Making a Difference through Book Studies

I am often asked what makes Chets Creek so special.  "Special" can be defined many ways but when I think about what is special, one of the things I think about is our professional development.

Book Studies - One of the things that has always set Chets apart is the way the administrators and teachers have embraced book study as one arm of professional development. The first school wide book study, Improving Schools from Within by Roland Barth, was completed  before the school even opened.   The school actually pulled students and faculty from three different elementary schools in the area.  In the fall preceding its opening in January, the faculty gathered together each week at one of the schools and began reading and studying Barth's ideas. Barth's book is a foundational "how to" book for administrators and teacher leaders on how to make a difference, a blueprint for school reform.  Barth sets up the steps for how to create change or how to lay the building blocks for a new foundation.  From his work emerged the foundational vision, mission and core values for Chets Creek Elementary that were to become the cornerstone for all that was to follow. As teachers left those meetings and talked about what they were doing, you could see the sparkle in their eyes.  They were inspired!  So, from the very beginning,  Chets was able to dream the impossible dream and then create the type of school culture that is rare in public schools but that was to become the hallmark of its success.    What an appropriate beginning!

The following year was my first year at Chets.  Like all new teachers at CCE, I was given Barth's book at my Chets' orientation.  I had already been teaching for nearly twenty years in seven different elementary schools in four different states, so I recognized immediately how different Barth's ideas were from anything I had ever experienced as a teacher.   For the first fifteen years, Dr. Stahlman and then Mrs. Phillips, started all new teachers at Chets with the gift of that book because they wanted new teachers to understand that they were stepping into a culture that thrived on collegiality.  They wanted the newbies to understand that they were walking into... a family... on a mission to make a difference in the lives of children.  As time went on, the book became unnecessary, because the culture itself provided the lessons.

By the next year, the county had adopted the America's Choice School Reform Design.  How much of the book study agenda in those first years was part of the America's Choice Design and how much of it was Dr. Stahlman is hard to tell.  The Design was based on state-of-the-art research, but its implementation was by a Principal who was innovative, creative and an out-of-the-box thinker, so while America's Choice may have laid the foundation, Dr. Stahlman took their ideas and ran.  Book Studies became a staple in the pantry of professional development ideas. Susan Phillips had carried that same torch as she took over the helm but has added her own torch of flaming red hair, fun and passion.

Lucy Calkins' The Art of Teaching Writing was the first book study that I remember during my first year at Chets.  The Leadership Team, or at least most of it, began meeting as soon as the book came out, with Dr. Stahlman facilitating the conversation and always asking the hard questions. We met at Starbucks and I'm pretty sure it was off the clock. Dr. Stahlman bought the books and gave them to each of the six to eight of us that were interested in meeting (a practice that continues to  this day - if you enroll in a book study, the book is a gift for you to keep and mark up as you like!) I had never had anyone give me a professional book!  I was in awe... and totally hooked on this community of learners!  We were all so anxious to get our hands on this new book and to start reading and studying.  We had so many questions.  As we began reading and meeting, our conversations were full of excitement, curiosity, and... how to embed these practices at Chets.  For me, this discourse about educational issues, reform and design with my colleagues was invigorating.  I couldn't stop my mind from bubbling over.  I could barely wait to share what I was learning through my reading. One of the added benefits of meeting together was that as we met, fellowshipped and shared our questions, fears and dreams,... we also became friends.  I  don't think we finished that entire book (it's a l-o-o-o-n-g book! ) but I do think we were all changed by that experience, because we realized that as we sat together and talked about the ideas of what we were reading, the learning deepened, questions were answered, the fog of misconception cleared and the impossible became possible. As we began to trust each other, we weren't afraid to show our vulnerabilities, confusions, and fears. We were able to argue, debate and we actually learned to listen.  It sounds so cliche now to think that the book study was an "aha" experience... but for me,  it was.

