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HomeMy WebLinkAboutTLC ARPA Attachment A Data and Structured LiteracyCONFIDENTIAL AND PROPRIETARY Pathways to Literacy (attachments to be publicly released only upon award of ARPA grant) The Learning Collaborative Atachment A COVID Related Learning Loss in Oshkosh (and what to do about it) Na�onwide, the COVID pandemic caused a marked learning loss in reading scores, and the state of Wisconsin was no excep�on. Each school year the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruc�on (DPI) requires all districts to administer the Wisconsin Forward Exam to all students. The Forward scores are compiled by DPI and it then provides school report cards for each district. The report cards provide grades for the district as a whole and for each of its schools on a scale of 0-100. The Overall Scores are based on a formula that includes four categories: Student Achievement, Growth, Target Group Outcomes, and On-Track to Gradua�on. The summary score for the Oshkosh Area School District (OASD) was 72.4 in 2019, a score close to the Exceeds Expecta�ons category. In 2022, the OASD score had fallen 5.5% to 68.4, a score solidly in the middle of the Meets Expecta�ons range. The number of individual OASD schools scoring in the “Meets Few Expecta�ons” category increased from one in 2018-2019 to three in 2022-2023. Category Score range 2018-2019 Individual School Rankings 2022-2023 Individual School Rankings Significantly Exceeds Expecta�ons 83-100 4 2 Exceeds Expecta�ons 73-82.9 9 8 Meets Expecta�ons 63-72.9 8 9 Meets Few Expecta�ons 53-62.9 1 3 Fails to Meet Expecta�ons 0-52.9 0 0 The Forward exam also provides categorical informa�on on students’ reading achievement scores. The four categories of scores reported are Below Basic (having few reading skills), Basic (having minimal basic reading skills), Proficient (able to read grade-level texts), and Advanced (above grade-level reading skills). The 2022-2023 report showed that only 36% of students in OASD scored in the Proficient or advanced categories, meaning that a whopping 64%—nearly two-thirds of all students in the district—are not proficient at reading and will not have the skills that would allow them to con�nue their educa�on at a postsecondary ins�tu�on such as UW Oshkosh or Fox Valley Technical Ins�tute, or to advance in their chosen careers. The numbers are even more alarming for students of color in the district. Only 8% of Black students read at the Advanced or Proficient levels, leaving over 90% of Black students in the CONFIDENTIAL AND PROPRIETARY Pathways to Literacy (attachments to be publicly released only upon award of ARPA grant) The Learning Collaborative COVID Related Learning Loss in Oshkosh 2 district reading at the basic or below basic level. OASD is not the only district in the state to struggle with low reading scores. Statewide, only 40% of all students read at the Proficient level or Advanced levels. Although these low scores are concerning, is it possible that now that the COVID shutdown is over, scores will return to normal? Researchers at the Education Recovery Scorecard explored this very ques�on and came to the following conclusions: “The researchers also looked at data from the decade prior to the pandemic to see how students bounced back a�er significant learning loss due to disrup�on in their schooling. The evidence shows that schools do not naturally bounce back: Affected students recovered 20–30% of the lost ground in the first year, but then made no further recovery in the subsequent three to four years.” They also looked at solu�ons to overcoming this learning loss and concluded: “We must create learning opportuni�es for students outside of the normal school calendar, by adding academic content to summer camps and a�er-school programs and adding an op�onal 13th year of schooling.” Clearly, learning loss is real and will not disappear with �me. In fact, the solu�on lies in providing children with proven learning opportuni�es that are squarely based on the science of reading. Science of Reading What to Teach Research on effec�ve reading instruc�on over the past six decades has helped to reveal both the “what” and “how” of effec�ve reading instruc�on. The outcome of this research is a reading methodology called “Structured Literacy”. The “what” to teach centers around effec�ve literacy instruc�on's “Big Five” elements. They are: 1. Phonemic Awareness: Ability to hear and manipulate sounds in spoken words. 2. Phonics: Knowledge of how leters and the sounds they make. 3. Fluency: Ability to read accurately with prosody at an adequate rate. 4. Vocabulary: Knowledge of word meaning and structure and syntax. 