Informal Reading Inventory Paper

The National Reading Panel identifies alphabetics, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension as literacy essentials. These components are what make up the readers in the classroom. In order for each individual student to thrive teachers must identify and provide them with appropriate reading content. There are many ways to assess each student in the classroom. A favored method is the Informal Reading Inventory. Informal Reading Inventory(IRI) is a system that gauges the skill level of individual students reading performance. Nina L. Nilson, an experienced scholar in the field of literacy education wrote in a journal article about IRIs and the importance they serve. “ While IRIs serve a variety of purpose, perhaps their greatest value

When students are aligned with appropriate material it helps prevent gaps in their present and future learning. IRIs consist of grade word lists and oral and silent passages that increase in difficulty. The IRI yields four levels: independent, instructional, frustration, and listening capacity (Gunning, 2014, p120). With all the information retrieved teachers can tailor each student with their level of reading material. There are many IRIs available to educators. Many schools provide teachers with a particular one for their grade level however, there are IRIs available for purchase, or some educators create their own. The procedure for administering an IRI varies. Typically IRI consist of two major components, a graded word lists and graded passages. Generally there are two passages, one intended to be read aloud to an evaluator and the other to be read individually. The word list typically start the process. A word list is presented in isolation to the student which allows for the student to use word-analysis strategies. This provides the teacher with insight in the students ability to use phonics, syllabic analysis, and decoding skills(Gunning, 2014, P85). The list provided at first is simple and

Studies of IRIs are small scale and dependent on individual schools, many schools go with what they know, standardized testing. Standardized testing are universal, therefor all students are taking one exam, vs. the one to one assessment which proves to be more time consuming in the classroom. Another reason why there are shortcomings with IRIs is that there are multitudes of options to choose from. This makes it hard for professionals to select the correct IRI for their students, teachers are met with confusion in choosing. If the IRI are not administered by a professional or if the professional is uneducated, and fully aware of IRIs it could inflate the results which could end up hurting the student (Gunning, 2014,