CaJiforn.ia Sta,te University a.t Northrldge
(San Fernando Valley State Colleee)
TEACHER'S RATINGS OF CHICANO
CHTTJDREN 'S REA.DTNG PERFORMANCE
A. pr-oject submitted in. partial satisfaction of' the
requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in
1:<:ducati.onv
Psychological
Foundations~
SpeciaJ lz!3.tion ln Readinp;/I.earning Disorders
by
tTohn Edward Ryan
.June v 1972
~e
project of John Edward Ryan is appr0ved:
California State University at N0rtnridge
June, 1972
l.
The necessity of distinguishing carefully between
reading and speaking, especia1ly the ability to read with
comprehension and the ability to speak as the teacher doefi,
has been pointed up for some time.
The consequences of
confusing these two sets of performance variables have
been dealt w:tth by, among others, Ecroyd (1968), Goodman
(1965)
~
and Wardhaugh (1969).
As Modiano indicated i.n a recent article ent:i.tled
"Where Are the Children?" ma.ny teachers can and do accept
the child where he is with his many manifestations of indivi.dual differences, "but acceptance all too often does
not extend to differences in speecho" (Modiano, 1969) ..
Tinker and McCullough (1968) commented on the disadvantaged listener and speaker tn the foll0w:tng:
"Their fami.Jy' s use of English majr dispense with word endings or word beginnings9 and substitute postures, gestures,
and facial expressions for all but one or
two words in a sentence.~.Knowledge and
use of •book English* are essential readiness for reading English in school books.
The old recipe for providing readiness is
still a pretty good one: Seat the child
beside a great taJJmr a.nd let nature take
its course."
Gilbert (1971) stndied the attitudE'S of 250 ex:per:ienced white male and fema.le
teachers~
Ethnic background,
soci-o-economic statuses and language cues of the Sr>eaJ\.ers
wer~
the relevant varia.bles.
He found that the Black spenkers were
r~tted
s ie;nifi-
cantJy 1ower than the white speakers matched on SES and
language levels,
Rated most negatively was the middle
cla.ss Black speaker, who seemed to have the most signi.ftcant impact on the teachers' ratingo
Race did not
dominate in.i.tial impressions of teacherss
BtJt the SES
and language factors appeared to compound and magnify
the racial bias rather than relieve itg
Therefore, the necessity of distinguishing care-
fully between reading and speaJdng should be focused
on.
Do teachers fairly
assess~
:i.n genera.lp students
who speak other than the way the teacher sneaks?
s ~21: J?.r.Q.lU&l!!~
The objective of this study was to determine the
effect of speech
vari::~.tj on
and labels assigned to child-
ren of differential :reading a,bility, socio-economic background (SES) and ethnic membership on teachers' ratings
of reading performance.
Teachf'rs' attitudes toward language, and children's
speech ln particular, will not s ignif:i.cantly affect their
assessment of children's oral
___
reading~
Procedure:
_..,....,__
;?~g.ts,:
Thi.rty-six teachers in a. graduate course
ln reading were asked to rate the reading
performanc~
some eighth grade boys.
f3e:tl!QlL.Qf....~~-QQ11~l!2~) 9J}.:
A forty-word standard
passage with a difficulty range of ahou.t eighth grade
of
Jeyel was read into a tape recorder by four eighth gra.de
boys representing four different levels of reading a.blli ty,
two different levels of SES and two different ethnic groups.
One boy was a white eighth grader from a low SES back,?;round and with a low readine lPvel.
was an upper
ity.
S"f!~S
A white counterpart
boy with above gra.de level readine; abil-
Si.milarly, one Mexican-American was an ei.ghth grade
boy with n. low SBS and low reading ability.
His counter-
part was a. Mexi.ca.n-4,merlcan boy of higher SES and above
grade level reading ability.
SES was determined by parents occupation and income.
Reading levels carne from school records and teachers• a!?s~ssments
that concurred.
for level of reading
ing special tsts
The
The ta:ne recordings were judged
perform~:mce
by a panel of three read-
8
te~tchers
were given no criteria for rating beyond
the :instruction that they were t0 use their own ,iudgement.
The:ir t::'l.sk wa.!3 to rate e:ight readers 9 us.ing a ratlng sheet
containing a scale of one to f:i.ve which represents "poor"
to "very good$"
The recordings of the eight readers a.c-
tu.ally consisted of the same tape presented two times for
each of the eighth graders,
Two r:tndom orders of the
readers were used to control for a.n order effect.
One-half of the :rating sheets contained labels by
each of the :numbers for each of the nases Ccw • for ex ...
amr>le, for TJ-1ower Sl:':S, W-wh ite).
The other :rr-Jtin,rs sheets
did not conta:in labels.
A scoring procedure was adopted for the responses
to the four readers rated two times.
