DIAGNOSTIC SPELLING TEST SPELLING SOUNDS TO DICTATION (DiST-S) Test: Kohnen, S., Nickels, L., & Castles, A. (2009). Assessing spelling skills and

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1 DIAGNOSTIC SPELLING TEST SPELLING SOUNDS TO DICTATION (DiST-S) Referencing this test: Test: Kohnen, S., Nickels, L., & Castles, A. (2009). Assessing spelling skills and strategies: A critique of available resources [Special Issue]. Australian Journal of Learning Difficulties, 14(1), doi: / Norms: Kohnen, S., Glenn, K., McArthur, G., & Nickels, L. (2012). Diagnostic Spelling Test Sounds; normative data for K-3. Materials 1 scoring sheet 1 answer sheet (2 pages, print double-sided on one sheet) Instructions Before administering the test, familiarise yourself with the sounds and look at the example words containing the sounds. When administering the test, it is important that you only say the sound, not the example word. The example words are only given as a reminder of the sound. All students should complete the entire test. This test can be administered to a group or in a one-on-one situation. If the test is administered to a group, make sure that the seating is arranged such that students cannot easily see anyone else s work. The student/s should not talk, look at anyone else s work or try to help one another. Only the answer sheet and a pen/pencil should be on the student s/students desk/s. Ensure the answer sheet (pages 7 and 8 of this document) is printed double-sided on one page. Page 1 of 9

2 Say the following (these instructions are also on the scoring sheet): 1. Write down your first name and your family name on your answer sheet. 2. Write down your date of birth (or age if more appropriate). 3. Write down the date. The date today is the (say date). 4. Turn over the sheet. I am going to ask you to do some writing and I want to see how well you can do. Please try to do your best and write as neatly as you can. If you are not sure what the correct answer is, I still want you to try your best. Please do not talk or look at anyone else s work or let anyone else see your work (only say when administering for a group). Your answer sheet is numbered from 1 to 32. I m going to say 32 sounds, one at a time, and I want you to write down the letter or letters that make this sound. Sometimes more than one answer is correct, but only write down one answer. I will say a sound. If you didn t hear the sound, listen very carefully because I will say the sound one more time. Then write down your answer. If you really didn t hear the sound, put up your hand and wait for me to ask you what the problem is. Unexpected incidents Repetition of items: If a student does not hear an item, the test administrator needs to make a judgement whether or not to repeat the sound, bearing in mind that too much repetition might be disruptive to the testing situation. Initially, the administrator may want to remind the student/s to listen carefully since items will not be repeated again. Administration speed: If requests for repetitions occur frequently, the administration speed may be too high. If students have too much time between test items, speed should be increased. Ability groups: For group testing, it may be useful to divide students into smaller groups that are matched on ability as poorer students may require more time, while administration speed should be higher for advanced students. Page 2 of 9 Diagnostic Spelling Test Sounds: Kohnen, Nickels & Castles (2009); Kohnen, Glenn, McArthur & Nickels, (2012)

3 Scoring 1) Responses that match one of the graphemes in the correct letters column on the score sheet are correct. If there are alternatives noted on the scoring sheet, any of these alternatives is accepted as correct. 2) If multiple responses are given to a single item, score by the final response and ignore previous responses even if an earlier response is correct. 3) If no response is given, this is scored as incorrect. 4) Both upper and lower case letters are accepted as correct. Double letter responses where there is an upper case letter and a lower case letter are scored as correct (e.g., Tt, Pp, Aa). Double letter responses (where only one letter is required) with both letters are in the same case (e.g., TT, ss) should be scored as incorrect. 5) If a response is a mirror reversal of a letter it is scored as correct, unless the mirror reversal creates another letter (e.g., p, d, p, q). Comparison data Normative/comparison group participants In 2010, the DiSTs was administered to children from two NSW schools in Kindergarten, Year 1, Year 2 and Year 3. See Table 1 for summary statistics. The schools were chosen because their NAPLAN results indicated average performance of students on literacy measures. To minimise instruction time, the test was administered to small groups of children by trained testers. Inter-rater Reliability Testers scored the children s responses and completed the data entry necessary for computing the normative data. All tests were double scored and the data entry checked. In 99.2% of test items, the initial scorer and the double scorer agreed on the scores. In 99.9% of the cases data entry was agreed upon by the two testers. Page 3 of 9

