The DRA is not a well-designed test, and IME kids with any kind of disability involving attention, memory, or sequencing tend to do worse on it. It requires the child to summarize the text, blow-by-blow. Kids who want to go off on a tangent because the text gave them an idea, kids who don't remember things in order, kids who think the whole exercise is pointless-- all these tend to do poorly on it.
We have requested that our school use a different assessment of reading comprehension. The Reading A to Z assessment is more accessible for 2Es.
Thank you for posting this. The school used DRA testing as a part of their reasoning for not accelerating DS8 and I disagreed completely with the tester. She basically wanted him to recite what he had read about Gandhi. He told her the salient points and then expounded upon the text and Gandhi but neglected to mention things like, "This is a biography of Mahatma Gandhi."
I said, "You noted here that he said something about Gandhi?"
"Yes, but he didn't say, 'This is a biography of Mahatma Gandhi.'"
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