to the next question.

2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7.

When you are ready to score a childs answer sheet, you will need BOTH the answer sheet that you used with the child and the answer sheet with the correct answers shaded to use as an answer key. This answer key can be found on page 30 of the Get Ready to Read! manual.

Place the answer sheet and the answer key from the manual side by side on the table in front of you.

Begin with Item 1remember not to score the Item Sample! For each question, compare the childs answer with the answer that is shaded on the answer key. If the childs answer is correct, place a 1 in the lower right corner of that box. If the childs answer is not correct, place a 0 (zero) in the lower right corner of that box.

Count the number of correct answers by counting only the 1s that you wrote. Rememberdo not count the sample!

Count the answers again to double-check your counting.

When you are sure of the score, write the total number of correct answers in the box at the bottom of the page.

Transitioning to Kindergarten

The Get Ready to Read! Screening Tool: How to Score