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A Preliminary Investigation of Second- and Fourth-Grade African American Students' Performance on the Gray Oral Reading Test—Fourth Edition

2010; Lippincott Williams & Wilkins; Volume: 30; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1097/tld.0b013e3181e04056

1550-3259

Tempii B. Champion, Linda I. Rosa‐Lugo, Kenyatta O. Rivers, Allyssa McCabe,

School Choice and Performance

Purpose Research has established that African American (AA) children are lagging behind other children in their reading skills. A number of factors have been proposed to account for the literacy gap; however no single factor has entirely explained this disparity. This investigation examined the appropriateness of the Gray Oral Reading Test—Fourth Edition (GORT–4) for identifying the oral reading proficiency skills of African American English (AAE)-speaking children in the second and fourth grades by comparing their reading skills with their levels of dialect usage as measured by the Diagnostic Evaluation of Language Variation-Screening Test (DELV-ST). Method The DELV-ST and the GORT–4 were used to assess 33 typically developing AA students in second and fourth grades. The scores were analyzed to evaluate associations between the two measures. Results Results of the DELV-ST indicated that the majority of the participants were AAE-speaking children. The participants also scored below the mean for the normative sample on the GORT–4. A statistically significant correlation was found between the participants' DELV-ST scores (higher scores represent less variation from mainstream American English; lower scores represent more variation and higher AAE usage) and participants' performance on the GORT–4 comprehension subtest, as well as a significant correlation between their grade level and performance on the GORT–4, in particular between the rate subtest and grade. Findings are discussed in terms of using the GORT–4 with caution by professionals in determining the reading skills of AA children who speak AAE. There could be some value in using the GORT with AAE-speaking children even though they may score lower on it.