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Success Stories

How are Literacy Collaborative schools doing?

In this section, we highlight some Literacy Collaborative success stories.

Franklin Avenue Elementary School
Westfield, Massachusetts

The Franklin Avenue Elementary School is located in the town of Westfield, Massachusetts. Primary and Intermediate Literacy Collaborative implementation began in 2001-2002, following a pattern of lower standardized test scores than other elementary schools in the district.

Franklin Avenue students have shown tremendous progress on state-mandated and other assessments since Literacy Collaborative implementation began. In a study of 51 Reading First schools in Massachusetts, Franklin Avenue was one of four schools considered “exceptional,” for remarkable improvements in student performance on the Massachusetts state assessment (MCAS) from 2002 to 2003. Based on progress made from 2001 through 2004, Franklin Avenue was recently selected as a 2005 Compass School in Massachusetts, which recognizes schools in which improvement efforts have yielded concrete results and in which there is a vision that can be shared. Only 12 schools were chosen in 2005 from a pool of 197 applicants from across the state.

Carly Bannish, the intermediate literacy coordinator at Franklin Avenue Elementary School, states that:

“It’s hard to believe that so much could have been accomplished in four short years! Beginning our primary and intermediate Literacy Collaborative training in the same year, we have now finished our fourth year of school-wide implementation. Our state-mandated test scores, as well as our district assessment scores, attest to the success of the model and our hard work. More importantly though, the literate culture of the school in general illustrates the gains we have made as an educational community.

“Books and words seem to be the foundation of Franklin Avenue School. Everywhere you look you will see an abundance of both. Classroom libraries spill over with hundreds of mentor texts, informational resources, fictional stories, and poetry anthologies. Students and staff are often overheard recommending titles to one another as they walk through the hallways or cafeteria. Bulletin boards and wall areas are dedicated to the celebration of students’ writing, displaying feature articles, investigative research, poetry, and personal narratives. Vocabulary and spelling games abound school-wide. Visitors often comment on how our community is so richly immersed in print.

“Recently, we have had exciting parental involvement in several literacy workshops (educating parents on how to access literacy websites to assist in their children’s reading development at home) and participation in a Poetry Coffeehouse (an opportunity to read poetry that students and adults have either written themselves or poems they just love to share with others). We know that Literacy Collaborative has made an impact on our families when a daughter and her father began writing poems to one another while he was stationed in Iraq.

“Yes, our test scores have dramatically improved over these past four years, but it is the increased excitement over literature and words that have made the greatest impression on all of us at Franklin Avenue School. We are readers and writers and poets…”

Henry Wilson School
Manchester, New Hampshire

Our goal is to create a school where all children will learn to read and write. The Henry Wilson School is an inner-city school that serves approximately 500 children in grades K-5 each year, all of whom live within walking distance from the school. The school is located in the area of the city that is a haven for immigrants and refugees settling in our country. Our cultural diversity makes our school rich in character. There are thirteen different languages represented at our school. The neighborhood is comprised of low-income housing units and apartment houses with very few single-family homes. We are a Title I School Wide Program by choice because of the high numbers of students receiving free and reduced lunch. A high percentage of our students enter school with extremely limited literacy experiences. We also have a high rate of transiency within our student population. Due to the needs of our diverse population, teachers felt obligated to deepen their understandings of the reading and writing process. Literacy Collaborative training has allowed us to create an atmosphere that embodies expert teaching that will allow us to meet the needs of our students.

By partnering with Lesley University and becoming involved in the Lesley University Literacy Collaborative, the Henry Wilson School has become a site where teachers work collegially in a problem-solving framework focused on improving instructional practices. As a result of implementing this model of professional study, our staff engages in a common language, common instructional practice, and holds high expectations for all students.

Teachers now involve themselves in the dynamic process of observing children’s reading, writing and word solving behaviors to inform their instruction and improve their teaching. This training has helped our staff bring theory and practice together in a way that makes their teaching more effective and more enjoyable. The coaching support that teachers receive has provided teachers time to reflect on and analyze their teaching and offer mutual support for learning.

