Evaluation Matrix- 391ac

1. Evaluation Matrix of
Screening Tools
Gabrielle Miller, Katharine Baskind, William Aye

2. Pals:
Phonological Awareness Literacy Screening
○ Early literacy screening is the key to
providing effective literacy instruction and
preventing future reading problems
○ The Phonological Awareness Literacy
Screening (PALS) provides a comprehensive
assessment of young children’s knowledge of
the important literacy fundamentals that are
predictive of future reading success.
○ State-provided screening tool for Virginia’s
Early Intervention Reading Initiative (EIRI)
○ Pals provides you with the assessment pieces
that help you solve the instructional puzzle,
including an online system for score, entry,
reports, and progress monitoring.
○ Pals includes assessments for
- Pre-K
- Kindergarten
- Grades 1-3
ASQ-3
● Used to accurately identify children
who may be at risk for developmental
delays
● Designed to encourage parent
involvement and education
● Low-cost, reliable, and rigorously
tested
● Also offers online questionnaire
completion and online data
management systems

3. Criteria That Should Be Assessed
1. Comprehensiveness
a. How comprehensive is the screener?
i. Assessment of dyslexia involves individual testing, most often provided by a team of
qualified professionals who have had extensive clinical training in assessment as part of a
graduate degree program. Professional clinicians who assess Specific Learning
Disabilities (SLD) and dyslexia may have M.A., M.S., M.Ed., Ed.D., or Ph.D. degrees in
Education, Reading, Speech Language Pathology, School Psychology, Psychology, or
Neuropsychology.
2. Validity
3. Administration
○ Types of screening
■ Questionnaire vs. more interactive
4. Scaling of outcome
○ Score VS. profile of scores
○ Administration

4. Importance of Dyslexic Assessments
● Early literacy screening is the key to providing effective
literacy instruction and preventing future reading problems
● Children can display signs of Dyslexia as early as 3 or 4
years old, but it is not usually identified until the age of 6 or
7
● Without early awareness and support, the impact of
Dyslexia on a person’s life can be extensive
● Earlier screening could lead to an earlier and more
successful intervention

5. Justification for Assessment
The following areas should be assessed in an educational evaluation of dyslexia:
● Phonological Awareness – an individual’s awareness of and access to the sound structure of his/her oral
language
● Phonological or Language-Based Memory – ability to recall sounds, syllables, words
● Rapid Automatic Naming – speed of naming objects, colors, digits, or letters
● Receptive Vocabulary – understanding of words heard
● Phonics Skills – understanding of the symbol (letter) to the sound(s) relationship, either individually or in
combination with other letters
● Decoding –ability to use symbol-sound associations to identify (read – pronounce) words
○ Real Words
○ Nonsense Words
● Oral Reading Fluency – ability to read accurately, at a story-telling pace – to facilitate / support comprehension
○ Single Words
○ Sentences and Paragraphs
● Spelling
● Writing
○ Sentence Level
○ Paragraph Level

6. References
● Curing Dyslexia: What is Possible? (n.d.). Retrieved
March 07, 2017, from http://dyslexiaida.org/
● PALS. (n.d.). Retrieved March 07, 2017, from
https://pals.virginia.edu/
● The Global Voice of Quality. (n.d.). Retrieved March 07,
2017, from https://asq.org/