We knew immediately that we wanted to take that same book study experience to the teachers, so we offered an elective book study of that same book.  Dr. Stahlman purchased the books and  we set up a schedule to meet off the clock.  I think about 20 teachers signed up for that first elective book study.  This experience mirrored that first excitement.  We learned so much from each other. You could walk through the hallways and see the implementation of the ideas from the book study - workshop models,conferring,  peer review of writing, partner work, examples of writing everywhere... as those reading and working through the book took the lead.  As for me, going through the book a second time only enhanced my experience and helped me deepen my understanding.  My first time through was about "big picture," but the second time through was about the nuts and bolts.  Dr. Stahlman really wanted to reward those first teachers who took a risk, our early adopters, so instead of a final meeting, she surprised the group  with a half day substitute and had us take the group to a local Book Store with a $20 gift certificate for each teacher to pick out a few books for her classroom.  I don't know if it was the gift certificate or piling into cars and heading for the bookstore with a half day out of the classroom that was the most fun, but it was so unexpected and... thrilling!  Teachers were almost giddy with the suspense and excitement.  For me, I think it was just the idea of being appreciated that meant so much.

After those first experiences, book studies have continued in many different forms through the years.  Now we try really hard to make sure we offer book studies before, after and during school "on the clock" to show our respect for a teacher's time.  I guess we average about two-three book studies a year and have offered them in Reading, Writing, Math, Science, Technology, and Leadership.  Sometimes, grade levels have asked to study a book during their grade level time or sometimes Council Groups (which are vertical subject leadership groups) have requested to study a specific book during their scheduled time together. The Leadership Team selects a book to study every year.  Sometimes we all study the same or different books during our Early Release time.  The money has gotten much tighter over the years to buy books, but basically, if a group is willing to meet, read and work through a book, it is provided... somehow!  Time is also at a premium with so many new mandates, but we have stayed true to what we know works and teachers have continued to respond.  Below is a list of some of the books we have studied over the past few years.  This is not an exhaustive list, but as at look at it, I have to admit it is pretty impressive. It does give you an idea of how professional development has been spiced up by providing what teachers need and what they ask for over time.

Culture/Community Building 
Insidethe Magic Kingdom, Tom Connellan

The End of Molasses Classes, Ron Clark
Revved, Harry Paul & Ross Reck

How Full is Your Bucket, Tom Rath and Donald Clifton

Raving Fans, Ken Blanchard and Sheldon Bowles

FISH!  and FISH! Sticks, Stephen Lundin, Harry Paul and John Christensen

Who Moved My Cheese, Spencer Johnson

Leadership 
Improving Schools from Within, Roland Barth

Results Now, Mike Schmocker

Shaping School Culture, Terrance Deal

Standards for Our Schools, Marc Tucker and Judy Codding

Professional Learning Communities at Work, Richard DuFour
School Leadership That Works, Marzano

The Teaching Gap, Jim Stigler

Masterful Coaching, Robert Hargrove

Leverage Leadership, Paul Bambrick-Santoyo

A WholeNew Mind, Daniel Pink

Blink, Malcolm Gladwell

TheDisney Way, Bill Capodagli & Lynn Jackson

The Radical Leap, Steve Farber

New Work Habits For A Radically Changing World, Price Pritchett

The 21 Indispensable Qualities of a Leader, John Maxwell

The Heart of a Leader, Ken Blanchard

Developing the Leaders Around You, John Maxwell

Good to Great and Great by Choice, Jim Collins
How the Mighty Fall, Jim Collins

Mission Possible, Ken Blanchard and Terry Waghorn

Zebra’s and Cheetahs, Michael Burt and Colby Jubenville
Greater Than Yourself, Steve Farber

Shine, Larry Thompson

Blink, Malcom Gladwell

Mindset, Carol Dweck

Math
Knowing and Teaching Elementary Mathematics, Li Ping Ma

Young Mathematicians at Work: Addition and Subtraction, Catherine Twomey Fosnot

Young Mathematicians at Work: Multiplication and Division, Catherine Twomey Fosnot

Young Mathematicians at Work: Fractions, Decimals and Percents, Catherine Twomey Fosnot

Teaching Mathematics Developmentally in the Elementary and Middle School Grades, Van de Walle

