How do I administer the Benchmark assessment to Early Readers?

When taking the Amira Benchmark assessment, the goal is for students to productively struggle during the Oral Reading Fluency (ORF) passage. When first taking the Benchmark assessment, the ORF passage will be at the grade level of the student. If a student is struggling to make progress on the first page of the passage, Amira will automatically prompt the student to try a new story. This story will be one grade level below the current passage. This process of downleveling will continue depending upon the student performance, and the last level of the ORF passage is at the kindergarten level.

The conditions for downleveling during the Oral Reading Fluency passage are:

• Failure to make sufficient progress within the first minute

• Reading at an accuracy rate of 60% or lower

Amira can continue to downlevel using this criteria. The kindergarten passage is the lowest level passage a student can receive.

If a student has trouble completing the kindergarten passage, encourage the student to try his/her best to:

• sound out words

• read known words

• skip unknown words

• name known letters

As long as some effort is made, Amira will give the student credit for the attempt after one minute.

Students who are unable to complete the kindergarten passage are given the assessment status of Early Reader on the Tracking Report. If a student's assessment status is listed as Early Reader, the student may not show across other Amira reports due to limited information available from the assessment.

Students who are known to be Early Readers, or students taking the assessment for the first time in kindergarten or first grade, would be best prepared for the Benchmark assessment by completing the following steps prior to assessment.

1. Explain to students that:

   1. Amira will explain what to do before they begin each step

   2. They will be using their computer or iPad and headset/microphone to read aloud a story to Amira and that the story will appear appear on their screen

   3. After they say a word, the text will turn from black to gray - if they are unable to read the word, they can skip the word, sound out the word, or even say the letter names

   4. While they read aloud, Amira will be listening to them read

   5. When they are finished reading, Amira will explain to them that their reading is being saved and that Amira will take care of logging them out

2. Show students this video which includes the beginning and ending of a student taking a Benchmark assessment

❗NOTE: Depending upon the student's score, the student may be placed into the Early Reader Skills Scaffold sequence. See the Related Articles section below for more information about the Early Reader Skills Scaffold feature.

Related Articles:

• Amira Readiness Checklist

• How do I prepare devices?

• How do I always enable the mic?

• How do I configure my classroom space?

• What is downleveling?

• How do I use the Benchmark Report to view class-wide results?

• How do I get Early Readers ready for the Benchmark assessment?

• How do I know when Early Readers are ready to practice reading with Amira?

• How do I get my students ready to use the Early Reader Skills Scaffold?

• How do I assign the Early Reader Skills Scaffold to students?

• How do I move students out of the Early Reader Skills Scaffold?

• What are the components of the Early Reader Skills Scaffold?