Specialists work to raise reading skills

Stall High School freshman Steaphan Whirl fluently reads aloud two pages of the novel before Kathleen King interrupts him.

King, a literacy specialist, asks Whirl questions about what he just read, such as what he thinks is happening at that point in the story and what he expects will happen next. She's trying to help him improve his reading comprehension skills.

The time King spends with Whirl is a small part of what she does in her new role as a literacy specialist. The district created the position this year and hired eight specialists to work in high schools across the district. Their job is to show teachers how to teach reading in their classes and work directly with students to improve.

The impetus for hiring the specialists came from School Superintendent Nancy McGinley after she saw the high percentage of district freshmen -- nearly 20 percent -- who couldn't read better than a fourth-grader. High school teachers typically don't receive training in college on how to diagnose or address their students' reading problems, and high schools with large numbers of students reading at low levels need someone with that expertise, she said.

The role of the literacy specialists vary from school to school, depending on students' needs and the school's existing remedial programs. Stall High has a higher percentage of freshmen who can't read better than a fourth-grader -- about 35 percent -- than almost any other district school. King has identified which students struggle the most with reading. She said many of those students are freshmen, particularly those who either speak English as a second language or are repeating their freshman year. Other students with weak reading skills include those who have failed the high school exit exam.

King works with some of the school's worst readers in classes that use intervention programs such as Read 180 and Voyager. Some of the lessons are computer-based, some involve direct instruction from a teacher, and others require students to read independently. King monitors students' progress to ensure they are growing. It's too soon to see conclusive results, but she said she's seeing signs that students are improving.

When she's not working with students, King spends her time with teachers to help them incorporate reading lessons in their classes. Research shows that giving teachers proper training leads to the greatest improvements in student achievement, and the most effective form of that training comes from literacy specialists or coaches, according to a 2006 policy brief on adolescent literacy reform from the National Council of Teachers of English.

King has offered school-wide trainings for teachers on ways to teach reading in their classes, and some of those have focused on vocabulary. Instead of directing students to a dictionary when they don't understand a word, for example, King tells teachers to make students use a diagram to explain the term in their own words and then to give similar and dissimilar words.

"If (teachers) know (students) have to know that word, it's time well spent," she said. "I think teachers are starting to buy into it."

It's not asking teachers to take 30 minutes away from their scheduled lesson, said Mike Ward, Stall High's curriculum learning specialist who also oversees the district's literacy specialists. It's taking a few extra minutes to make certain that students can understand the course content, he said.

The challenge is getting teachers to implement these kinds of strategies in their classes, he said. King teaches with teachers to show them how to do that, and Ward said he's trying to spend more time in classrooms, too. Teachers also have been asked to submit literacy-based lesson plans so administrators can see the ways they are teaching literacy, he said.

Ward used to do some of the work that King does -- analyzing students' test scores and determining what kind of help they need -- but he had a number of other responsibilities and couldn't concentrate his attention on reading. It's good to have someone in the building who focuses on that area, he said.

"We probably could use another (literacy specialist)," he said.

Adam Richardson, who teaches freshmen global studies, said he's used some of the vocabulary tactics that King has suggested. He recognizes that his students won't understand the content if they can't read, but he didn't receive extensive training in college on how to teach reading, he said.

"It's good that I'm getting help now," he said.

McGinley said she expects to make a long-term commitment to staffing high schools with literacy specialists because not all students will be reading on grade level by the time the stimulus money that funds the positions runs out.

"If we believe this is essential, then we have to make this a priority as a budget issue," she said.

Reach Diette Courrégé at 937-5546 or dcourrege@postandcourier.com.