Number Talks, Sherry Parrish

Literacy 

First Grade Writers, Stephanie Parsons

Second Grade Writers, Stephanie Parsons

Craft Lessons – Teaching Writing, Ralph Fletcher

The Art of Teaching Writing, Lucy Calkins

The Art of Teaching Reading, Lucy Calkins

Mosaic of Thought, Ellin Keene

The Fluent Reader, Timothy Rasinski

Growing Readers, Kathy Collins

Classrooms that Work, They Can All Read and Write, Patricia Cunningham

Literature Circles and Response, Bonnie Campbell

Literature Circles Voice and Choice in the Student Centered Classroom, Harvey Daniels

Nonfiction Matters, Stephanie Harvey
Is That a Fact? Tony Stead

I Read It But I Don’t Get It, Chris Tovani

Guiding Readers and Writers, Irene Fountas and Gay Su Pinnell

When Kids Can’t Read: What Teachers Can Do, Kylene Beers

About the Authors, Katie Wood Ray

Bringing Words to Life: Robust Vocabulary Instruction, Isabel Beck, Margaret McKeown 
Creating Robust Vocabulary, Isabel Beck, Margaret McKeown

Is That a Fact? Tony Stead

On Solid Ground, Sharon Taberski

Reading With Meaning, Debbie Miller

Words, Words, Words, Janet Allen
Words Their Way, Bear, Invernizzi, Templeton, Johnson

Wondrous Words, Katie Wood Ray

Strategies That Work: Teaching Comprehension to Enhance Understanding, Stephanie Harvey

Learning to Learn in a Second Language, Pauline Gibbons

Units of Study for Reading and Writing, Lucy Calkins

Fallingin Love with Close Reading, Christopher Lehman and Kate Roberts

Scaffolding Language, Scaffolding Learning, Pauline Gibbons

Pathways to the Common Core, Lucy Calkins, Mary Ehrenworth, Christopher Lehman
What Really Matters: Response to Invtervetion, Richard Allington

Science 
Understanding by Design, Jay McTighe, Grant Wiggins

Inquire Within:  Implementing Inquiry-Based Science Standards, Douglas Lewellyn

Primary Science: Taking the Plunge, Wayne Harlen

Inquiring into Inquiry Learning and Teaching in Science, Jim Minstrell
Nurturing Inquiry:  Real Science for the Elementary Classroom, Charles R. Pearce

Science Workshop:  Reading, Writing and Thinking Like a Scientist, Wendy Saul

Science for All Americans, F. James Rutherford

Active Assessment for Active Science:  A Guide for Elementary School Teachers, George Hein

Teaching Science with Interactive Notebooks, Kellie Marcarelli

Science Notebooks: Writing About Inquiry, Brain Campbell and Lori Fulton

Technology 
Web 2.0New Tools, New Schools Gwen Solomon & Lynne Schrum

Web Literacy for Educators Alan November

Integrating Literacy and Technology Susan Taffe & Carolyn Gwinn

Leading 21^st Century Schools, Lynne Schrum and Barbara Levin
Connected from the Start, Kathy Cassidy
 

Teachers meet together over the summer to work
on vocabulary activities after reading Bringing Words to Life.

The results of Book Studies have been profound.  For instance, after studying Beck and MeKeown's vocabulary work Bringing Words to Life, a group of six kindergarten teachers spent the summer writing vocabulary activities based on the book to be used with the read aloud stories they would read the following year to their children.  They continue to use these vocabulary activities today and now sell them on Teachers Pay Teachers as "Star Vocabulary" and donate the proceeds to the charity, Promise to Kate.

Another example - After the faculty studied Fish! the Principal opened the Chets Creek Crab Shack in Pike Place's Fish Market-style and served fried fish, gift certificates, laughter and fun to remind teachers in the middle of the year to "choose their attitude, play, make the students' day and to be present in the moment!" This became an annual event and is a much-anticipated stress reliever each year.  It reminds us about the joy every day in teaching!

Welcome to the Chets Creek Crab Shack!

