Early comprehension is an important, but not well-understood, contribution to early literacy and language development. Specifically, research regarding the nature of skills representative of early comprehension, including how they contribute to later reading success, is needed to support best practices to adequately prepare students. This article describes the process involved in the creation and refinement of the newly developed comprehension Individual Growth and Development Indicators (IGDIs 2.0). Two theoretical models of early comprehension are discussed to highlight the inherent complexity of this domain. Results of three studies are presented: Study 1 outlines the initial piloting process, Study 2 represents a larger-scale investigation, and Study 3 describes further field testing and reveals the final IGDI 2.0 comprehension candidate: Which One Doesn’t Belong (WODB). Results indicated WODB out-performed the other candidate measures across psychometric and pragmatic criteria. The utility of the WODB task within a Response to Intervention (RTI) framework is also discussed.
AarnoutseC.Van LeeuweJ.VoetenM.OudH. (2001). Development of decoding, reading comprehension, vocabulary and spelling during the elementary school years. Reading and Writing, 14, 61–89.
2.
AlbanoA. D.RodriguezM. C.McConnellS.BradfieldT.Wackerle-HollmanA. (2011, April). Scaling with measures of early literacy. Paper presented at the meeting of the National Council for Measurement in Education, New Orleans, LA.
3.
AnthonyJ. L.WilliamsJ. M.McDonaldR.FrancisD. J. (2007). Phonological processing and emergent literacy in younger and older preschool children. Annals of Dyslexia, 57(2), 113–137. doi:10.1007/s11881-007-0008-8
4.
BradfieldT.BesnerA.Wackerle-HollmanA.RodriguezM.McConnellS. (2014). Redefining individual growth and development indicators: Oral language. Assessment for Effective Intervention. Advance online publication. doi:10.1177/1534508413496837
5.
BradleyL.BryantP. E. (1983). Categorizing sounds and learning to read: A causal connection. Nature, 301, 419–421. doi:10.1038/301419a0
6.
Carrow-WoolfolkE. (1999). Test for Auditory Comprehension of Language–Third Edition. Austin, TX: Pro Ed.
7.
CEED@UROC. (2011). Individual growth and development indicators 2.0 identification assessments: Rhyming, first sounds, which one doesn’t belong, picture naming and sound identification (Unpublished assessment). Minneapolis: University of Minnesota, Center for Response to Intervention in Early Childhood.
8.
ChiM. T.KoeskeR. (1983). Network representation of a child’s dinosaur knowledge. Developmental Psychology, 19, 29–39.
9.
CowleyJ.GlasgowC. (1994). The Renfrew bus story: Language screening by narrative recall—Examiner’s manual. Centreville, DE: The Centreville School.
10.
DenoS. (1992). The nature and development of curriculum-based measurement. Preventing School Failure: Alternative Education for Children and Youth, 36(2), 5–10.
11.
DickinsonD. K.SmithM. W. (1994). Long-term effects of preschool teachers’ book readings on low-income children’s vocabulary and story comprehension. Reading Research Quarterly, 29, 105–122.
12.
DooleyC.M. (2011). The emergency of comprehension: A decade of research 2000-2010. International Electronic Journal of Elementary Education, 4, 169–184.
13.
DooleyC. M.MatthewsM. W. (2009). Emergent comprehension: Understanding comprehension development among young literacy learners. Journal of Early Childhood Literacy, 9, 269–294. doi:10.1177/1468798409345110
FuchsD.FuchsL. S. (2006). Introduction to Response to Intervention: What, why, and how valid is it?Reading Research Quarterly, 41, 93–99.
16.
FuchsD.FuchsL. S.ComptonD. (2012). Smart RT: A next-generation approach to prevention. Exceptional Children, 78, 263–279.
17.
FuchsL. S.DenoS. L. (1991). Paradigmatic distinctions between instructionally relevant measurement models. Exceptional Children, 57, 488–499.
18.
GlenbergA.GalleseV. (2012). Action-based language: A theory of language acquisition, comprehension and production. Cortex, 48, 905–922.
19.
GoodR. H.KaminskiR. (2002). Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills 6th edition (DIBELS). Eugene, OR: Institute for the Development of Educational Achievement. Available from http:///dibels.uoregonedu
20.
GorinJ. S.EmbretsonS. E.McKayD. (2008). Item response theory and Rasch models. In McKay (Ed.), Handbook of research methods in abnormal and clinical psychology (pp. 59–74). SAGE.
21.
GreenwoodC.CartaJ.McConnellS.GoldsteinH.KaminskiR. (2008). Center for response to intervention in early childhood. Available from http://www.crtiec.org
22.
