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Nonsense Word Fluency

What is it? Why is it assessed in grades k-2?

What does the assessment look like?

What can I do to help my child if they need extra support with this skill?

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What is it?

Nonsense Word Fluency or NWF is a screener that assesses a student’s knowledge of letter sounds and their ability to blend those sounds to read words.

The words on the assessment are made up of the vowel-consonant or VC pattern and the consonant-vowel consonant pattern or CVC. The vowel will have its short sound.

Real words with these patterns would be: it, at, fun and win.

Some examples of nonsense words with such patterns would be: iv, un, min & doz.

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Why is it assessed in grades K-2?

Students in grades K-2 are learning and applying the alphabetic principle. This is being able to recognize each letter and understanding that each letter has a special sound attached to it. This is being able to look at the letter s and knowing to say the /s/ sound when you see it.

Learning and using this skill fluently and accurately makes reading easier, thus assuring a solid foundation for reading success.

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When are students assessed?

Kindergarten students will take the NWF screener in the middle and end of the year.

First graders take the screener at the beginning, middle and end of the year.

Second graders take the screener at the beginning of the year.

If students do not meet the benchmark expectations for their grade level, they will receive small group instruction to help strengthen this skill. In the small group setting, teachers work with students to help improve their letter sound knowledge and fluency when blending unknown words.

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Let’s Take a Look

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How can I help my child with this skill?

Letter sound knowledge: Practice letter sounds. It is important that your child can look at a letter and produce the sound that the letter makes.

Blending Sounds to Read Words: Next allow them to practice blending those sounds to read both real and nonsense words with the vc or cvc pattern. Make it fun with letter cards, white boards, magnetic letters, magna doodles, etc. ,

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	Beginning of the Year	Middle of the Year	End of the Year
Kindergarten	Not Assessed at this time	17 correct letter sounds in one minute	28 correct letter sounds in one minute
First Grade	27 sounds per minute 1 whole word per minute	43 sounds per minute 8 whole words per minute	58 sounds per minute 13 whole words per minute
Second Grade	54 sounds per minute 13 whole words per minute	Not Assessed at this time	Not Assessed at this time

Grade Level Goals for Nonsense Word Fluency