News and reflections from experts and practitioners on the latest literacy research, events and daily practice
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April 3, 2023 by User
What is a Book Desert?
As a former classroom teacher and university professor, I am an enthusiastic advocate for early childhood literacy and for ending the literacy crisis in America. In order for children to become lifelong readers, they must have ample access to books in their homes, schools, and communities. Surprisingly, this is not yet the reality in the United States; too many children today live in ‘book deserts’, geographic areas where books are scarce.
Access to books is a necessity in a child’s development, not only as lifelong readers, but as engaged, productive members of society. When young readers own diverse, reflective texts, we increase the likelihood that these children will embrace lifelong reading. But it will take a village to make this happen.
Impact on Reading Development
A robust body of research shows profound disparity in the availability of books between high-income and low-income neighborhoods; in a high-poverty area of Washington, DC (with poverty levels above 60%) there is one book per 833 children (Neuman & Moland, 2019). In a 2015 article, American Federation of Teachers president Randi Weingarten provided these staggering statistics:
Forty-five percent of our nation’s children live in neighborhoods that lack public libraries and stores that sell books, or in homes where books are not present.
Two-thirds of schools in our nation’s lowest-income neighborhoods can’t afford to purchase books at retail prices.
The Coalition For Literacy Equity
As the co-founder of The Coalition for Literacy Equity (CLE), and the creator of the End Book Deserts podcast, I’ve intentionally created a national coalition of nonprofits, book distribution programs, literacy projects, book publishers, librarians, and university professors to promote a culture of literacy and ensure that all children have access to books. We aim to foster positive reading cultures in homes, schools, and communities. Through programming, advocacy, research, and collaboration, we promote lifelong literacy for enjoyment, engagement, and empowerment. With 32 million American children lacking access to books, book distribution and donation is a linchpin of our work to harness the collective energy of our advocacy and to address our nation's literacy crisis through research, policy, and best practices.
Promoting Equity and Access Through School Librarians
One way to promote more equity and access in our schools is through school librarians. There are 2.5M students enrolled in schools without a library. Students attending schools in high-income neighborhoods had access to eight times as many books in their classrooms as did students attending schools comprised of students from low-income and black communities. Access to books in school and public libraries was a significant predictor of 2007 fourth grade NAEP reading scores.
It is no wonder that students are better readers and writers in schools that value well-trained school librarians. Access to books increases children’s emergent literacy skills, the frequency of shared book experiences with parents / caregivers, and reading fluency in later years. Nearly three decades of research shows positive correlations between high-quality library programs and student achievement (Gretes, 2013; Lance & Kachel, 2018; Scholastic, 2016).
School Libraries as an Issue of Social Justice
Equitable access to school libraries and librarians is an issue of social justice, as schools in the poorest and most racially diverse communities have the least access to library services (Lance & Kachel, 2018; Pribesh, Gavigan, & Dickinson, 2011).
My 2022 brief from the International Literacy Association, "Clarifying the Role of School Librarians,” argues that school librarians are more than mere keepers of books – they serve as powerful literacy partners with teachers through collaborative instructional planning and resource curation (Crary, 2019). Librarians promote, develop, and foster culturally relevant and responsive environments. They curate collections that represent the ethnic and linguistic diversity of the student population and for students with various learning needs. They stock various texts and genres, such as manga, graphic novels, and novels or picture books addressing current social issues. Furthermore, they facilitate the use of school-wide technology and provide tech support.
10 Ways to End Book Deserts
How do we help school leaders, librarians, families, and coalitions like the American Consortium for Education Equity and The Coalition for Literacy Equity change the odds for children who lack access to books?
1. Increase local, state, and federal funding for book distribution programs. Book distribution programs are a relatively low-cost intervention that positively impact children’s literacy development, increase children’s reading interest, and yield higher literacy scores for young children.
2. Encourage family participation in book distribution programs. Families involved in book donation programs increase reading-related behaviors and improve the frequency of language-rich interactions between parent and child.
3. Establish book distribution programs in high-traffic community areas like urban laundromats, WIC centers, community centers, churches, barbershops, and salons.