GreenwoodC. R.BradfieldT.KaminskiR.LinasM.CartaJ. J.NylanderD. (2011). The Response to Intervention (RTI) approach in early childhood [Feature ABI: Y FTI: Y; P]. Focus on Exceptional Children, 43(9), 1–22.
23.
GreenwoodC. R.KratochwillT. R.ClementsM. (2008). Schoolwide prevention models: lessons learned in elementary schools. New York, NY: Guilford Press.
24.
JusticeL. (2010). The language basis of reading comprehension. Washington, DC: Institute of education sciences grant award, National Center for Educational Research.
25.
KailM. (2011). The study of early comprehension in language development: New methods, findings and issues. Language Interaction and Acquisition, 2, 13–35. Retrieved from http://dx.doi.org/10.1075/lia.2.1.01kai
McBride-ChangC. (1999). The ABCs of the ABCs: The development of letter-name and letter-sound knowledge. Merrill-Palmer Quarterly: Journal of Developmental Psychology, 45(2), 285–308.
28.
McConnellS. R.PriestJ. S.DavisS. D.McEvoyM. A. (2002). Best practices in measuring growth and development for preschool children. In ThomasA.GrimesJ. (Eds.), Best practices in school psychology (4th ed., Vol. 2, pp. 1231–1246). Washington, DC: National Association of School Psychology.
29.
McMasterK.van den BroekP. (2011). Making the right connections: Improving the comprehension of struggling readers. Washington, DC: Institute of Education Sciences grant award, National Center for Special Education Research.
30.
National Early Literacy Panel. (2008). Developing early literacy report of the National Early Literacy Panel. Washington, DC: National Institute for Literacy.
31.
RobinsonE.EinavS.FoxA. (2013). Reading to learn: Prereaders’ and early readers’ trust in text as a source of knowledge. Developmental Psychology, 49, 505–513. doi:10.1037/a0029494
32.
Rojas-DrummondS.TorreblancaO.PedrazaH.VelezM.GuzmanK. (2013). Dialogic scaffolding: Enhancing learning and understanding in collaborative contexts. Learning Culture and Social Interaction, 2, 11–21.
33.
SénéchalM.LeFevreJ.Smith-ChantB. L.ColtonK. V. (2001). On refining theoretical models of emergent literacy: The role of empirical evidence. Journal of School Psychology, 39, 439–460. doi:10.1016/S0022-4405(01)00081-4
34.
SénéchalM.OuelletteG.RodneyD. (2006). The misunderstood giant: On the predictive role of early vocabulary to future reading. Handbook of Early Literacy Research, 2, 173–182.
35.
Skarakis-DoyleE.DempseyL.LeeC. (2008). Identifying language comprehension impairments in preschool children. Language, Speech and Hearing Services in Schools, 39, 54–65.
36.
SnowC. E.BurnsM. S.GriffinP. (Eds.). (1998). Preventing reading difficulties in young children. Washington, DC: National Academy Press.
37.
StorchS.WhitehurstG. (2002). Oral language and code-related precursors to reading: Evidence from a longitudinal structural model. Developmental Psychology, 38, 934–947. doi:10.1037/0012-1649.38.6.934
38.
TompkinsV.GuoY.JusticeL. (2013). Inference generation, story comprehension and language skills in the preschool years. Reading and Writing, 26, 403–429.
39.
van den BroekP.KendeouP.KremerK.LynchJ.ButlerJ.WhiteM.LorchE. (2005). Assessment of comprehension abilities in young children. In StahlS.ParisS. (Eds.), Children’s reading comprehension and assessment (pp. 107–130). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
40.
van den BroekP.KendeouP.LousbergS.VisserG. (2011). Preparing for reading comprehension: Fostering text comprehension skills in preschool and early elementary school children. International Electronic Journal of Elementary Education, 4, 259–268.
41.
Wackerle-HollmanA.BradfieldT.McConnellS.AlbanoA.RodriguezM. (2011, April). Task development and item analysis in innovative measures of early literacy. Paper presented at the National Council for Measurement in Education, New Orleans, LA.
42.
Wackerle-HollmanA.SchmittB.BradfieldT.RodriguezM.McConnellS. (2014). Redefining individual growth and development indicators: Phonological awareness. Journal of Learning Disabilities. Advance online publication doi:10.1177/0022219413510181
43.
WhitehurstG. J.LoniganC. J. (1998). Child development and emergent literacy. Child Development, 69, 848–872.
44.
WiigE. H.SecordW. A.SemelE. (2004). Clinical evaluation of language fundamentals–preschool (2nd ed.). San Antonio, TX: Psychology Corporation.
45.
WilsonM. (2005). Constructing measures: An item response modeling approach. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