Corresponding to
the independent measures of reading a.ch tevement scores
(I,C-8th :cr.rade readlng level; INI-6th gra.de reading level;
HW-tOth grade read.ing level; HC is 9th grade reading
level) a.s wel 1 as una.nlmous judo;ements of a panel of
reading sneciaJists whir.h
m~:ttched
these a.chlAvement
a score of 3 wa.s assiA;ned:
sco-res~
when IIW wa.s rated 1 (Poor)
2 (Falr)
IJC "
",,
"
It
Ht;
tl
tl
HW
It
4 (Good)
5 (Very
"
Good)
A score of 2 wa.s asslgned:
when T.W was rated 2 (Fair)
J~C
3 (Average)
"
"
J,,. (Good)
HW "
"
"
c
tl
"f~rt
II
\.
~core
"
"
J
(V!!'lrY Gt)rvl \
of 1 was arw igned:
~vhem
"
..
"
LW was
l~C
"
HW "
HC "
r.~ted 1
(Av0rage)
1 (Poor)
3 (Average)
3 (Average)
"
II
"
AJ!gl~f!l![_Q.f..~.YJ~,!.!~9~:
With 1.8
ca~es
.in each cell, the mean score in Table
VII were com-o1.1ted on
TBble VI.
th~
th~
:ratings shol}m in
A. two-way ana.lyRis of variance yielded no
significant d1fferences
labels).
hA.si.s of
~or grou~R
Nor was there a
r':roups and reader-type.
r-:;
(with or without
ie;nifica.nt interaction between.
Reader·~~rn'-";
howover, was s :ignl-
f.icant a.t the *001. .levele
B~~iSQ..lJ..SSign._t
The ratings of all 36 f:Ubjects, those with and without
labels~
were highly consistent and reasonably accurate
in accord with the pri.or assigned levels for three of the
four readers
&
They corresponded to the i.ndependen.t meas-
ure of rea.di.ng achievement (Iowa scores) as well as the
judgements of a panel of readi.ng speci.aLtsts which matched
these achievement scores, HW is a better reader than HC
who is better than LC who .i.s better. than I1W.
HW was
rated at tenth grade reading leve18 HC at the ninth 9 J.,C
at about eighth3 and U"/ at
5.5 to 6th grade
level~
The HC (or h:i.gh SES Chi.cano) boy represented an e.xception to these flndings.
The HC reader received an a.c-
curRte rating of "4" (good) from only 13 subjects.
One
subject rated him consistently "-5" (very good), but
9
subjects consistently gave him a lower rating of "3"
( l:l.Verage) •
An indication of the consistency of
thM~e
responses
can be noted by looking at the total n\imber of subjects
whose ratings for the same reader were identical (indicated by
A,
and B i.n Tables I - IV).
For the 1ow SES Chicano (J,C), 23 of 36 subjects respond~d
both times with an identical rating.
The low SES
white (I,W) reader elicited the same rating both trials
from 32 of the 36
subje~ts~
For the h:igh SES white
6.
readere the number of same responses on both trlais was
33 of 36 and 20 of 36 for the low SES (IJC) Ch i.ca.no reader.
These findings indicate consistency, and only consistency.
As for the a.ccuracy of these cons is tent ratings§ 22
subjects rated the IC a 2(Fair) - - His assigned accurate
rating ... - and one subject rated him lower with a l.(Poor).
For the I,W reader, 24 subjects rated him accurately with
a 1(Poor) and 7 subjects gave him a higher rating of 2
(Fair).
For the HW 30 subjects rated him accurately with
.5(Very Good), and only two rated him lower with a 4(Good).
At this point, the genera.l. pattern of these findings
begins to dissolve..
The HC reader received an accurate
rating of 4(Good) from only 1.5 subjects.
One subject con-
sistently rated him 5(Very Good), but 11 sub,jects consistently gave him a lower rating of 3(A.vera.ge).
figures poi1--.+. up the rl."ramati r~
Fl""~Pr~.te
flP.r:;J ine
-~.x.
the
These
number of
yet cons iRtent res-ponses ~l:ird.ted by th•~ HG
reader3
Teachers a.re often taught to assess a child's reading
performances level by administering what ls sometimes called
an informal read:tng
inventory~
Their subsequent judgements,
of course, should be based only in part on this informal assessment, but many teachers give great weight to this sort
of assessment.
The main point to be noted is that they
judge on wha.t the child sounds like to them--gross and minor
errors sometimes notwithstanding.
What a group of teachers was asked to do for thif:l
study does not differ substantially in kind from what is
recommended generally as standard procedure ln tne teaching of reading.
The teachers were able to avoid the ef-
fects of labelling the Chicano child, but were unable to
fairly assess a good Chicano reader as bei.ng as good a.s
he is.
'I'hese findings would seem to support the contention
that many teachers tend to confuse norms of speaking and
reading performance variables.
This inabilit:f to distin-
guish betv1een read.i.ng and Etpea.king would appear to influence their judgement of children's readinG;.
In particular,
this confusion may prevail among teachers of reading who
teach children whose speech differs considerably from
their own.
No. of Subjects w5.th Cons is tent and Accurate Ratings*
gon.:~ja.!tDJ:!.
UJ
r-l
(!)
