Personal Goals

Since I work with students who have already been diagnosed with reading and writing difficulties, I am excited to be taking this course to gain a better understanding as to how these students arrived at the school that I work at.  In other words, what types of assessments and classroom behaviors led them to be diagnosed and how did their district find their differences to be so severe that they needed an outside placement.  An important goal of mine is to learn more about the informal and formal assessment and diagnostic tools that are used to identify students with reading and writing difficulties.  More specifically, what goes into performing these assessments, why are they chosen, and how do these measures separate the readers from non-readers.  I have learned the names of many of theses assessments (i.e. DRA, DIBELS, etc.) but am interested in learning more about them.  Another goal I hope to achieve through this course is learning how to choose a proper program for instruction for those who are identified as having reading and writing difficulties.  At my school, we use the Wilson Reading System and some other programs but I am curious as to why that one is chosen.  I have observed Wilson resulting in success but have also witnessed students that are not able to progress using that particular program.  Is the success based solely on the students' specific reading difficulties or does teacher instruction play a role?  I hope that by the end of the semester some, if not all, of these questions are answered.