There is a marked difference in the way that teachers identify learners’ strengths and needs through both systematic and informal assessment, and through a combination of whole-group, individual, and independent works as appropriate for the particular skills and strategies being taught. Teachers are much more aware of the progress of individual children and groups. The instructional focus is now to teach students how to manage their own reading and writing and extend their learning. Teachers are immersing students in basic principles that allow learners to become independent and strategic readers, writers and spellers. Teachers are also better able to evaluate and select literacy materials without being dependent on one reading program.

Reading Recovery has proven to be an extremely effective intervention program for our students who find learning to read and write difficult. With three Reading Recovery teachers we are able to service the lowest 20% of first-grade readers. Classroom teachers feel that the program complements the instruction that is happening in the classroom. First-grade teachers note that students who graduate from our Literacy Collaborative Kindergarten classrooms achieve at higher levels compared to the children who are new to our school. Not only are the children more comfortable with the literacy framework, they also have a much stronger repertoire in terms of early literacy strategies. Likewise, Reading Recovery teachers feel strongly that children are now moving through the program more efficiently due to the training classroom teachers have received. The two programs complement each other in research base, theory and pedagogy. A high percentage of our students are reading at a level 18 or 20 by the end of the year, which is significantly higher than our standards for our initial years of the program. In addition, Reading Recovery teachers note that the quality and ability of the children to generate ideas for writing has improved compared to previous years.

We have recently trained one of our staff members in the Leveled Literacy Intervention Program (LLI). This additional safety net provides further support for groups of students who find learning to read and write difficult. The students that have been taught in LLI groups thus far have made significant progress and are reading at the average of the class within eighteen weeks.

As we have currently completed three full years of implementation, the data that we have compiled over the past years has shown a notable increase in student progress, especially when tracking the students who have received Literacy Collaborative teaching since Kindergarten. The percentage of students reading on or above grade level continues to rise. Teachers also note a drastic improvement in the quality of student’s writing with regard to both craft and convention. Children are writing for longer periods of time and are composing pieces that include a variety of genre.

Parent surveys and interviews indicate a high level of satisfaction with regard to the Lesley Literacy Collaborative. We designed a parent brochure that is specific to each grade level and highlights expectations for reading, writing and word study. It also provides helpful suggestions for ways parents can support their children at home. The brochure is written in “parent friendly language” and has been translated into Spanish. We offered separate grade level Open House nights to better explain the brochure in a PowerPoint presentation. This venue allowed us to incorporate specific examples of student’s work at each grade level to better explain the literacy principles mentioned in the brochure.

Literacy Collaborative training has helped the staff at Henry Wilson School come together around a coherent vision and foster mutual commitment to that vision. Collaboratively, we have worked together to initiate some major shifts in our professional abilities. Our staff realizes that we have a strong foundation due to everyone’s efforts with the Lesley Literacy Collaborative model of professional development. Our journey in literate learning has created experts in the field. We feel very strongly that our high at-risk population deserves only the most knowledgeable staff members. In fact, one of our first-grade teachers had contemplated leaving the teaching profession prior to Lesley training.

“Before I was introduced to the Lesley Literacy model of professional development, I didn’t know what I was doing in terms of teaching a variety of learners. My classroom management was the weakest part of my program. I was forced to rely on a packaged reading program that did not meet the needs of my students. Now I understand that I am trying to build a strategic processing system for each of my students in reading, writing and word study. I have clear expectations for all of my students and my classroom is under control. The beauty is that I can’t wait to learn more! It is exciting to be part of comprehensive school reform where we are working together to continuously polish and refine our teaching practice. We are truly working together for the good of the kids.”

Due to the site-based leadership that now exists in our building, we have the ability to customize our professional development plans to meet the needs of both our teachers and our learners. We will continue this type of ongoing, close-to-practice professional development where complex ideas are experienced, analyzed and discussed within a variety of learning contexts. School reform takes time and energy. We are aware that there is no quick fix, but Henry Wilson School is certainly on its way.