And a final example - Several groups studied Richard Allingtons'  What Really Matters: Response to Intervention when we were trying to figure out the RtI process.  We were able to take the tangled, flawed system that was being imposed on us and to develop a better in-school system that made sense and that got results.  Understanding the research and how all the pieces fit together made a profound difference in our work and we were able to give the system what it mandated but to also really do what was best for our children.

I could go on and on about how different books have made a difference in our quality of life, our decisions, and our teaching at Chets, but you get the picture.  Ask any teacher at the Creek about her own experiences.  They are as individual and unique as the teachers themselves.

So why is this particular form of professional development so powerful?  I am sure there are professional lists of reasons, but these are the benefits that I see from my own personal experience.
1.  Book Studies introduce new knowledge and push learning.  Teachers learn from teachers and through dialog. Teachers teach each other, explore new ideas and noodle new possibilities when they have the time and a vehicle for spending time together.
2. Book Studies offer long term, embedded opportunities for practice.  Each teacher has a room full of children to practice and refine new ideas and if things don't work, a  teacher can always come back next week and share her experience and reflections - and ask for suggestions.
3.  Book Studies promote natural accountability.  If all the participants agree to try something, it's hard to just blow that off, when you continue to see and meet with those same folks!
4. Book Studies naturally help teachers develop collegiality.  After talking together and meeting in each other's rooms, teachers are more likely to visit each other when they have questions at other times, or are looking for someone to bounce off a new idea, or just need a stress reliever. Teachers begin to feel safe - to be risk takers.
5. Book studies offer teachers a way to form professional and personal relationships and friendships.  Teachers share both professional and personal ideas, problems and solutions that lead to conversations and relationships outside of the Book Study.

The biggest deterrent to Book Study is teacher apathy. All teachers have times in their lives when they simply cannot take on one more thing, which is understandable, but every teacher also needs to commit to times that they continue to develop their skills, not just by adding points for re-certification but by making a commitment to engage, learn and improve as a professional. When a teacher thinks they no longer need to learn, in my opinion,  it is time to leave the profession!  That's what Book Study offers - a relevant topic with people that will hold you accountable. If teachers are not signing up for book studies, there is a reason.  Examine the reasons before bashing teachers - maybe it's the presenter, the timing, the topic, crushing paperwork, too much going on...  It's not a teacher problem, it's a culture problem.

My advice for administrators and instructional leaders:
1. Buying the book for each  teacher to participate in a book study is a necessary perk.
2. Listening to what teachers want to study and balancing that with what you think they need to study is just plain common sense if you want engagement.
3. Model your expectations by being an often and enthusiastic participant in any book study.  Never go unprepared.  There's nothing that makes teachers perk up more than when the Principal becomes a learner in the trenches beside them!
4. Make sure teachers can earn re-certification points for doing the study. Unfortunately, it's a rather novel idea to have relevant work for professional development re-certification, so surprise them!   Make sure you do the paperwork to give the teacher maximum benefit for their efforts!
5.  Notice and praise implementation of book study ideas often!  Teachers, just like our students, never get tired of hearing what they are doing something right.

I feel very blessed to have had the experience of working at a school where book studies have always been available.  I have loved the idea of picking and choosing my own course of development.  After all, I do consider myself a professional and having the learning right here, so available, makes it easier for me to realize my personal goal of continuing to improve my practice.  I have learned so much from my colleagues and have grown to respect their time, talent and wisdom. There is nowhere I have learned more than right here with the people who are walking the talk.

Making Words in Frist Grade

Making Words is a program the district bought and dispersed to first grade teachers without any explanation.  It's a shame there wasn't some explanation or professional development around the book arriving, because the program is good. It's based on Patricia Cunningham's work.  I had used the program many years ago and liked the concept but struggled with all the little individual letters that students were suppose to have and manipulate.  They got lost.  They got mixed up.  I just never found a way to manage all the little slips of paper.... but I liked the concept...

So when I found this updated program in my box, I wasn't impressed.  However, I kept looking at it on my desk and wondering how I could fix my earlier management issues.  I really liked the way it took a set of letters and built words.  It was suggested as a Tier 2 intervention for RtI, but I just didn't need "another" small group.  However,  I am very happy to say, I think we have found a great solution that uses the best of the program for several different group of students.

