Interpreting NWEA & DIBELS for APS 4th grade

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I feel like my kid just isn't the best at DIBELS.

He has been struggling but this year he has made huge improves. Like he went from reading 30 WPM at the second grade level to reading 140 WPM at the 4th grade level (he is in 3rd). He used to refuse to read books and is now reading chapter books and stupid DIBELS is saying he is further behind than he was at the beginning of the year (needs strategic help vs core, but I guess was only off by one point). The kid got 100% on his writing assessment and is well into the range of well prepared for the VGA.

So I am a bit over DIBELS right now. It just made me feel like all the progress he made for the year meant nothing!

DIBELS isn't a test of intelligence. When used correctly, it is supposed to pick up on learning disabilities including dyslexia. If your kid is scoring well on writing assessments but is testing behind on any of the individual DIBELS categories (especially oral reading), it could be a flag for dyslexia. APS is really bad at identifying dyslexia in the 2e kids in elementary school. Our kid was never flagged in K-5, but was just diagnosed in 7th grade when she struggled with phonemic awareness in her foreign language class. I asked APS to go back and pull her K-5 DIBELS and she consistently tested slightly below average on the oral reading metrics, but because she was testing so high above average in the written reading comprehension part of DIBELS, they just looked at her overall average and passed her as reaching goal. Her dyslexia manifests as an encoding challenge more than a decoding challenge, but APS tends to miss those nuances because they only focus on the overall score.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I feel like my kid just isn't the best at DIBELS.

He has been struggling but this year he has made huge improves. Like he went from reading 30 WPM at the second grade level to reading 140 WPM at the 4th grade level (he is in 3rd). He used to refuse to read books and is now reading chapter books and stupid DIBELS is saying he is further behind than he was at the beginning of the year (needs strategic help vs core, but I guess was only off by one point). The kid got 100% on his writing assessment and is well into the range of well prepared for the VGA.

So I am a bit over DIBELS right now. It just made me feel like all the progress he made for the year meant nothing!

DIBELS isn't a test of intelligence. When used correctly, it is supposed to pick up on learning disabilities including dyslexia. If your kid is scoring well on writing assessments but is testing behind on any of the individual DIBELS categories (especially oral reading), it could be a flag for dyslexia. APS is really bad at identifying dyslexia in the 2e kids in elementary school. Our kid was never flagged in K-5, but was just diagnosed in 7th grade when she struggled with phonemic awareness in her foreign language class. I asked APS to go back and pull her K-5 DIBELS and she consistently tested slightly below average on the oral reading metrics, but because she was testing so high above average in the written reading comprehension part of DIBELS, they just looked at her overall average and passed her as reaching goal. Her dyslexia manifests as an encoding challenge more than a decoding challenge, but APS tends to miss those nuances because they only focus on the overall score.

We had him tested privately because of DIBELS in 2nd grade, but private testing shows no evidence of dyslexia. He also has a reading tutor who screened him, but she saw no evidence of dyslexia either. He has been pretty low (like well below/below) on DIBELS for a while (hence the tutor/private testing) but his oral reading fluency has improved immensely after tutoring (according to his tutor and his teacher) it just isn't being reflected in DIBELS. I mean maybe everyone has missed it. He does have ADHD and is getting OG tutoring so we are doing everything we need to for dyslexia whether or not he has it.

I also just think my kid HATES oral assessments. When they did the old PALS test we were told he doesn't know the alphabet (which he clearly knew, he just hates answering them) and DIBELS doesn't given any results for effort.

[Anonymous]

1) Dibels take about a minute. It’s meant as a mass screening tool; teacher can get through lots of kids and quickly weed out who needs help. It should never be used to diagnose a reading disorder AND it will miss kids.

2) what you need to do is delve into the various components of Dibels if your child is struggling and figure out which section is causing the problem. That may give you a clue — but not necessarily the answer — as to what is going on. Particularly if they are consistently missing a section. For example, dyslexic children often struggle with the nonsense word part which isn’t tested in fourth grade. Our excellent student child kept missing that part in 2nd and 3rd grades and I WISHED someone told me to demand the breakdown. It would’ve stoked me to pursue diagnosis much earlier. Do not be afraid to demand everything about these results. All they give you is the composite score but you need to know the composite of what.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:1) Dibels take about a minute. It’s meant as a mass screening tool; teacher can get through lots of kids and quickly weed out who needs help. It should never be used to diagnose a reading disorder AND it will miss kids.

2) what you need to do is delve into the various components of Dibels if your child is struggling and figure out which section is causing the problem. That may give you a clue — but not necessarily the answer — as to what is going on. Particularly if they are consistently missing a section. For example, dyslexic children often struggle with the nonsense word part which isn’t tested in fourth grade. Our excellent student child kept missing that part in 2nd and 3rd grades and I WISHED someone told me to demand the breakdown. It would’ve stoked me to pursue diagnosis much earlier. Do not be afraid to demand everything about these results. All they give you is the composite score but you need to know the composite of what.

