Administration of the Informal Reading Inventory (IRI)

Purpose: To obtain quick, efficient and reliable information about a student’s reading level, diagnose
some specific reading problems and learn about the skills, abilities, and needs of the student to
design a reading program.

Testing Environment: Private room 1:1 administration

Time: 30- 45 minutes

Grades: K- 12

Materials: IRI, scoring sheets, tape recorder, stop watch/timepiece with seconds, paper, pencils,
incentives (stickers, pencil, eraser, stamp)

Administration: After administering the sight word list assessment for placement and establishing the
student’s independent grade level (usually 95-100% of words read) select the reading passage closest to
the independent grade level placement from the sight word lists. Tell the student you are going to ask
him/her to read orally and silently and then ask some questions about what was read. Explain that some
of the questions will be really easy and others harder. It is okay if you do not know all the answers but
try to remember what you can from the story and try your best.
Begin with oral reading. If the student is unable to read any of the passages, administer the listening
comprehension. After the oral reading rate, fluency and comprehension is completed, administer the
silent reading rate and comprehension.
Oral Reading Rate, Fluency and Comprehension
Present the student’s copy of the first oral reading passage and read the title. Ask the student if he
knows about this topic and provide a one sentence statement about the story. Be careful not to give
away too much detail or to summarize the story (“A Busy Bird”, this is a story about a bird and
something special he does). Have your stop watch/timer ready and have your copy of the passage in
front of you. Ask the student to read the passage orally as quickly as s/he can. Ask the student not to try
to sound the words out but skip words not known by saying “skip” or “don’t know”. Time the student for
1 minute and mark on your copy the last word read in 1 minute. Do not tell the student s/he is being
timed. The student continues to read to the end of the passage.

Mark all miscues on your copy as the child reads. Miscues are marked as follows:
 Mispronunciation – “wert for went” (slash/ through word and write word said above word)
 Substitution – “them for that” (slash/ through word and write word said above word)
 Refusal to pronounce - says skip or don’t know (mark word TP, pronounce the word for student)
 Insertion – inserts a word not in the text ( use a ^ mark and write word where inserted)
 Omission – omits a word(s) in the text (circle the word(s) omitted
 Repetition – repeats one or more words read (underline the word(s) repeated
 Reversal – “saw for was” (mark word with an “r”
 Self-correction – (mark as sc)
Note word-by-word reading, inaccurate intonation, losing place easily, head movement, holding paper
close to eyes, finger-pointing, attitude, effort, fatigue, frustration, body activity, blinking or squinting,
and other behaviors that may be useful in describing student’s reading behaviors.

Quickly count up the miscues. Don’t count self-corrections, repetitions, and mispronunciations of proper
nouns. These will be used to see the kinds of errors the student is reading. Record the wpm read in 1
minute on your copy and the number of miscues.
Remove the passage from the student’s view and ask the accompanying comprehension questions.
Record exact answers. If the child answers with only one word, ask “Anything else?” or “Could you tell
me more?” Quickly count up the incorrect comprehension answers and mark the comprehension
percentage. The comprehension questions consist of the following:

Main idea question - Asks for the central theme of a selection

Detail question - Asks for bits of information directly stated in the material
Inference question - Asks for information that is implied, but not directly stated, in the passage.
Sequence question - Requires knowledge of events in their order of occurrence
Cause-and effect question - Names a cause and asks for its effect or an effect and asks for its cause
Vocabulary question - Asks for the meaning of a word or phrase used in the selection

If the student met the criteria (rate, fluency and comprehension) for the independent level, move to the
next highest level. See chart in Reading section of this document for oral reading rate by grade level.
Comprehension must be at 100% and miscues no more than 1 of every 100 words of the passage.
If the student did not meet the criteria for the independent level, drop back to the next lower grade
level and continue with the same administration process until the independent level is found and
labeled. If the frustration level has not been met (less than 80% word recognition and below 50%
comprehension) go to the next level above that passage. Continue to move forward until the frustration
level is found and labeled. Stop moving up levels when students word recognition drops below 80%,
comprehension drops below 50%, or when student looks frustrated /stressed. This would mark the end
of the oral reading assessment.

Silent Reading Rate and Comprehension

Start with the silent reading passage at the same placement level as the oral reading. Present the
student’s copy of the first passage and read the title. Ask the student if he knows about this topic and
provide a one sentence statement about the story. Be careful not to give away too much detail or to
summarize the story (“A Busy Bird”, this is a story about a bird and something special he does). Ask the
student to read silently and look up at you when he is finished. Tell the child to begin and start your
timer. Record the time it took the student to read the entire passage on your copy of the story. If the
child asks for help say “Do the best you can. I want to find out how well you read without help.”
Remove the passage from the student’s view and ask the accompanying comprehension questions.
Record exact answers. If the child answers with only one word, ask “Anything else?” or “Could you tell
me more?” Quickly count up the incorrect comprehension answers and mark the comprehension
percentage.

If the student met the criteria of rate and comprehension for the independent level, move to the next
highest level. For independent level in silent reading wpm refer to the chart under Reading section.
Comprehension must be at 90% or higher. If the student did not meet the criteria for the independent
level, drop back to the next lower grade level and continue to drop back until the independent level is
found and labeled. If the frustration level has not been met, go to the next level above that passage and
continue to move forward until the frustration level is found and labeled (see chart for wpm and less
that 50% comprehension). Stop moving up levels when comprehension drops below 50%, or when
student looks frustrated /stressed.

Listening Comprehension
Sometimes students are nonreaders and would be too frustrated by the process of an oral/silent reading
assessment. This certainly is the case with kindergarten-aged children who are usually in the stage of
word recognition and have not started the formal reading process. In these cases, a Listening
Comprehension Inventory is conducted after having the student do all the pre-reading assessments for
grades K-3 noted in the prior section of this document. The purpose is to try to find highest point at
which student can understand 75% of material. Beginning with the next level up (from oral/silent
independent reading) read 1-2 selections from each level to student and ask the comprehension
questions. For kindergarten children begin with the kindergarten listening passage, “A Busy Bird”. Ask
the student if he knows about this topic and provide a one sentence statement about the story. Be
careful not to give away too much detail or to summarize the story (“A Busy Bird”, this is a story about a
bird and something special he does). Keep going until student cannot answer comprehension questions
with at least 75% accuracy. Stop when the student misses at least 75% of the comprehension questions
and record on your copy the level of listening comprehension.

Results: Use the charts in the Reading section of this document to determine the Independent,
Instructional and Frustrational reading levels for the student. Analyze the data to note other learning
problems in the administration of the test such as vision, hearing, lack of pre-reading skills, excessive
body movements and lack of prior knowledge.