,0
«I
r:l
!&
IJW
HW
HC
10
tt
15
9
4
2
3
J::~C(2)
I..W(t)
HW(5)
10
11
15
9
8
13
14
15
6
27
23
3.5
30
1..5
HC(4)
.p
::>
0
..c:
+>
•r-1
t
:;::
Total
12
14
t
3
23
32
15
32
6
*Figures in parentheses denote a.ss i.gned ratings;
consistency ""' two identical :ratings; accuracy
mntchtng prior determiner'l
in each
= 36.
leveJs~
~
posslble total
T A B I E
.
RatLYlgs
of All
_.._.
IZ
R~aders
II
.
Heard Two T1mes
*
-
1{Poor)
r,c
4
r,w
56 (27, 28)
{2~
2)
7JAverage)
55
(27g28)
10 (?, 3)
72
18 {10, 8)
1 (1~ 10)
72
HW
~(1
.... v
5(Very Good)
2(
- H'. . al.r,
•
'
1 (1, 0)
4(QQC)J:l}
Total
1 (Oll 1)
6 (5, 1)
62 (31, 31)
?2
30 (10. 20)
38 ( 22' 16)
6 ( 3 f 3)
72
·----------------·------------------------~-----------··---------------·-----------------------------------------------·
Tota1 60
*
74
42
44
68
288
First and Second figures in parentheses denote respectively the number of
ratings by Ss without and :1i_th labels.
..
\0
10.
T A B I, E III
Mean Scores on Ratings of Readers Heard Twice
Ql:qEJ2
I,C
LW
Ji~
HC
-·
Without
5.3889
5~3333
5.7222
4.5556
.5~2500
5e7778
3~7222
5.0334
J.,abels
With
J,ahels
5.2?78
Total
5.3334
5 .4L~4 5
5. 7500
u.
TABLE IV
A:n~J.ys j 8
of
Variance for Ratin.g Means
Without/With 1a.be.ls (rows)
Reader ..Types (columns)
In.teraction
Within
c~ll~
Tota.l
*
Reader-Type F - 12e83;
1 $0000
1
54.,0.5.56
3
18~018.5 -~~
• 91~.44
3
.3:1.48
181~0000
1.36
:1.~3044
237~0000
1.43
p
1,0000
A.nnerson, I. H., The relation o.f meaning to oral :reading
errors
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Creative writing .i.8 related to reading.
R.e.?.:9..:.1n£.L. i\S _,,AQ_.In te]J;~~A..£:tiv.!:tx., Internat i.onal
Reading Conference Proceedjngs 9 8, 1963
Capiobianco~
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and Miller§ D. Y ~
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270-273 e
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Unl.vers:ttYo New York Resea.rch Tnstitute, 1.958 0
71~
CohenD s. A~ and Ko:rnfif'ld, a~ s. OraJ Vocabu1:3ry ::tnd
ber;inn ing reading :in disadvantaged Black chi 1 n:r.eno
Th~_ . lJ.:[email protected]!lTI/': ..rrfl~.Qh~.:r. 24, 19?0, 33-38s
Ecroyd~
n.
l'Jegro children and language arts.
. :iD..e: __T.~Slcll~r., ?1
F1J~m :i:ng,
p
Oral 1 rmgua.r:,f' and beg irm i.nf.'!: reading.
J. T.
fteadi.~eacb,~tP 22u
Gil~erts~
R$ A,
F.co:nomi<:!
J'h~ ..J!£.~.9.,­
1968 e 624-629.
1.968 0
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Teacher
r~t.~.;1+:~:,..~
Pnrc~ntio~R of R~ce~ Sen~.­
~.1'"!(1 T.~nguage l'~h:n"a.C"t0ristics,
W1£S&Jl:in. s ta:!!.§L..lln.lx.r£2.t~L.-~ Jlnllg~~!.~r...._3i.QhopJ...
Q.f_J~duggt.J!i9.!LRYJ?lic.§.~ion,
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Goodman, Ko s. Analysts of Oral reading miscues: appli0d
psy cho lon~u :is t lcs ~ B..~§!J! in.e;.J5~.§~3~!.£h._9,:Uf!·1"-:!=~r1Y, 1 •
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T.h~=J~.f~s.9Jng=_Tft£tr~b~~.r. a ·- 24 , 1 9 70 ,
~omp:rehens
ion8
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Tinker, M. and M~Cullough, c. T.g.r?&hJne...~J.em~m.srr.Y.J~,~~.91!1?:9
New Ynrk.
Appleton-Century nrr-:tfts, Third Editio11~
1968.
Wakefj.<=:-1<'iu M* W., and Silar.olj. N.
s.
A. ~tudy nf oral
lant:;uar:e -patterns of low soc :to-economic.. groups.
Jlf'~!iin.e_.:!'.~.9hgr, ?.~ ~ 1969 ~ n??.-624 ..
Th'f.'·
WA.rdhaugh, R ~ Reading: A_ 1·'"1D_t;nd.§_ti"c;LJ!~t:~!LS1!JY.~.
York; Harcourt, Brace and Worlrl~ Tnc.D 1969,.
New