one child at a time

from a teacher:

Sometimes, in spite of all the , life is good in a problem-ridden, low-SES urban school.

We have had so many changes of administration in the last 22 months I have lost count. Are we on Principal #7, or 8? I forget. And how many assistant principals -- 4? 5? I think 5. Anyway, all chaos all the time is what it feels like at the grass roots.

But sometimes chaos can work to one's advantage, and this is such a story.

In June of 2007 I was testing children in the primary grades (reading, spelling and math levels for reporting on a project the school was engaged in). One student, finishing third grade, really concerned me. She had never been flagged for intervention, referred to the school support team, or even gotten failing report card grades. She was a nice kid, well-spoken, positive attitude. But -- she could NOT read. She had almost no understanding of the alphabetic principle: a few consonant sounds, no vowels, not even much of a "guessing" strategy. My hypothesis is that she got by on superior verbal and listening skills, good copying (nice writing and printing), and being the kind of kid all teachers like.

I made a mental note to do something about her the following school year.

So LAST fall (2007), I tried to work her into one of my reading groups. I ran into opposition from her classroom teacher, who didn't think she "needed" it and who was worried she was "missing class." (I always laugh at the though that a student who is finally learning to read is missing valuable "silent reading" time in class, but I kept my sardonic remarks to myself). I only got consent to let her work on a computerized program, Academy of Reading for 15 minutes every morning. Frankly, I think a knowledgeable teacher can do a lot more than that particular program, but I figured it was better than nothing. The student was not LD, would never meet criteria (no processing problems although the discrepancy between ability and achievement certainly could be documented), and decoding was definitely the issue.

She diligently worked on Academy of Reading three or four days a week for most of the school year (we had a computer upgrade that meant all the computers were offline for a few weeks, so that was an interruption). At the end of the school year though, I tested the child again. She had mastered CVC words using the computer program, but her overall decoding skills were at a beginning 2nd grade level, at best (she was finishing fourth grade). Her oral language was 70th percentile for her age (PPVT). Still a HUGE discrepancy.

All summer I brooded and schemed. I decided to take advantage of the fact that we had yet another change of administrators -- a complete one this time -- and probably no one knew who authorized what when. I called the child's mom the first week of school and outlined my plan. She said go, go, go! (She knew the child couldn't read). Next, I tackled the fifth grade teacher -- fortunately, a laid back sort (great teacher, just not hung up on minutiae) who wasn't at all worried the student would be damaged for life by missing a half hour of class every day. Woo hoo!

S. comes with a group of fifth graders, all working on decoding skills, and I could see that she is making excellent progress, but I didn't know exactly HOW much until yesterday. The other fifth grade was on a field trip, and S. came up by herself. I took advantage of the opportunity to give her the Word Attack part of the Woodcock . Up from 2.0 to 5.8!!! Holding my breath, I pulled out 3 Oral Reading Fluency passages at a fifth grade level. She averaged 90 WCPM (median was 92), on cold reads, with nice prosody, expression etc. She needs work on multisyllable word decoding -- fine. I know just what to do there. Her rate of 90 WPM is not fast enough (needs to be closer to 150-200), but for less than 3 months I thought it was awesome, and promptly wrote a jubilant note to her mom. By the end of the year our goal should be to have her at a seventh-eighth grade level and work on her writing as well.

One of our paraprofessionals was in the room while this was going on. She said to me (after S. left), "You can tell she knows she is successful --her whole body language, demeanor and personality have changed this year. She's so much more outgoing and confident." I had noticed it, but hadn't put two and two together. She's a smart little girl, and she knew she couldn't read before....that HAD to have affected her sense of self-worth. She was a hard worker, too, so why was she not learning? She probably blamed herself.

Not now. We high-fived each other, and I promised to keep "picking on" her (I make them correct every error, in true DI fashion) , and get her to the level she should be at.

Oh, and we can do that WITHOUT the parents. It's nice if parents have time and energy to do extra work with the children, but it is NOT necessary. I know I can count on parents to celebrate success -- and they do.

Like I say, sometimes the cr** is worth it.