Brianne McGlone Oral Language Assessment The purpose of an oral language assessment is to determine how effective the students

oral communication is. Using the checklist allows a teacher or observer to note if the students are sharing stories, taking social action, expressing feelings or points of view, among other things that are important in oral language. Performing an oral language assessment also gives the teacher the opportunity to gauge the current oral language abilities expressed by the students and use that knowledge to plan future lessons accordingly. A teacher can also do an oral language assessment on an individual child, which can make apparent areas that student may need help in. For my oral language assessment, I observed my first grade classroom at Wicoff Elementary School. There are nineteen students in the class, all from different cultural backgrounds. A few of the students are English Language Learners. I first observed the class as a whole during reading and writing workshop. I later chose to observe a seven year old girl for my individual observation and tried to keep watch of her interactions with other students. For the observations, I used the Oral Language Functions worksheets from Kidwatching: Documenting Childrens Literacy Development by Owocki and Goodman. While observing the single student, I continued to observe and make notes on the class as a whole. In my observation of the whole class, I watched the students immediately walk up to the teacher when they arrive and begin telling her stories about something that happened at home or on the bus. Sometimes the students would ask her several questions as well, usually on seemingly random topics, though sometimes about classwork or the upcoming school day. Some

of the students were having problems on their bus with hurting another students feelings and making them cry, and the students that hurt the other students feelings came to the teacher and immediately explained what happened on the bus and told her that it was an accident. She then took this information to have a talk with the three students involved to resolve the issue. Most of the students, with the exception of a few, are very social and communicate constantly with each other. When the students are talking to each other and the teacher needs to gain their attention, she says One, two three, eyes on me and all of the students look and her and respond One, two, eyes on you to show that they have refocused their attention on her. She does not frequently have to repeat the phrase a second time to gain their attention. This shows a relationship between the students and teacher that is positive for the learning environment, because the students actively listen to and respond to the teacher. Another strength in this classroom is morning meeting. Each day, a different student is the helper for the day, and with this job he or she is put in charge or morning meeting. The teacher does not run morning meeting, but sits and listens from her desk as the students go through morning meeting on their own. She occasionally chimes in or redirects, but for the most part she can sit quietly and just observe. The students have learned a routine to doing morning meeting, and the helper for the day chooses a helper for him or herself, and together they go through the weather, calendar, the number of days they have been in school, read monthlythemed poems on the bulletin boards, recite the Pledge of Allegiance, count in units of their choosing (such as by fives to one hundred), and go around their circle and greet each other. This is a clear example of the students taking a leadership role and building productive learning relationships. In one instance, one of the students was being disruptive so the student in charge of morning meeting sent him back to his seat. The student in charge later allowed him to come

back to the carpet if he behaved. This shows that the students are taking social action even in the role of teacher. They are also enjoying language for its aesthetic value, because the students get extremely excited to read the poems and they squeal with delight with then get to certain rhyming portions of the poems. Though I was able to find examples of each category during my observations, I believe there is a need for more collaborative relations between the students. I only saw students working with partners once, and I think the students might enjoy more time working with a partner. I also did not see very much of the students creating imaginative worlds, though I have also not observed them during gym or recess where this might take place. When I observed the individual student, I found that she was very adept at sharing stories. While on the bus to the dentist for a short field trip, she sat near me and told me story after story about her parents, brother, and uncle. At the beginning of the day when she arrives at school, she will occasionally come up to me and begin telling me what happened over the weekend or ask me questions about school. Her strengths are definitely in sharing stories and retelling events. While observing her reading, she is at a lower reading level than other students in the class and has difficulty reading and comprehending what she is reading. I found a similar issue with her writing. She was writing a how-to on drawing a rainbow, and could tell me how to do it but was having difficulty putting her thoughts into steps on the paper. She continuously tried to talk to me about other things instead of staying on task. I noticed that she frequently would waste time talking to the student next to her or spend an excessive amount of time looking for a book instead of actually writing or reading like she was supposed to. Based on these observations, I think she needs to be helped stay on task in order to spend time actually practicing reading and writing so that she can improve.

The findings of my whole class observation could be used to plan for activities that allow the students to utilize their strengths, such as telling stories. A creative writing workshop or a time for sharing stories could be helpful for the students to share with the class the stories they share with me and the teacher. Understanding the levels of oral language throughout the class can help to identify the students that may need extra help in areas like taking social action and taking leadership. With this information, the teacher can design lessons that involve students interacting with peers and being leaders. It is important to note the areas students seemed to enjoy but could use more instruction on, such as the aesthetic value of language. I observed that the students seemed to really enjoy reading the poems on the bulletin board every day during morning meeting, so maybe teaching about poetry and rhyming would be a fun lesson for the students so that they could learn to not only read and understand it but also to write it. I also think it is important to take the area I found lacking and improve on it. I found building collaborative relations to be lacking a bit, because there were few instances when students would be paired or in groups to collaborate on a project or problem. I would assign projects or tasks that the students could do in pairs or in their small groups of four or five to encourage collaboration. For the individual student, it could be beneficial to have her work with a student that may be at a higher reading level. It also may be helpful to practice reading with her one on one while the other students are doing independent reading. Since she loves to tell stories, it could be a good idea to have her write down a story she wants to share. This could help because she would be writing about something she actually wants to share and might stay on task more than an assignment she has little personal connection to.

Teachers can use the oral language assessment to estimate the oral language strengths and needs of his or her students. Doing the assessment can be a tool to document what may need to be focused on more in order to improve skills in that area. After performing the assessment, a teacher can use the newfound information to adapt lessons to better serve the needs of his or her students.