I introduce the letters and words.  For most of my kids, having them write the words on a white board works just fine.  When I say, "1-2-3 Turn." they turn their white boards toward me so I can do a quick check to see who has the word and who doesn't.

 For the majority of my kids, they don't really need the extra step of manipulating the letters.  For my highest kids, I challenge them to figure out the mystery word, which uses all the letters for the day, before I get to it.  They take this challenge seriously and you can see them trying out words in their minds and boards until they figure it out!  My co-teacher pulls a group for Tier 2 RtI intervention and has the students do the same words with the class sitting at a table and actually manipulating magnetic letters, while the ESE teacher pulls her students that need the extra manipulation to another table and has them do the same words with class with a set of paper letters (you can easily manage the paper letters with a very small group of students). 

We actually have four different groups of students using the same words and letters and meet the need of a vast number of students.   Woot!  Woot!

When Is It Too Much?

This is one of those weeks that I wonder why I ever wanted to go back into the classroom full time!  Sometimes the load on a teacher's shoulders is almost unbearable.

First of all we've been working on a class pumpkin. The tradition is to have your class choose a favorite book and then illustrate the book in pumpkins. It's a tradition I've always loved as the lobby is adorned with pumpkin creativity. However, most teachers have worked out a system that includes having their Room Mom take on most of the responsibility for the project so as not to take away from instructional time. I'm not quite as good at that! Our room mom was already committed to a run in Atlanta to support her sister with breast cancer - a noble cause - so we've been painting and designing and hot gluing in between each lesson all week. Today someone came in and said the instructions (there were instructions?) said not to use hot glue! Too late!

Then there are the grades that are due on Friday. That's a big undertaking any nine weeks - especially with our on-line system (which is suppose to make it easier, but until we learn the system well, only makes it harder) but this nine weeks we have had seven new students and each of them has a different set of circumstances so we have been running around trying to find out just who needs what - driving the office nuts as we try to get the paperwork we need from states across the country. We've been making up assessments with children that have been absent and trying to make sure that our grades reflect what has actually been going on this nine weeks. We never seem to have everything we need. We've been working at every planning time- coming early, staying late. We still have comments to write for each student and the social growth and development grades to finalize before the Monday deadline.

Then there's the standard-based bulletin board that is due on Friday. My teaching partner has taken most of this on her shoulders as she prepares a Math board, but I am impressed again with the time that it all takes. Doing the student work is the easy part. It's the commentary and actually designing the board that takes the time. Even covering the board with paper and scraping the hot glue from the last board takes time! And did I mention the expected creativity and quality that is a given?

Then there's the Mem Fox Celebration Day on Friday. We are completing the four week unit which we have really enjoyed. On Friday we will be Skyping a class in Australia and then having a teacher's son play the digideroo. Then it's on to themed centers and activities and the students performing Readers' Theatre of Mem's books. We also need to look up a recipe for pavlova which is a Mem Fox dish and which we will be preparing as our Fun Friday treat. Lots of prep for the special day.

And did I mention that next Friday is our parade of book characters so we have to decide how to dress? That might be the most difficult decision of the entire week! And of course, I've been buying the supplies for our Fall Centers all week. We'll have parents in for that fun day after the parade to help so we certainly want it to be fun and organized. That night we will be dressed again and at school to give out trick-or-treating candy. It's also our responsibility to decorate the basketball toss, which is one of the games that evening.

Today we met with our RtI group and I was again reminded that we are at the end of a nine weeks. One fourth of the year has flown past. Have we done enough to make sure every child is getting what they need? Because in between all of the other "stuff" we are suppose to be teaching! It's the teaching that can't suffer, no matter what else is going on.

I know I'm at a school where much is expected of teachers. I sometimes think so much is done that it begins to be more expected than appreciated, but I wouldn't want to be at a school where we were satisfied and didn't want to do more for our students. It's just important that the fluff doesn't overpower the important stuff - that teachers stay true to their main mission - that when teachers have to let something go because it's just too much that it's the extra things that go - not the strength and depth of instruction. If we keep our mission in mind, all the other pieces will fall into place...won't they?