4. Provide funding to distribute books through mobile libraries, direct mail, and digital access. In the COVID pandemic, many book distribution programs shifted their delivery to direct mail. Participation in these programs – including the Imagination Library founded by Dolly Parton – has been linked to children’s increased reading motivation and interest, improved early literacy skills (including letter knowledge and phonological awareness), and increased frequency of family reading.
5. Partner. When programs come together and spearhead efforts, parents / caregivers receive multiple messages about the importance of literacy. A collaboration between Imagination Library and Reach Out and Read, a national book distribution program that relies upon pediatricians and primary care providers, yielded increases in family engagement, children’s language outcomes, and kindergarten readiness scores.
6. Build literacy programs to include multiple contact points with caregivers and increased duration. Because changes to family literacy behaviors increased with extended participation, programs should consider how they engage participants over time. Additionally, book distribution programs must listen to and adhere to caregivers’ perspectives and intentionally target families who wish to receive books, while being cognizant of the unintended messages and pressure that parents might feel.
7. Evaluate the kinds of books distributed with these important considerations: (a) increased number of narrative books and of books in various languages, (b) concerted inclusion of books depicting characters of various race and ethnicities, (c) student-choice of books, as less than half of book distribution programs included student self-selection, and (d) more distribution of shorter, concept books to support parents/caregivers with limited time and reading skills.
8. Investigate community-based literacy needs so that efforts can better focus on creating reading cultures within neighborhoods.
9. Create a well-coordinated database for national book distribution programs to increase targeted approaches. A 2020 article from Susan Neuman tracking book distribution efforts in one city revealed overlapping efforts and that books did not always end up in the hands of those who needed them the most.
10. Establish a national coalition of literacy projects and book donation programs. As book distribution programs bring together literacy advocates spanning education, public health, for-profit industries, and nonprofits, there must be concerted efforts to coordinate, collaborate, and communicate across programs to maximize and systematize reach, operate with intentionality and effectiveness, share best practices, and contribute meaningful research.
Summary
Many children come to school unprepared; too many students experience book deserts all their lives. A lack of books deprives children of important literacy skills, including vocabulary acquisition and content knowledge, as well as the socioemotional benefits of shared read alouds.
By highlighting the work of innovative organizations and grassroots efforts, we can raise awareness about the implications of limited literacy resources on children’s reading development in our schools and country. Through advocacy, fundraising, and author outreach, we can strive to eradicate book deserts, get the right books into the hands of the right readers, and promote lifelong reading for all children. Join us!
About Dr. Molly Ness
Molly Ness is a former classroom teacher, a reading researcher, and the Vice President of Academic Content for Learning Ally, a national nonprofit working with schools across the country to solve the literacy crisis for diverse and marginalized students. Dr. Ness holds a doctorate in reading education from the University of Virginia, and spent 16 years as an associate professor at Fordham University. With four books and numerous peer-reviewed articles, her research focuses on reading comprehension, teachers’ instructional decisions, and dyslexia. In 2019, she founded the End Book Deserts podcast to bring attention to the issue of book access and equity. She serves on the Board of Directors for the International Literacy Association and on the elementary advisory panel for Penguin Random House.
Categories: Activities, Assistive Technology, Audiobook Library, Authors for Access, Curriculum & Access, Early Literacy, Education & Teaching, General, Reading Strategies for K-12, Student Centric Learning, The Digital Age, Whole Child Literacy
March 27, 2023 by User
Janecia Rolland, better known as Coach Jae, talked with Dr. Terrie Noland in a Literacy Leadership podcast, about the intersection between education, trauma, and Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs), and how they affect equity and learning in schools.
Coach Jae is the Founder and CEO of Restoration Coaching, LLC. She is an educator, content creator, author, youth speaker, and expert facilitator, holding dual Masters Degrees in Family Practice and Restorative Clinical Counseling.
Traumatic experiences are not who we are.
Coach Jae believes that the heart of equity are relationships, and understanding “who we are as people.” As a lifelong learner of human behavior, she applies her expertise in education, psychology and impacts of Trauma in education to help educators find their “center.” Jae says, “To improve equity in our classrooms, we must first understand ourselves. Then we will be better prepared to look for indicators that uncover deeper grievances affecting how we relate to each other, our ability to learn, and our coping mechanisms.”
Why do we do and react the way we do?