YES! I posted above. This is exactly what happened to us. I asked APS to go back and pull the breakdown by section for prior years, after our kid was diagnosed privately with dyslexia. It was upsetting to me that the clues were there the whole time, but APS only ever provided the composite score.

[Anonymous]

Thanks to PPs for posting the links. I'm a little infuriated by how complicated that was to track down and interpret. It would be nice if APS provided even minimal information or resources.

[Anonymous]

We are at Claremont, and at least in years past, our child's DIBELS has been broken down--I only recall with certainty because they typically tested high on nonsense words, but, really low in comprehension, and APS would always try to embrace the overall composite score to say, "look! everything is fine"! And I was like this child scoring well on nonsense words, but, terribly on comprehension does not point to a child who is going to thrive as they progress academically. It is really frustrating to have to try and push for honest narratives--parents are unlikely to be educational experts and should not have to advocate for commons sense actions from the school.

[Anonymous]

In the past there has been MUCH more detailed info than just one number and "core." I believe we should have received more info this year, per the APS website.

https://www.apsva.us/assessment/ela-assessments/

Under the header "How does APS communicate with families/caregivers about DIBELS?

"After students have taken DIBELS, schools communicate the results via the Parent Report and an accompanying Parent Report Letter. The Parent Report, generated by DIBELS, provides specific information related to student performance. It includes students’ scores on each of the DIBELS measures administered at the student’s grade level, a brief explanation of the scores, and an indication of risk related to reading proficiency."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We are at Claremont, and at least in years past, our child's DIBELS has been broken down--I only recall with certainty because they typically tested high on nonsense words, but, really low in comprehension, and APS would always try to embrace the overall composite score to say, "look! everything is fine"! And I was like this child scoring well on nonsense words, but, terribly on comprehension does not point to a child who is going to thrive as they progress academically. It is really frustrating to have to try and push for honest narratives--parents are unlikely to be educational experts and should not have to advocate for commons sense actions from the school.

Another Claremont parent here with the EXACT same experience. High on nonsense words, low everywhere else and told everything is fine. I feel like I'm not getting an honest narrative. Kid is miserable in school. I'd really appreciate if the school could even guide me on what I could/should supplement with since I'm not an education expert but they are. I know they can't sit one on one with each kid so I'm not asking them to do anythign special for my kid, just want to know what would help my kid grow.

[Anonymous]

A new poster here, also at Claremont, and it can’t even get my kids’ teachers to respond to basic questions about performance, let alone get a thorough break down of their testing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is the latest version

https://dibels.uoregon.edu/sites/default/files/2022PercentileRanksDIBELS8Report.pdf

This was really helpful. Since APS provided only the composite score, it seems A LOT of information is missing from what they've given to parents, correct?

[Anonymous]

I've never gotten a parent letter for any assessment. It drives me nuts because APS pays for these. There's absolutely no reason to withhold these. If you want engaged parents who partner with their teachers to improve performance, you got to give them decent data

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Thanks to PPs for posting the links. I'm a little infuriated by how complicated that was to track down and interpret. It would be nice if APS provided even minimal information or resources.

They don’t have enough people at Syphax to work on this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:In the past there has been MUCH more detailed info than just one number and "core." I believe we should have received more info this year, per the APS website.

https://www.apsva.us/assessment/ela-assessments/

Under the header "How does APS communicate with families/caregivers about DIBELS?

"After students have taken DIBELS, schools communicate the results via the Parent Report and an accompanying Parent Report Letter. The Parent Report, generated by DIBELS, provides specific information related to student performance. It includes students’ scores on each of the DIBELS measures administered at the student’s grade level, a brief explanation of the scores, and an indication of risk related to reading proficiency."

I have been in APS for ten years and have never gotten this. They are paying for this? That is infuriating.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:In the past there has been MUCH more detailed info than just one number and "core." I believe we should have received more info this year, per the APS website.

https://www.apsva.us/assessment/ela-assessments/

Under the header "How does APS communicate with families/caregivers about DIBELS?

"After students have taken DIBELS, schools communicate the results via the Parent Report and an accompanying Parent Report Letter. The Parent Report, generated by DIBELS, provides specific information related to student performance. It includes students’ scores on each of the DIBELS measures administered at the student’s grade level, a brief explanation of the scores, and an indication of risk related to reading proficiency."

I have been in APS for ten years and have never gotten this. They are paying for this? That is infuriating.

I've gotten them at parent teacher conferences, it's never been posted on Parentvue.

[Anonymous]

Yes, they are typically given at parent teacher conferences, but we have always gotten the complete report. However we never get any real feedback from teachers about the report. So we just gave up and did everything privately.

My kid also scores high on nonsense words and lower on reading comp but all other testing were have done shows he excels in reading comprehension so I am really just ignoring DIBELS from here on out.