TOSCRF: Test of Silent Contextual Reading Fluency

The TOSCRF is a companion to the Test of Silent Word Reading Fluency (TOSWRF). While the TOSWRF measures a student's ability to recognize individual words accurately and efficiently, the TOSCRF measures a student's essential contextual reading abilities (i.e., word identification, word meaning, word building, sentence structure, comprehension, and fluency).

Using a series of printed passages adapted from those in the Gray Oral Reading Tests Fourth Edition and the Gray Silent Reading Tests, the TOSCRF can be used to identify both poor and good readers. Students are presented with short passages comprised of rows of contextually related words, ordered by reading difficulty; all words are printed in uppercase without any spaces or punctuation between the words (e.g., AYELLOWBIRDWITHBLUEWINGS). Students are asked to draw a line between the boundaries of as many recognizable words as possible within 3 minutes (e.g., A/YELLOW/BIRD/WITH/BLUE/WINGS). The passages become gradually more complex in their content, vocabulary, and grammar (embedded phrases, sequenced adjectives, affixes, etc.). To do well on the test, the student has to read the meaning of the text. The test can be easily administered to a single student or to an entire classroom of children, thus making it an efficient and cost-effective screening method.

The TOSCRF accurately and reliably identifies students who are struggling with reading. Once students with poor reading skills have been identified, a more detailed diagnostic assessment can help determine the factors contributing to reading difficulties and the goals for intervention. It can also be used to periodically monitor reading progress, especially contextual reading.

Features of the TOSCRF: