Literacy Assessment
Educational Testing brings clarity and direction.
Dyslexia and Educational Testing with a qualified MD or Assessment Specialist correctly identifies dyslexia versus other language-based learning disorders or co-diagnoses. This is an important first step for families and tutors! The resulting detailed report drives each student’s tailored intervention.
Highly trained Certified Academic Language Therapists (CALTs) interpret neuropsychological and dyslexia testing reports to create effective tutoring sessions, ensuring meaningful progress without wasted time.
Although I purposely do not conduct formal educational diagnostic testing at Milwaukee Dyslexia, I welcome calls and questions regarding this important topic.
Milwaukee Dyslexia does provide ongoing literacy screening to pinpoint specific needs, identify mastered skills, monitor progress, and communicate with caregivers.
Milwaukee Dyslexia screening
As a CALT, I conduct informal (non-diagnostic) screening before beginning academic language services and at scheduled steps in each learner’s development. These screenings allow the student, the parents, and me to use quantitative and qualitative data to evaluate and record progress, mastery, and next steps.
In my screenings, the following areas can be assessed:
Phonological Awareness Skills
Phonemic Awareness Skills
Print Awareness
Knowledge of Letter and Letter Combination Names
Letter-Sound Correspondence
Spelling
Reading Accuracy
Reading Fluency
Comprehension & Vocabulary
Handwriting
Educational diagnostic testing
Parents are at their most vulnerable when their child is struggling. They want information and trust experts to tell them what is wrong—and to give advice about how they can make it better. But they need to be careful about finding the information they desperately seek and the advice they fervently want. We often get asked whom a parent should contact if they have a concern about dyslexia and would like to have their child evaluated for dyslexia, and what such an evaluation should include.
Finding an Evaluator: A number of professionals have the proper degreed training and experience to evaluate children for dyslexia. They include psychologists (educational psychologists, neuropsychologists, some school psychologists), developmental-behavioral pediatricians, child neurologists, and, in very young children, speech pathologists. Evaluations can be expensive; parents may be able to find evaluations for dyslexia on a sliding scale of fees. Make sure that the evaluator is properly credentialed, is comfortable using the word “dyslexia”, and will state the word in the diagnosis (The Yale Center for Dyslexia and Creativity).
Components of diagnostic testing
The evaluator should have a deep knowledge of dyslexia which will allow him or her to explore and identify the most relevant symptoms in a careful and complete clinical history. No two evaluators or evaluation centers will test for dyslexia exactly the same way.
The diagnosis of dyslexia is discussed in Dr. Sally Shaywitz’s book Overcoming Dyslexia (p. 133) and is outlined briefly here. The clinician evaluating your child uses his or her knowledge of dyslexia and, through history, observation and psychometric assessment, makes a judgment whether or not your child has dyslexia. In order to accomplish this the evaluator should: establish a reading problem, determine whether it is “unexpected”, and demonstrate evidence for a relative weakness in phonology. The diagnosis of dyslexia should reflect a thoughtful synthesis of all the clinical data available.
A typical evaluation will include:
An informed history of the child’s language development and any issues relating to attention
A careful history of the child’s educational progress
Assessment of reading accuracy (untimed tests of reading individual words and nonsense words)
Assessment of reading fluency (timed measures of reading individual words and nonwords as well as timed measures of reading connected text)
Assessment of phonological processing (blending and pulling apart individual words into their basic sounds)
Assessment of spelling
Assessment of math, including word problems and calculations
Assessment of general intelligence, including verbal and nonverbal ability
Evaluations often take place over two days, with about four to five hours of testing each day. But the duration can vary, depending on the individual being evaluated and the evaluator. (The Yale Center for Dyslexia and Creativity).