Unique Screener of Reading Fluency and Comprehension for Adolescents and Adults

Abstract

Because there are few brief reading fluency screeners available for older adolescents and adults we developed one, then investigated its psychometric properties, obtained for 161 college students. Two experimental versions of this unique, silent, group-administered screener of reading fluency and comprehension require adolescents and adults either to read and identify ideas or words (i.e., word chaining) within connected text of increasing difficulty. Both instruments and the Nelson-Denny Reading Test (Brown, Fishco, & Hanna, 1993) were administered in counterbalanced order. Results indicate moderately strong relationships (r values ranged from .52 to .63) between both versions of the screener and Nelson-Denny comprehension and rate scores. These data provide preliminary evidence of validity for these screeners for this population. The format requiring examinees to identify ideas produced slightly higher correlations with Nelson-Denny comprehension scores than did the word chain format. Both may be useful because they can be created from existing curriculum materials and are efficient (i.e., group administered) and quick (requiring only 5 minutes).