Letter Name and Sound Identification Benchmark Assessment: Additional Guidance

Phase theory does not identify a specific number of letters or letter sounds a child should be able to name in order to move from one Phase to the next. As a result, the microphase correlation for the Letter Name and Sound Identification assessment is mostly meant as a guide for grouping and choosing the appropriate materials for differentiated small-group instruction; the microphase identified for this assessment does not necessarily translate to other skills, such as spelling and decoding.

The results of this assessment also help a teacher determine whether to administer the Spelling and Decoding Benchmark Assessments to determine a microphase for those skills.

While the Letter Name and Sound Identification assessment does not provide a direct microphase correlation, the following descriptions of the Pre-Alphabetic and Partial Alphabetic phases provide context for teachers:

Pre-Alphabetic:
Children in the Pre-Alphabetic Phase have limited or no knowledge of the alphabet and instead use visual cues to read environmental print (such as the word STOP on a stop sign). Skills Block instruction across this phase focuses on developing students’ phonological awareness skills and knowledge of the letters and sounds.

Partial-Alphabetic:
Children in the Partial Alphabetic Phase are beginning to use their growing knowledge of letters and sounds to decode and spell simple words. Children entering this phase do not yet attend to all parts of a word when reading or spelling and may instead rely on initial and final sounds with varying accuracy. Skills Block instruction across this phase focuses on strengthening students’ phonological and phonemic awareness skills through daily opportunities to work with both individual sounds and whole words through blending, segmenting, isolating, encoding, and decoding.

The following table offers guidance for teachers on how to take the results from the Letter Name and Sound Identification assessment and plan for additional assessments (when needed) and, more importantly, teacher-led differentiated small group instruction.

	Score on Letter ID and Sound ID Assessment	Guidance for further assessments	Guidance for teacher-led small group differentiated instruction*
Student A	Knows few or no letters or sounds	Administer the Phonological Awareness assessment. Do not administer the decoding/ encoding portions of the Benchmark Assessment at this time.	Choose activities where students… identify rhyming words among a given set count and blend syllables identify the initial sound in a given word, with support practicing recognizing the letters in their name work on fine motor and concepts of print/ book handling skills
Student B	Know some letters (mostly uppercase) and few sounds	Administer the Phonological Awareness assessment. Do not administer the decoding/ encoding portions of the Benchmark Assessment at this time.	Choose activities where students… begin to identify words that rhyme begin to isolate, count, and blend syllables in a spoken word learn additional letters (including their upper and lowercase formation and their consonant or short vowel sounds) learn to recognize simple high-frequency words such as the, I, and am Using the Assessment Conversion Chart, identify which cycles teach the letters and sounds students do not know. Use the Decodable Reader Routines for these Cycles as a resource for planning small-group instruction. Consult the resources in Learning Letters as needed.
Student C	Know some letters (upper and lowercase) and some sounds	Administer the Phonological Awareness assessment. Teachers may choose to administer the decoding/ encoding portions of the Benchmark Assessment to see how students apply their letter/ sound knowledge, but these assessments are not required at this time.	Choose activities where students… begin to identify words that rhyme begin to isolate, count, and blend syllables in a spoken word learn additional letters (including their upper and lowercase formation and their consonant or short vowel sounds) review high-frequency words that have been introduced in the Late Pre-Alphabetic microphase (if Whole Group instruction is already past Cycles 1-11) Using the Assessment Conversion Chart, identify which cycles teach the letters and sounds students do not know. Use the Decodable Reader Routines for these Cycles as a resource for planning small-group instruction. Consult the resources in Learning Letters to review and teach letter formation.
Student D	Know most letters and some sounds	Consider administering the decoding/ encoding portions of the Benchmark Assessment. When making this determination, look at specific known and unknown letters and sounds. If the student can identify most of the more commonly used consonants, some vowels and their sounds, the Benchmark Assessment will likely yield interesting data for the teacher even if the student falls below a score of 4 on either assessment and is placed in the Late Pre-Alphabetic Microphase.	Choose activities where students… identify and produce words that rhyme segment, count, and blend syllables in a spoken word begin to isolate and pronounce the initial, final, and medial sounds (with support) in a spoken word learn additional letters (including their upper and lowercase formation and their consonant or short vowel sounds) review high-frequency words that have been introduced in the Late Pre-Alphabetic microphase during WG instruction (see Scope and Sequence) Using the Assessment Conversion Chart, identify which cycles teach the letters and sounds students do not know. Use the Decodable Reader Routines for these Cycles as a resource for planning small-group instruction. Consult the resources in Learning Letters as needed. Depending on which letters and sounds are known, the student may be ready for instruction using the Decodable Readers. The Early Partial microphase provides a review of all short vowel sounds. Small group instruction in Cycles 14-18 using the decodable readers will reinforce students' knowledge of the vowels and their short sounds.
Student E	Know most or all letters and sounds	Administer the decoding/ encoding portions of the Benchmark Assessment. The Benchmark Assessment will yield interesting data for the teacher and help determine if the student has entered the Early Partial Microphase (or beyond!) in decoding or encoding.	Choose activities where students: identify and produce words that rhyme segment, count, and blend syllables in a spoken word isolate and pronounce the initial, final, and medial sounds in a spoken word continue to identify and write all uppercase and lowercase letters work with the Decodable Readers (Cycle 14+) begin to decode and spell VC and CVC words review high-frequency words that have been introduced in the Late Pre-Alphabetic microphase during WG instruction (see Scope and Sequence)

* For teacher-led differentiated small groups, use the Activity Bank in the Resource Manual, Decodable Reader Routines, and the Learning Letters guide as a resource.

The Phonemic Play routine (included in the Cycle Planners) provides specific guidance for incorporating Phonological Awareness into whole-group instruction. This routine can easily be included in small group instruction for students in the Late-Pre-Alphabetic, Early Partial, and Middle Partial microphases on the Cycle Planner landing page. Many Instructional Practices introduced during whole-group instruction can be easily adapted to small-group instruction as well.