“Behavior is a learned skill, and children are sponges,” says Jae. “They replicate what we do.” Learned behaviors begin at a young age, and connect to everything we act on, feel, and think. They affect biases to reinforce our behavior. Coach Jae wants us to recognize that all people have experienced trauma and adversity in some way. This could be a devastating loss of a family member, a national tragedy, or lack of food at our dinner table, and/or the pandemic. There are infinite examples of trauma and ACEs in our lives. Our ability to recognize our emotions of a triggered event, and what our learned responses are is a valuable skill set – one that can help us as individuals and educators connect deeply with ourselves and students who cross our path.
Reading As a Barrier
A student struggling to read, write or communicate effectively may be caused by a trauma or can become a traumatic experience. Some students associate themselves with their abilities. If separated from their peers due to a reading barrier, students may feel less than or isolated. If they cannot read grade-level materials and are given low level books, they may show anger at themselves or the teacher, or have the feeling of not caring to read at all.
Coach Jae recently worked with a fourth grader who rarely spoke in class. His teacher recognized that he was dealing with some form of trauma using a learned behavior of alienation, but she could not reach him, even with praise. “Positive reinforcement is wonderful,” she says, “but not everyone reacts positively to it.” What this youngster did respond to was a conversation about the Super Mario Brothers, a topic he was interested in. It got his attention. It got his curiosity. It opened dialogue that led to a book about the Mario Brothers, and another book, and another. The student began to see himself differently. Instead of praise, this student wanted lollipops…not always the best reward, but it worked for him.
Heightening Our Awareness
Sixty-seven percent of our population has experienced at least one traumatic experience. By heightening our awareness, and acknowledging our triggers and behaviors, we are better equipped to recognize and understand others’ behaviors. We can more easily identify trauma indicators. We are more apt to ask relevant questions; open dialogue, speak authentically, influence, inspire, empower, and model what healthy grief and trauma responses look like. "We need exposure to different ways of thinking,” says Jae. “That way, we can be receptive to others and their experiences which increases our ability to view life through a more equitable lens. This is what equity truly is about. We may not understand what equity means for each individual, but we can show up as our authentic self as an invitation to co-create and build safe spaces for all to gain access and to support individual and collective needs.
Mindfulness Mental Health
Trauma and Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) can encompass various forms -- physical, emotional neglect, family dysfunction, hunger, poverty, and impact mental health. Coach Jae offers these suggestions:
It’s okay to pause.
Incorporate self-care into your daily functions. If you like nature, teach a lesson on this topic.
Challenge your behaviors, thinking, and relationship with yourself.
Special thanks to Coach Jae for discussing the topic of equity in education, and the emotional, psychological, mental, and spiritual aspects of trauma, and ACEs. With improved awareness of our own circumstances, we can better understand ourselves, and transfer that knowledge into positive ways to improve students’ wellbeing and academic outcomes and make life better for all.
Coach Jae can be contacted at: janecia.rolland(at)gmail.com.
Categories: Curriculum & Access, Education & Teaching, Educator Community, Educators, Student Centric Learning, Teacher Best Practices, The Digital Age, Whole Child Literacy
March 21, 2023 by User
It’s a commonly held belief that it takes at least 10,000 hours of practice to master any given skill, but this oversimplification leaves many variables unconsidered. Take for example the ability to read fluently. For students learning to read, practice is essential to developing fluency, but the number of hours needed, as well as the quality and type of practice, may vary greatly depending on the student’s individual needs. In this year’s Spotlight on Dyslexia literacy experts, Jennifer Ferlito, Sheryl Ferlito, and Nancy Chapel Eberhardt, discussed their research with the Learning Ally community, and taught us how to perform more meaningful reading practice.
“We want to broaden our idea of what reading practice looks like,” Nancy Eberhardt began her session. At the heart of their research is reimagining what reading practice is – one that sets it apart from instruction time, and apart from infamous ‘drill-and-kill’ strategies. She says, “It isn’t necessarily going through flashcards. It is trying to present new or known information in novel situations to build those transfer bridges.”
Reading with Automaticity
Their research identifies the unique ability that practice has to contextualize learned information. Jennifer Ferlito explains, “Practice makes learning stick. We move from what we’ve learned from short-term memory (where we have to constantly think about it), to long- term memory (where we can actually use it).” This ‘stickiness’ allows students to access learned information as their own knowledge, even when facing new and challenging situations. The more a new idea is reinforced with practice, the more easily our brain can perform that task unconsciously. The researchers call this “Automaticity.”
If something is automatic, it clears up brain space for other thoughts and functions. Furthermore, automaticity is important for performing a mental task as complicated as reading. “As we move from pre-alphabetic to consolidated, there’s something new and different that has to become automatic for us,” shares Sheryl Ferlito. In order to truly develop reading fluency, students need the brain space to decode, understand, and analyze a text all at once.
Space Reading Practice Throughout the Class or Day
So what can you do to improve the effectiveness of your reading class practice time? Spacing practice time out is important,” shares Sheryl Ferlito. “Practice has to be cumulative.” The researchers also emphasize the importance of integrating reading practice with a cumulative scope and sequence. For example, systematic phonics practice can be easily divided and organized based on the use of the most commonly used sounds.
Scope and Sequence - Connecting Patterns in our Brains
Jennifer Ferlito says, “Scope and sequence contributes to well distributed practice. It can be parsed out into small amounts of content. “These small doses make it possible [for students] to reach mastery before we add another dose [of instruction]. Our brains are pattern connectors. Having kids sort with patterns and meanings helps to bring automatic, semantic understanding.”
During the session, Jennifer Ferlito demonstrated sorting games using morphological meanings such as ‘singular vs. plural’ and ‘plural vs. possessive’, and games using computer-assisted instruction: a tool the researchers encouraged, noting how computer programs can increase the opportunity for student response and monitoring.
Dr. Maryanne Wolf says “Some of our children need not 10 exposures, but a hundred exposures. That’s not drill and that’s certainly not kill. That is supporting children who need that time.”
I Do, We Do, You Do
Using practice methods like computer-assisted learning which monitor students’ progress can be one of the best resources for determining just how much practice each individual reader needs. Ferlito, Ferlito, and Eberhardt are fighting the stigma that repetition has to be redundant. A great rule of thumb to help to guide your practice planning is “I do, we do, you do” a phrase coined by educational consultant Anita Archer. “If they don’t retain it,” says Archer, “We have not taught it”.
Learn more about Learning Ally’s Spotlight Series
Article by: Michael Manzi. Michael was a struggling reader. Now, he writes articles and blogs to promote research-backed literacy interventions for students across the education spectrum.
Categories: Activities, Education & Teaching, Educator Community, Educators, Reading Strategies for K-12, Teacher Best Practices
March 13, 2023 by User
When asking U.S. educators to speculate on how much of the English language actually follows some sort of rule set, Jean Rishel sometimes hears answers as low as 10%. “This tells me that we need to help our population better understand how the English language is structured,” says the Level 5 Master Instructor for Multi-Sensory Education Institute (IMSE), who is an expert on these rules. It is a generally held belief among native English speakers that our vocabulary set is of the most rebellious and unpredictable, but despite exceptions, there are some fundamental rules to our words that, when understood, can help struggling readers unlock their comprehension.
At this year's Spotlight on Dyslexia Virtual Conference, Rishel sat down with the Learning Ally community to share some overlooked insights about the structure of English words. She explains, "When we first begin teaching language to students, we start with phonics: the study of how letters and sounds work together. These rules are helpful when trying to pronounce our most common, one-syllable words, like “go”, “see”, and “from”. These base words often originate from Anglo-Saxon and Old-English vocabulary. As students get older, they can learn to combine these common bases to create compound words like “playground” or “armchair”.
But phonics can only take students so far. Rishel recommends that as early as first and second grade, students should be introduced to Morphology. Morphology is the study of the structure of words within our language. It focuses on the use of morphemes: meaningful units of language which cannot be further divided. Morphology can help older students to decode multi-syllabic words that can’t merely be interpreted with phonics.
Morphology breaks down multisyllabic words into bases and common affixes. These smaller units of language help students build the meaning of bigger words. For example, if we were to break down the word “unpredictable” into morphemic parts, we’d get “un”, “pre”, “dict”, and “able”. “Un” is a common prefix, meaning “not”. “Pre” is also a common prefix meaning “before”, and “able” (sometimes seen as “ible”) is a common suffix and means “able to”. If we scramble these thoughts together, we get “not able to, before”. “Dict” is the last piece of the puzzle.
