To help determine instructional reading levels at the beginning of the school year, a second-grade teacher would assess students' sight-word vocabulary. To gather this information, the teacher would most appropriately engage each student in reading:

• A. Published lists of high-frequency words
• B. Narratives at the students' independent level
• C. Nonfiction passages with questions
• D. A reader's theater script

Answer: (A)

The key idea here is measuring sight-word vocabulary—how many common words a student recognizes instantly without decoding. At the start of the year, you want a quick, reliable snapshot of which high-frequency words a child can read automatically, because these words form a big part of early reading fluency and help you place instruction.

Published lists of high-frequency words (such as Dolch or Fry lists) are designed for this purpose. When a teacher has students read through these lists, they can see which words are instantly known and which require decoding time, giving a clear indicator of where a student stands and what to focus on next. This direct measure of automatic word recognition is exactly what you need to gauge instructional reading level early on.

Other options involve reading material that assesses broader skills like comprehension, content knowledge, or expressive fluency, which are important but don’t isolate sight-word recognition as efficiently.