5. Comprehension: Ability to gain meaning from print and monitor understanding. Any instruc�on designed to effec�vely address literacy skills must contain all of the Big Five elements (see heading The Big Five below for a more detailed descrip�on of these elements). How to Teach In addition to having knowledge of the elements of effective reading instruction, teachers must know how to deliver instruction that offers students the best chance of success. Following are the four key principles of effective instruction: CONFIDENTIAL AND PROPRIETARY Pathways to Literacy (attachments to be publicly released only upon award of ARPA grant) The Learning Collaborative COVID Related Learning Loss in Oshkosh 3 1. Explicit: Effective instruction does not allow for student guessing or discovery learning, but makes use of direct statements such as, “This is the letter “a” and it makes the sound /ǎ/.” 2. Diagnostic: During each lesson, the teacher constantly assesses student knowledge during each lesson and does frequent cumulative assessments to determine student skills and the goals of the following lessons. 3. Systematic: Lessons are presented in an orderly manner, building on what the students know and progressing areas of student need. 4. Cumulative: Lessons incorporate frequent reviews of past skills to keep them fresh in students’ minds. These principles can be boiled down to an instructional method known as “Model, Lead, and Test,” and they work not only with reading but also with other skills-based subject areas such as mathematics and written expression. The purpose of direct instruction is to “teach more in less time,” a necessity for students who have fallen behind. Community Need Many students in the Oshkosh area need assistance in improving their reading skills. For many parents, finding a science of reading qualified tutor who will tutor for a reasonable fee is challenging. Few private resources exist in the area and many private tutors charge high fees, placing help out of reach for most families. The Big Five Phonemic Awareness Phonemic awareness is recognizing and manipulating the spoken sounds in words. The ability to perceive, consider, and work with individual sounds is an important part of phonemic awareness. This component is a subcategory of phonological awareness. For example, the concept of word and syllable awareness is crucial to developing the alphabetic principle in the early reading stages. Phonemic awareness is most critical to learn during the early stages of reading and starts to develop around ages four through six. Teachers must be knowledgeable about phonemic awareness to prepare effective classroom activities. Phonics Phonics is the second component for teaching reading instruction and helps children to learn the alphabetic principle, meaning that letters are connected to sounds in words. Teaching phonics should begin in kindergarten or first grade and should only need to be taught for a year or two at the most. The Reading Rockets website defines phonics as, “…knowledge of letter sounds and the ability to apply that knowledge in decoding unfamiliar printed words”. Phonics CONFIDENTIAL AND PROPRIETARY Pathways to Literacy (attachments to be publicly released only upon award of ARPA grant) The Learning Collaborative COVID Related Learning Loss in Oshkosh 4 teaches the grapheme-phoneme association of American-English language. A solid understanding of phonics is the key to later reading success. Fluency Fluency is known for providing a link between word recognition and comprehension. This area of reading comprehension develops for students over a period of time. Because fluency develops over time, students’ reading is slow at first and is done word-by-word because they are sounding out unfamiliar words. Reading fluency is defined as reading accuracy plus rate. Fluency is measured by calculating the accuracy of words that students read correctly plus how long it took them to read the text. Fluency is required so that students are able to focus on the content of the reading for comprehension. Vocabulary Vocabulary is one of the most important parts of reading instruction. For students to become advanced readers, they need to have development and interaction of skills that will develop over a period of time. This fits into the Simple View of Reading Model, which defines reading comprehension as a product of lower-level skills such as word recognition and fluency and higher-level thinking processes, most notably, listening comprehension. In order for students to have a wide vocabulary instruction, they need to be able to process the information they are reading as well as know the meaning of the words that they are reading. Comprehension Comprehension is the ability to make sense of what we read and connect it with prior learning. It is a product of strong word recognition skills, reading fluency, vocabulary, background knowledge, and language ability. This means that when students start to read, they know they need to pay attention to the text to understand what they are reading. When reading, students need to be purposeful, meaning that they need to read to find out what they are reading about.