When dealing with morphology, we introduce base words that come from Latin and Greek backgrounds. Common Latin bases for students to start with include “rupt”, “tract”, and “aud”. Common Greek bases for beginners include “micro”, “tele”, and “bio”. In the example of “unpredictable”, “dict” is a Latin base. “Dict”, sometimes written “dic” means “to say”. When we combine this meaning with our affixes, we are able to fully decode the word. “Unpredictable” means “not able to say before”.
This method of linguistic analysis can give students a very literal understanding of multi-syllabic words that they may encounter for the first time when reading independently. That’s why Rishel is pushing to bring Morphology back to the forefront of language education. She recommends that educators teach young students the common affixes, as well as the common Latin and Greek bases, the same as other vocabulary is taught. “You can do this with blending drills using flashcards,” she says, “Ask the children to write them down three times a week”.
Rishel also recommends exercises in which students must break down words into their morphemic parts. Using different notations, such as underlining and circling, students can recognize and differentiate the bases, prefixes, and suffixes.
For more information on the magic of Morphology, watch Jean Rishel’s full lecture by registering for Learning Ally’s Spotlight on Dyslexia on Demand.
Categories: Curriculum & Access, Education & Teaching, Educators, English Language Learners, Professional Development, Reading Strategies for K-12, Teacher Best Practices
March 8, 2023 by User
For Immediate Release:
Learning Ally's 2023 Great Reading Games
March 8, 2023 - Princeton, NJ – Learning Ally, a national nonprofit working with U.S. schools to strengthen reading outcomes and improve equitable access to grade-level books, has wrapped up its seventh annual Great Reading Games. The organization celebrated a record number of K-12 participants, more than 186,600 students who read more than 39 million pages in just seven weeks.
The finale of this award-winning audiobook challenge coincides with “Read Across America,” and is designed to support teachers who encourage at-risk students to read. Students with dyslexia and other learning barriers explore personal reading interests, while building foundational skills in vocabulary, comprehension, and fluency. As a result, many students feel more empowered as independent readers and learners.
During the Great Reading Games, educators report deeper connections with students and positive academic outcomes, such as the ability for more struggling readers to read grade-level material, doubling reading frequency in just 50 days, and enhancing reading scores. Innovative teachers have also leveraged this event to enhance their teaching capacity, and to expand their class and school libraries with accessible books. Literacy leaders have implemented school-wide initiatives to create a culture of strong, inclusive readers, and taken steps to broaden their professional knowledge on the science of reading.
This year’s top school winners are:
Dr. Terrie Noland, Learning Ally’s VP of Educator Initiatives said, “It’s always thrilling to wrap up another successful year of the Great Reading Games. When educators tell us, “I can’t believe how many students are now reading on grade-level,” or a particular student “shined” in this reading challenge,” or that schools have implemented a “read for 20 minutes a day initiative,” these are the best results we could hope for.”
Pre-made teacher resources for the Great Reading Games are ready to launch for educator members. Learning Ally’s app tracks students' reading activity on a sliding point schedule incentivizing students to read in and out of the school day. Students accumulate points in one of 12 brackets based on grade-level and school size. Top winners include schools, teachers and students, who can win digital gift cards and national recognition.
The Great Reading Games concluded in a celebrity livestream event to discuss the importance of reading to learn and reading for pleasure. This year’s guest author, Carmen Agra Deedy, wrote several bestsellers, including The Library Dragon, The Cheshire Cheese Cat, 14 Cows for America, and Wombat Said Come In! “Never give up…keep reading," was Agra Deedy’s parting message to students.
Learn more about the Great Reading Games.
About Learning Ally
Learning Ally is a leading education nonprofit dedicated to empowering educators with proven solutions that help new and struggling learners reach their potential. Our range of literacy-focused offerings for students in Pre-K to 12th grade and catalog of professional learning allows us to support more than 2 million students and 445,000 educators across the United States.
www.learningally.org/educators. 800-221-1098.
Categories: Activities, Audiobook Library, Authors for Access, Books, Authors, & Movies, Education & Teaching, Educators, In the news, Press Releases, Reading Strategies for K-12, The Digital Age, The Great Reading Games
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