Selecting at-risk first-grade readers for early intervention: Eliminating false positives and exploring the promise of a two-stage gated screening process.

TLDR

The base screening model includes phonemic awareness, rapid naming skill, oral vocabulary, and initial word identification fluency (WIF). The study aims to identify additional measures that reduce false positives in a first‑grade screening battery and to evaluate the efficiency gains of a two‑stage gated screening procedure. The authors tested 355 first‑grade children, assessed reading difficulty at the end of second grade, and compared models that added short‑term WIF progress monitoring, dynamic assessment, running records, or oral reading fluency to the base battery. Adding WIF progress monitoring and dynamic assessment significantly lowered false positives, while the two‑stage gated screening with phonemic decoding efficiency markedly reduced the number of children needing the full battery.

Abstract

The purposes of this study were (a) to identify measures that when added to a base 1(st)-grade screening battery help eliminate false positives and (b) to investigate gains in efficiency associated with a 2-stage gated screening procedure. We tested 355 children in the fall of 1(st) grade, and assessed for reading difficulty at the end of 2(nd) grade. The base screening model, included measures of phonemic awareness, rapid naming skill, oral vocabulary, and initial word identification fluency (WIF). Short-term WIF progress monitoring (intercept and slope), dynamic assessment, running records, and oral reading fluency were each considered as an additional screening measure in contrasting models. Results indicated that the addition of WIF progress monitoring and dynamic assessment, but not running records or oral reading fluency, significantly decreased false positives. The 2-stage gated screening process using phonemic decoding efficiency in the first stage significantly reduced the number of children requiring the full screening battery.