Case Study: Introducing Suzy

Suzy is currently a fifth grader in a suburban school composed mostly of students who identify as white and who come from affluent families. She lives with her mothers, who work full time outside the home, as well as her younger brother. Suzy loves to swim and play with her dog. She is also a member of the local children’s community theater. Suzy’s mothers report that she is a happy and outgoing child who maintains positive relationships with her family and friends. Parents do not report any health concerns. They have noted that it takes Suzy a long time to complete her homework (more than two hours); they wonder if this is the expected time for homework completion for all fifth graders.

Suzy is also a student with a Specific Learning Disability in the area of reading. Her teachers report that she is a joy to have in class. For the last few years, however, there have been reports that Suzy seems to be struggling with her schoolwork. She occasionally turns her work in late or incomplete; moreover, some of her work is inaccurate, especially in social studies and science. Her academic record shows that her school-wide reading screening scores have been below the expected performance levels for her grade level for the past three years. She has shown minimal growth in her monthly classroom reading comprehension assessments as well as the bi-annual district-level Measures of Academic Progress (MAPs) testing. Currently, she is performing at the 2nd/3rd grade level in reading. Suzy’s teachers have recognized a pattern of her not meeting grade-level targets by collecting additional data and tracking Suzy’s progress. They are able to identify areas in which she is meeting expectations, such as ordering/sequencing events, and where she struggles, such as identifying the main idea and supporting details in academic contexts (e.g., social studies and science).

To support Suzy in her reading comprehension, Suzy’s special education case manager has explicitly taught her strategies to help develop skills such as summarizing, making predictions, and utilizing graphic organizers. Given these supports, the data on Suzy’s performance indicate that by using material at her instructional level, Suzy is able to identify the main individual and/or the main event. However, when given five informational text passages at her instructional level, Suzy was able to determine the central idea of a text and explain how it was supported by details one out of five times (20%), a skill expected to be achieved by the fifth grade.