As we discussed at great length in last spring’s Food For Thought, current policies in reading education require teachers to assess student progress frequently. (If you want to read that article, you can find it on our web site at www.stevensonlearning.com/newsletter.asp, “Assessing the Situation.”) Although the real value of some of the testing may be questionable, making sure that students are at least moving forward and mastering basic skills seems wise. That’s the idea behind the Stevenson Program’s Mastery/Management Tests. We have had these curriculum-based progress monitoring tests available for the Beginning Green and the Basic Blue levels for some time. Now that assessment has become more frequent, we decided to extend our monitoring procedures to the Lonely Vowels segment of the Program.

This past July we began distributing the Lonely Vowels Mastery/Management Test Manual and Test Booklet. The format is the same as our previous assessments: one decoding mastery test and one comprehension management test given at the same point.   However, there are only five test points in Lonely Vowels, in contrast to six in each of the Beginning Green and Basic Blue Levels, because the Lonely Vowels segment of the program is shorter. In addition to the new Lonely Vowels test books, we have also posted additional decoding tests for the Green and Blue Levels on our web site. Some teachers are required to assess students every one to two weeks, so we created nine more Beginning Green Decoding Tests (for a total of fifteen) and eleven more Basic Blue Levels Tests (for a total of seventeen). These tests can be downloaded for free by anyone who has purchased the corresponding books. To find the additional decoding tests. go to the Teaching Resources section of the web site - www.stevensonlearning.com/teaching_tools.htm. If you want to order the new Lonely Vowels tests, just check out the on-line order form. If you have any questions, call us at 1-800-343-1211.