Interventions that work

For ten years we have offered a safety net to our Kindergarten and first grade students who perform in our lowest 20% on each grade level. The safety net is offered for 30 minutes daily and is taught by one of our paraprofessionals. We have invested in professional development over the years and have sent our paras to training that is only offered to teachers. We were very fortunate to have a teacher that had been a Reading Mastery Master Teacher before coming to us and had received advance training, come to our school as one of our Kindergarten, First Grade looping teachers. In years when we couldn't find outside training she always graciously offered to train and support our paras and has been their "go to" person when they had questions. The paras meet in every crook and cranny in the building including the hallway and closets! Since Reading Mastery is such a very scripted program, some people are surprised that we would use it at Chets Creek but it provides intensive lessons in phonemic awareness and phonics and that is what most of our youngest learners who are at-risk need.

We've never kept really good records on the success of this safety net program, but teachers anecdotal information is convincing. They can't wait for it to get started each year and often credit the para's work with students as a key to a child's success. However, as we get deeper into the RtI model, I am sure that will change. Keeping specific data will be our next step and proving that this really works with the numbers. We will also get better at matching the right kids with the right intervention. For now, the program simply provides extra support for our neediest students. My hat's off to our para group that cares more than they have to and works harder than we could hope for!

From Inclusion to RtI

I have been a Special Education teacher for my entire career. I have seen all kinds of models come and go in popularity. They all have their great hope and challenges. When I first started teaching in 1970, all Special Education students were slowly moved to self-contained classes. When the efficacy studies showed that students did better socially in those classrooms but didn't do as well academically, Resource Rooms became the new fad where Special Education students were pulled out for part of the day for some of their academic work and remained in their general education class for the rest of their day. After years of that model the efficacy studies once again showed that the Special Education students didn't fair well because their day was too chopped up with little coordination between what was going on in the Resource Room and what was going on in the general education classroom. As a result the students were often just confused. Then inclusion swooped in with its push-in programs. We left kids in the classroom and the Special Education teacher worked with struggling students in their classroom. The idea is that you offer a "continuum." In other words you offer all of these options, but in most schools - even our best schools - that is more dream than reality.

Recently in a conversation with an inclusion teacher, we decided that this analogy best describes what it is like to be the general education teacher in an inclusion class. You come upon a lake and you see three boats. In one boat all of the children have paddles and they are all paddling in different directions, making no progress. In another boat there are enough paddles in the bottom of the boat but the children are all looking around trying to decide what to do. They don't know what the paddles do or how to use them to move forward. The last boat is empty, but around the boat, children are drowning. The first boat represents those students that are at the highest level in your class who all think they know what to do, but without a teacher to help direct the course, they will continue to go in circles or to not move at all. The middle boat represents the normally developing children who have all the tools but just don't know how to use them without a teacher to develop their skills. The empty boat represents the students that are struggling - the ones who are drowning without your help. As you arrive on the scene, who do you help? On your worst day, that is the way teaching feels, as if you can't possible get to every student and that without your guidance and intervention some students will not make it. If there are too many children drowning in your class, you can only save those that are about to go under and you wonder if you will ever have time to guide the rest to safety. It's a scenario that keeps me awake at night.

In the ideal world there is rescue and balance so that while one person is saving those that are drowning, another is practicing with those who don't know how to paddle and still another drops in to get all those that are paddling rowing in the same direction, but that is so much easier said than done. The only people who say that can be done easily or effortlessly are the ones designing the programs, not the ones living it. On the best of days, there are enough hands to touch every single child and you leave at the end of the day with a smile on your face and a skip in your step. Doesn't every single child deserve an education like that? It's just a matter of figuring out how to make that happen... Is RtI the next great model? Will it be the answer we've searched for all these many years? Will it provide the life preservers and compass that we are looking for?

