Cognitive and Noncognitive Assessments to Inform Literacy Instruction

As teachers, we use assessments to develop and guide instruction to meet the needs of all students (Walden University, 2014c). The use of assessments starts at the beginning of the school year and throughout the school year to track student growth and development. Teachers use these assessments for data discussions, goal setting, instructional reflection, and parent-teacher conferences. Assessments are a big part of teaching and learning and we want to make sure we are choosing the right assessments to develop instruction for student success.

Starting in our career we learn different ways to support and scaffold instruction to meet and build the foundational needs of students. What happens when a student exceeds expectations in literacy instruction? How can we better support advanced literacy learners? Cognitive assessments are used to gain insight into a student’s fluency, comprehension, and vocabulary skills (Walden University, 2014c). Cognitive assessments include but are not limited to reading inventories, retelling, word lists, and running records. Noncognitive assessments serve as a purpose to understand what motivates a student to read. Noncognitive assessments such as interest surveys and student interviews allow teachers to understand how their student engages with the text, and develop positive reading experiences, and topics they enjoy reading (Walden University, 2014c). Each type of assessment should be used when evaluating student growth in literacy instruction.

Let’s think of a situation. Jason is a sixth-grade student who enjoys reading informational texts and has career plans focusing on mechanical engineering. Jason’s teacher performed a variety of cognitive and noncognitive reading assessments on him concluding that he is advanced in literacy. Jason can read texts fluently, has an extensive vocabulary, and has great comprehension skills while reading informational texts. The noncognitive assessments showcased that Jason does not like engaging with students to discuss texts and rarely reads fictional texts to limited engagement in class discussions. Engaging with students to discuss texts is an appropriate developmental skill that advanced readers should obtain (Walden University, 2014h). What can we do as Jason’s teacher to challenge a developed skill but support his engagement with his peers? Vocabulary is a skill Jason can work on to continue growth. A cognitive assessment that Jason would benefit from is the Interactive Highlighting of Unknown Vocabulary (Reutzel, & Cooter, 2019). Since Jason is an independent reader, he can read texts that interest him and highlight words that he does not understand. This will allow Jason to continue to expand his vocabulary knowledge as well as support his text interest. Encouraging Jason to engage in literary discussions is important as well. His teacher can start by allowing a Think-Pair-Share (Reading Rockets, n.d.) with texts that students are currently  independently reading. This will boost Jason’s confidence in student engagement and allow his teacher to support social growth.

Assessments determine a decent amount of information about a student's development and growth. Also, getting to know your students through activities and discussion is a great way to determine the type of assessment they would benefit from. We never want to over assess or under-assess so, choosing the right cognitive and noncognitive assessments can benefit your instruction for the long haul.

References

Reading Rockets. (n.d.) Think-Pair-Share. Classroom Strategies. https://www.readingrockets.org/classroom/classroom-strategies/think-pair-share

Reutzel, D. R., & Cooter, R. B., Jr. (2019). Strategies for reading assessment and instruction: Helping every child succeed (6th ed.). Boston, MA: Pearson.

Walden University, LLC. (Producer). (2014h). The developing reader: The transitional, intermediate and advanced reading stages [Video file]. Baltimore, MD: Author.

Walden University, LLC. (Producer). (2014c). Cognitive and noncognitive assessments [Video file]. Baltimore, MD: Author.