#27 Reading Mistake: Letting Assessments Determine What You Teach
Assessments are an essential part of effective reading instruction. They help you measure student learning and can provide valuable information to guide your teaching. However, they should never replace a systematic scope and sequence.
Many educators analyze assessment results and immediately teach only the concepts students missed. Although that approach may seem logical, it often creates unintended gaps in a student’s understanding of the English language. Instead of allowing assessments to determine every instructional decision, use them to inform your teaching while continuing to follow a carefully planned sequence of instruction.
Assessments measure learning and help guide instruction, but they should never determine the entire instructional pathway.
The Purpose of Reading Assessments
Reading assessments serve several important purposes. First, they establish a benchmark at the beginning of the school year. Next, they help you monitor student progress throughout the year. Finally, they measure growth at the end of the year.
You can also administer brief assessments during instruction to check for understanding, identify misconceptions, and determine whether students need additional practice before moving forward.
These are all appropriate and valuable uses of assessment.
What assessments should never do, however, is replace explicit, systematic instruction.
Why Assessments Don’t Tell the Whole Story
Assessments can quickly identify a few foundational skills, such as whether a student knows individual consonant sounds, including qu, and individual short vowel sounds. Beyond those foundational sound-symbol correspondences, however, assessment results cannot tell you everything a student needs to know.
For example, imagine a student correctly identifies the sound of ay on an assessment. Does that mean the student understands:
- that ay is a vowel team?
- that ay typically appears at the end of a one-syllable word?
- how ay differs from ai?
- when to apply that pattern while reading and spelling unfamiliar words?
The answer is no.
The assessment tells you that the student recognized a sound. It does not tell you whether the student understands the underlying concept or can apply that knowledge while reading and spelling.
Follow a Scope and Sequence
The English language is built on patterns, rules, and concepts that build upon one another over time. Therefore, students need explicit instruction that introduces each concept in a carefully planned sequence.
When teachers rely too heavily on assessment results, students often learn isolated pieces of information instead of developing a complete understanding of the language. As a result, they may recognize individual sounds but fail to understand the spelling patterns and generalizations that support accurate reading and spelling.
A systematic scope and sequence prevents those gaps. It ensures that you explicitly teach every concept—even those a student may appear to know on an assessment.
That kind of instruction builds stronger, more confident readers.
Use Assessments the Right Way
Use assessments to answer questions such as:
- How much growth has the student made?
- Is the student retaining previously taught concepts?
- Does this concept need additional review?
- Is the student ready to move forward?
Don’t use assessments to answer questions such as:
- What concepts should I skip?
- Which spelling patterns don’t need to be taught?
- Which phonics rules can I leave out?
Every student deserves explicit instruction in every concept that supports skilled reading and spelling.
The Takeaway
Assessments are one of the best tools we have for measuring progress. Likewise, a systematic scope and sequence is one of the best tools we have for teaching reading.
When you use each for its intended purpose, they work together beautifully. Use assessments to monitor learning, identify areas for review, and measure growth. Then use your scope and sequence to determine what you teach and when you teach it.
That’s how we build strong, confident readers who possess the foundational skills they need for lifelong literacy.
If you’re looking to deepen your understanding of structured literacy and learn how to implement evidence-based reading instruction with confidence, we invite you to explore the courses and resources available through the Orton Gillingham Online Academy. Whether you’re a classroom teacher, interventionist, tutor, or parent, our practical, research-informed training is designed to equip you with the knowledge and tools to help every student become a successful reader.