RtI and Interventions

We have been doing a school wide book study for the past three Early Release days on Richard Allington's What Really Matters in Response to Intervention. We are broken into about 12 small groups of 6-8 teachers. The groups are vertical with hopes of having many different views within each group. Each group has a facilitator. Nina Thomas, one of the facilitators established a wiki where each group could post some of their thoughts. Yesterday after our last book talk, the groups met together to share with each other 3-5 of the things that they thought should be considerations for next year. I am so proud of the thinking that has been going on in our building - the professional conversation in the hallways. I'm glad to be at a school where a Principal is not threatened by such a process but opens the doors for free thinking and creative solutions. While many schools are attending in-services to try to figure out how to get their faculties to "buy-in" to RtI, our school "bought in" a long time ago. We have had our own "intervention team" since the school was established, long before it was mandated. Although the paperwork is different now, the intent - of making a difference for our struggling readers - has always been the same. The law has made it all more complex and difficult to grasp but at the heart is the hope that we can provide the best possible reading program in our Workshop model to reach the most students and then provide specific intensive interventions for any that we miss. We are in solution mode at the Creek! As facilitators shared today there was a lot of thinking "outside of the box" such as

• trying to get a late bus to run to our community of most at-risk students so that we can tutor them after school
• taking all of the Science and Social Studies books in the building and reallocating them so that every grade level has books for EVERY reader on their level on the content topics that are covered on their grade level
• a request for Math/Science teachers to learn non-fiction reading strategies while the Reading teachers requested the Science topics so that they can incorporate that content into their informational writing
• a resource in addition to Music, Art and PE that would include Readers Theatre and Drama that could reinforce fluency

The list goes on and on with creative ideas and solutions. Next Wednesday the Admin Leadership Team will take that list that has been added to the wiki and go through every single suggestion. Many of the suggestions don't cost a dime! They just mean reallocating people or resources. Many of the ideas really ARE possible.

I guess this is what I love most about Chets Creek. We ARE going to make a difference. Thank you Richard Allington for pushing our thinking and for giving us, in a short and sweet summary, the best research has to offer us right now. We plan to use that knowledge to teach more and more children to read - just watch!

RtI

If you're like me, you have been run over by information, and misinformation, about RtI - Response to Intervention. It seems I have been mucking around in all the little pieces - which seem overwhelming - and what I really need is to understand the big picture and to understand why this is a good thing. I understand, of course, there is a financial, political side to RtI which I really don't want to know about, but what I do need to understand - and believe - is how this is going to be better for children. If I am going to make all these thousands of graphs to prove what I am doing, then I want to know that it is really going to make a difference for my struggling readers and is not just jumping through a bunch of hoops that do no more than satisfy a bureaucracy.

In an effort to get the big picture I am reading Richard Allington's What Really Matters in Response to Intervention. I actually heard Allington when he was President at IRA give a keynote - in fact he talked about some of the same issues he discusses in this book - and he is someone that I really respect. I picked this particular book because of that respect and the belief that he could cut through all the goobly gook and give me the nitty gritty. I am not disappointed.

Allington suggests, for instance, that Kindergarten is the perfect place to start with interventions and that it is the kindergarten teacher that is the first line of defense. She should have daily small group focused lessons in her plan for those two or three lowest-performing children in her class. It is our job to provide our teachers with the professional development that they need to identify and teach these students to close the gap right there. This small group of students will be seen every day while students who have better developed skills and need less teacher-directed time will be seen less often. Research shows no negative impacts on assigning those student with better skills more student-directed work.

Up until this point I am jumping up and down because this is exactly the situation at Chets Creek. We do expect the kindergarten teacher to provide the interventions in a small group daily. However, it is the next part that frustrates me. In the best situation this very small group of students will be getting a second literacy period each day, which means after and before school interventions. Most of our struggling readers do get a second period of reading instruction in a small group BUT - and it is a big but - this is done by a paraprofessional and sometimes is during the literacy block to make the best use of the para's time. We don't have money for before and after school unless the child's parents are able to pay for Extended Day. Even though - in our very large school of 1200 students, we have almost 300 students considered at-risk - a small school of students within our large school - we don't qualify for that type of help. That will be my challenge for the new year...

