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K-3 Universal Literacy Screening

As part of our commitment to supporting literacy development, the Manasquan School District has conducted universal literacy screenings for students in kindergarten through grade three for the past eight years. These assessments have allowed us to monitor student growth, adjust our core instruction, and communicate reading progress with parents. By identifying students who may benefit from targeted literacy support early in their education, we are better able to partner with families to ensure strong foundational reading skills.

The State of New Jersey passed new legislation (P.L. 2024, c.52) in 2025 requiring all districts to screen students twice per year using an approved literacy assessment in kindergarten through grade 3. The Manasquan School District administers the Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills 8th Edition (DIBELS) as our screening tool. If a child’s screening results indicate a need for additional support, our school will provide interventions, which may include extra instruction or further assessments.

To access your child’s screening results, please log in to the Genesis Parent Portal. Directions are included below.

How to Access Your Child’s Scores in Genesis

To view your child’s screening results:

  1. Log in to the Genesis Parent Portal: Genesis Parent Portal
  2. Click on the Assessment tab.
  3. Select your child’s name to view their literacy screening results.
  4. You will see results for each of the DIBELS 8th Edition components along with benchmark indicators in the link provided below.
     

Understanding the DIBELS Results

The DIBELS 8th Edition is a set of short fluency measures designed to assess critical early literacy skills. Your child’s results are reported in color categories that show how they are doing compared to grade-level expectations:

  • Blue: Your child is performing above grade level and does not need additional support at this time.
  • Green: Your child is on track and meeting grade-level expectations.
  • Yellow: Your child may need some extra support to stay on track with reading.
  • Red: Your child needs significant support to build important reading skills.

You will see your child’s scores in the following areas:

  • Letter Naming Fluency (LNF): How quickly and accurately your child can name letters of the alphabet.
  • Phonemic Segmentation Fluency (PSF): How well your child can break a spoken word into its individual sounds (for example, “cat” → /c/ /a/ /t/).
  • Nonsense Word Fluency – Correct Letter Sounds (NWF-CLS): How well your child knows letter-sound relationships by sounding out made-up words.
  • Nonsense Word Fluency – Words Read Correctly (NWF-WRC): How well your child can blend those sounds together to read the whole made-up word.
  • Word Reading Fluency (WRF): How quickly and accurately your child can read grade-level words.

  • Oral Reading Fluency – Words Read Correctly (ORF-WRC): How fluently your child reads connected text aloud.

  • Oral Reading Fluency – Accuracy (ORF-Accuracy): The percentage of words your child reads correctly when reading a passage.

  • MAZE (Reading Comprehension): How well your child understands what they read by choosing the correct word to complete sentences in a passage.
     

Resources
For a full explanation of DIBELS components and benchmark goals, please see DIBELS 8th Edition Parent Guide and/or DIBELS 8th Edition Benchmarks & Composite Score Information. Additional resources are available on the New Jersey Department of Education Learning Equity and Academic Recovery webpage.

We value your partnership in supporting your child’s reading development. If you have any questions or would like more information about the available reading supports, please contact our Supervisor of Instruction, Christin Walsh (cwalsh@manasquan.k12.nj.us).

Thank you for working with us to support your child’s literacy growth!

Sincerely,
Jackie Puleio
Director of Curriculum & Instruction