9486 in the collection
Pasco educators trying to improve reading scores
Stephen Krashen Comment:
Sent to the Tampa Tribune, September 22, 2009
The real "reading problem" in Pasco County is that administrators have not read the reading research ("Pasco educators trying to improve reading scores," Sept. 21). Research and common sense tell us that the only way we become expert readers is by doing a voluminous amount of self-selected reading. Studies show that those who read more read better, write better, spell better, and have larger vocabularies than those who read less.
The obvious steps to take are for teachers to stimulate interest in a number of topics, and to make sure the books are accessible to students. This means making sure schools have quality school libraries. Studies show that students in schools with better libraries and qualified librarians do better on reading tests.
Instead, Pasco has decided to try yet another commercial program, filled with instruction on skills and strategies that experienced readers acquire anyway as they read.
By Ronnie Blair
LAND O' LAKES - It's a mystery that has tugged at Florida educators for years.
Based on Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test scores, elementary school students with excellent reading skills see their reading proficiency drop to mediocre by the end of middle school and plummet to abysmal in high school.
That leaves school board members and educators puzzling over why students would suddenly forget how to read by the time they reach 10th-grade.
One theory is that the high school version of FCAT is too difficult, a claim that is lent some credence by national reading exams in which Florida students outperform many of their peers across the country.
Still, Michael Cloyd, who supervises language arts programs for middle and high schools in Pasco County, is unwilling to let that premise serve as license to ease up on efforts to improve reading scores.
"The test does become significantly more difficult by the time we get to grades 9 and 10, but I don't want to ever be making excuses," Cloyd said.
The 2009 FCAT scores provide a snapshot of the problem. Third-grade students in Pasco, the youngest to take the reading exam, fared well, with 72 percent of them scoring high enough to be deemed proficient by the state Department of Education.
Just 56 percent of eighth-graders scored at the proficient level, though, and 34 percent of 10th-graders were proficient. Tenth-grade is the last year students take FCAT reading, though some teenagers retake the 10th-grade exam as juniors and seniors if they didn't score well enough to meet diploma requirements.
The downward trend in reading proficiency isn't unique to Pasco. It's a phenomenon repeated throughout Florida.
"What we see across the grade levels is pretty consistent with what we see across the state," said Madeline Barbery, a supervisor in the district's research and evaluation department.
At a workshop on reading strategies last week, Pasco County School Board members learned about efforts to reverse that shrinking proficiency rate.
Last year, high schools in Pasco began using a reading series called Edge in an attempt to give a boost to those ninth and 10th-grade scores. Edge, published by National Geographic School
Publishing/Hampton Brown, places a heavier emphasis on nonfiction, just as the FCAT reading exams for freshmen and sophomores do, Cloyd said.
School district officials are hopeful that more practice with informational texts, as opposed to literary texts, will help high school students move those FCAT scores in the right direction.
In elementary grades, FCAT reading uses a heavy dose of fiction, but that changes as students reach higher grades, Cloyd said.
By middle school, the test is half literary and half informational. In high school, 70 percent of the test is informational, so students answer questions after reading about such topics as social studies or science, Cloyd said.
The district is making efforts to improve reading at all levels, with a goal this year of improving reading proficiency in every grade by 7 percent. Several intervention programs are used to provide intensive reading instruction to students who struggle the most, from third through 10th grade.
"Certainly, we know grade 10 remains a challenge for us," Cloyd said.
If all else fails, the district could try a tongue-in-cheek strategy suggested by school board member
Kathryn Starkey.
"If we made them read while playing video games," Starkey said, "the scores would be higher."
— Ronnie Blair with comment by Stephen Krashen
Tampa Tribune
2008-09-21
http://www2.tbo.com/content/2009/sep/21/pasco-educators-trying-improve-reading-scores/life-education/
INDEX OF OUTRAGES
Pages: 380
[1] 2 3 4 5 6 Next >> Last >>