Allington discusses the research on intervention and identifies principles that accelerate reading development:

• Make sure that struggling readers have books that they can read all day long. Sounds so simple but Allington makes a very convincing argument for text books - one size fits all - being inaccessible to most struggling readers. He suggests that students need to spend most of their time reading books that they can read with 99% accuracy! He calls this high-success reading.
• Practice makes perfect. Allington explains quite eloquently why students need to practice reading and going back to the first point, reminds us that students can't practice if they can't read the text. He calls this reading volume. In a 30-minute researched intervention design he explains that 20 minutes should be reading appropriate text, 5 minutes of word work and 5 minutes of comprehension and skills. He discusses how to design appropriate interventions which really goes back to having the quantity and quality books that students enjoy including a non-fiction library that matches the standards in Science and Social Studies. We have worked so hard on this at Chets Creek, but it's still not enough. We have a long way to go to make this a reality!
• Group size for interventions should be no larger than 3! Yikes! He even suggest that if a child in a group of 3 is not developing satisfactorily that he be moved to a 1-on-1. Yikes!
• Intervention must be coordinated with core classroom instruction. I have always felt that if a child was not learning in the core program then the intervention should be a different approach, but Allington says that this is confusing to the child and the intervention must instead reinforce the core - be coordinated with the core. This is one I will have to think about some more... Getting the type of coordination that he is talking about is difficult. It is difficult for the general education teacher and the interventionist to find the time to plan that type of intervention with real daily coordination, especially when he does not believe that standard protocol design -a specified box program - is the best. Instead he would suggest a responsive intervention design that is designed specifically for the child and reinforces what the child needs from the core classroom instruction each day. While this sounds ideal, the reality is most difficult.
• Intervention should be delivered by an expert teacher. This seems so obvious. The best teachers have the largest toolboxes and when a lesson isn't producing the targeted results, they simply reach back into their toolbox and know how to present it in a different way. These teachers have flexibility because they are able to adapt their lessons to the needs of their students on the fly. At Chets Creek we have turned our teachers away from commercial programs and asked them to look instead at their students and their data and a pacing guide of the scope and sequence of the grade level expectations to teach tomorrow's lesson. I think we are preparing them to teach with this type of flexibility. It's so much harder and so much more time consuming than just teaching the next page of the teacher's manual, but Allington's research certainly confirms what we are seeing in our teachers. The effort does create teachers with a larger toolbox. Effective teachers improve their performance every year while less effective teachers achieve their best results after 5 years and nothing after that!
• Focus instruction on meta-cognition and meaning. As I was reading this chapter and Allington was identifying sub-groups of children, I am jumping up and saying, "Yes, I have that group and that group and that group!" In one study of 4th graders 20% of the strugglers could word call but with no understanding. Another 20% had problems with decoding but could comprehend. Other clusters were slow steady readers who comprehended but read so slowly. Another cluster were deliberate, slow decoders who maintained comprehension, and a very small cluster who were low on everything. All of these describe MY kids!! According to Allington only a very few of these need intervention with an emphasis in decoding but instead could use lessons focused around getting the meaning (summarization, graphic organizers, question generating/ answering, prior knowledge/ predicting, and visualization) and lessons around mega-cognition which basically is knowing if the text you are reading is making sense as you read it (slowing down, pausing, looking back, reading aloud, strategies for figuring out unknown words, skipping a word and rereading).
• Use text that are interesting to students. If we want struggling readers to accelerate their reading then they have to read. What better way to get them to read than to surround them with books about topics that they have an interest in or even an expertise. Seems so obvious but how often do teachers ask struggling readers what they would like to read about and then go out and find appropriate texts?

There is so much in this book that I find compelling. The back even has a guide to use as a book study and I hope that we will do that at Chets Creek. I want to reread this book and talk about its contents with my Leadership team, with my ESE peers and with my grade level teachers. I want to identify what we are doing right according to the research and how we can do things differently. I want to argue with some of Allington's finding and get a deeper understanding through conversations with my peers. This book has a lot to say - this book can make a difference.