4 Year Group Terms of schooling completed at testing Number of children tested Girls : Boys Mean age (Range) in years, months K : 36 6yrs, 0mth (5yrs, 5mths 6yrs, 8mths) : 33 7yrs, 1mth (6yrs, 5mths 7yrs, 9mths) : 33 8yrs, 1mth (7yrs, 4mths 8yrs, 9mths) : 50 9yrs, 2mths (8yrs, 5mths 9yrs, 10mths) Table 1: Summary statistics for norm sample Critically low scores Children reached ceiling on this test by Year 1. Therefore, rather than providing normative scores for every possible raw score, we are indicating what constitutes critically low scores. That is, if a child obtains a score that is the same as or lower than the critically low score in Table 2, this should be considered below average performance and may warrant intervention. In order to determine critically low scores, we computed the score that was significantly lower than the normative sample using Crawford s modified t-tests 1. The critically low scores in Table 2 are significant at a p- level of <.05 (one tailed). Year Group Mean correct Range Critically low (Terms completed at testing) (SD) score K (3) 25.5 (4.0) (7) 28.3 (2.8) (11) 28.3 (2.4) (15) 28.6 (2.4) Table 2: Means, range and critically low scores by Year group 1 Crawford, J.R., & Garthwaite, P.H. (2002). Neuropsychologia,40, Page 4 of 9 Diagnostic Spelling Test Sounds: Kohnen, Nickels & Castles (2009); Kohnen, Glenn, McArthur & Nickels, (2012)

5 Looking up normative data: Use Table 2 to evaluate whether a child you have tested has a critically low score or not. Determine the best comparison group for the child in question (Kindergarten, Year 1, 2 or 3). It is possible that when performing a test early in the school year (e.g., in term 1) that the best comparison group is a year below the child s actual grade. For example, for a child you test in early term 1 of Year 1, it may be more appropriate to compare them to the Kindergarten group who were tested in term 3, than the Year 1 group. Check if the number of correct responses for the child you tested is the same, lower or higher than the critically low score. If the score is the same or lower, the child you tested knows significantly fewer sound-letter correspondences than the comparison group. If the score is higher, the child you tested knows the same (or possibly a greater) number of sound-letter-correspondences as the comparison group. Average accuracy per item: Table 3 provides an overview of the percentage of correct responses for every sound-letter-correspondence in the DiSTs (ordered by accuracy). For example, in Kindergarten, 95% of the spelling responses for the o sound (as in opera ) were correct. In Year 3, 54% of the spelling responses to the kw sound (as in queen ) were correct. Table 3 may be useful for teachers and clinicians when trying to determine which sound-letter correspondences to teach and in what order. Teachers and clinicians may choose to teach those sounds first that were known by most children in the early grades, before teaching more difficult sounds that were known by fewer children, even in the later grades. Page 5 of 9

6 Item Number Sound Letter/s Example Word with Sound Percentage of Correct Sound-Letter Correspondence Kindergarten Year 1 Year 2 Year 3 Average Across All Years (Grades) 1 b b big æ a ant t t tip m m mit l l lip r r rug f f/ph fig g g gift n n not z z zip s s sit d d dog v v vet k c/k cat h h hip ɪ i ill ɒ o odd j y yet w w/wh wet p p pot ɛ e elk tʃ ch chair ʃ sh ship ʤ j jam ð th then ʌ u up u: oo mood θ th thin ŋ ng long i: ee/ea eel a: ar arm kw qu quit Table 3: Accuracy data per item: Percentage of correct responses per sound-lettercorrespondence by Year (Grade). Page 6 of 9 Diagnostic Spelling Test Sounds: Kohnen, Nickels & Castles (2009); Kohnen, Glenn, McArthur & Nickels, (2012)

7 DiST-Sounds Answer Sheet First name Family name Date of Birth Age Testing Date For teacher/tester only: Tester Name Raw Score Critically low score for comparison group: Evaluation: Student s Year Other comments: Page 7 of 9

8 Total Page 8 of 9 Diagnostic Spelling Test Sounds: Kohnen, Nickels & Castles (2009); Kohnen, Glenn, McArthur & Nickels, (2012)

9 DiST-Sounds Scoring Sheet Participant: Examiner: Date: Comments: Instructions: 1. Write down your first name and your family name on your answer sheet. 2. Write down your date of birth (or age if more appropriate) 3. Write down the date. The date today is the (say date) 4. Turn over the sheet. 5. I am going to ask you to do some writing and I want to see how well you can do. Please try to do your best and write as neatly as you can. If you are not sure what the correct answer is, I still want you to try your best. Please do not talk or look at anyone else s work or let anyone else see your work (only say when administering for a group). Your answer sheet is numbered from 1 to 32. I m going to say 32 sounds and I want you to write down the letter or letters that make this sound. Sometimes more than one answer is correct, but only write down one answer. I will say a sound. If you didn t hear the sound, listen very carefully because I will say the sound one more time. Then write down your answer. If you really didn t hear the sound, put up your hand and wait for me to ask you what the problem is. No. Sound Example word with sound 1 b big B 2 æ ant A 3 d dog D 4 g gift G 5 m mit M 6 l lip L 7 p pot P 8 n not N 9 f fig F or PH 10 t tip T 11 s sit S 12 h hip H 13 z zip Z 14 j yet Y 15 v vet V 16 ɪ ill I 17 r rug R 18 ʤ jam J 19 k cat C or K 20 ð then TH 21 ʃ ship SH 22 w wet W or WH 23 ɛ elk E 24 kw quit QU 25 i: eel EA or EE 26 θ thin TH 27 ɒ odd O 28 u: mood OO 29 ʌ up U 30 ŋ long NG 31 a: arm AR 32 tʃ chair CH Correct Letters Response Accuracy SUM CORRECT Page 9 of 9