By Dennis Oda, Star-Bulletin
Getting into their reading program at Blanche Pope Elementary
School are clockwise, starting from lower left, Kekai Garcia, 6;
Madeleine Richards, who is helping with the school program;
Kalapana Wolcott, 9; Nani Alcaraz, also a program helper; Alii
Garcia, 10; Dana-Lynn Deitschman,9; Renee Chong, a helper;
Tina Marie Deitschman, 10; Jody Maukele, 6; Bebe Kepa,
and John Waiolama, 8.

Reading success:
We did, you
can, too

A school's success with the
'Success for All' program is being
watched by educators, and what's
more, 'the kids love it'

Part One of two
Part Two of two
'Starting Out Right' reading tips

By Christine Donnelly
Star-Bulletin

Blanche Pope Elementary School in Waimanalo has hosted many educators lately, and principal Louise Wolcott welcomes the attention.

"Last (school) year, we had almost daily visitors, people coming in to observe our students," Wolcott said. "It's so exciting, because they're seeing our progress."

What's attracted the attention is a structured, schoolwide reading instruction program Pope Elementary adopted in January 1998 called "Success for All."

The curriculum, which was created 12 years ago by researchers at Johns Hopkins University in Maryland, was developed for schools with large proportions of economically disadvantaged students.

The program is now used in 1,100 schools in 45 states. Blanche Pope -- which has 285 students in grades kindergarten through sixth -- was the first public school in Hawaii to try it, Wolcott said. And she believes it's paying off.

At the end of the first full year, 81 percent of Pope's first-graders were reading at or above grade level, compared with 33 percent the year before, Wolcott said.

"It's a lot of work, but it's
very, very worthwhile to see our
children learning to read."

Louise Wolcott

POPE ELEMENTARY PRINCIPAL

"And it's reading with comprehension, not just sounding out words," Wolcott said. "The kids love it because they're succeeding. Success is the best motivation."

The program puts heavy emphasis on language arts instruction in kindergarten and first grade, in the belief that children are long at a disadvantage if they don't learn to read the first time they're taught.

For reading and writing instruction, students (both regular and special-education) are grouped by ability, not age. Pope Elementary has 17 groups; each meets for 90 minutes a day.

"We have third-graders in fifth-grade-level groups, and vice versa," Wolcott said. "The teachers can really focus instruction better without a wide range of reading abilities."

The most basic groups get systematic phonics instruction and lots of reading aloud by the teacher. The most advanced read complex books themselves and write about them. Each group is led by trained school staff.

By the end of the first-grade level, children are expected to be able to read and understand simple books and master skills such as decoding words by letter-sound relationships.

Spelling, vocabulary and writing are included in all groups. And at all levels, kids are encouraged to choose their own books as well as do assigned reading. There's homework every night: 20 minutes of reading whatever the child wants and a short essay describing what was read.

By Dennis Oda, Star-Bulletin
Left to right, Kekai Garcia, 6, Dana-Lynn Deitschman, 9,
Kalapana Wolcott, 9, Alii Garcia, 10, Renee Chong (helping
to read) and Tina Marie Deitschman, 10 enjoy reading.

Besides reading with their kids at home, parents are encouraged to volunteer at the school.

"It's a lot of work, but it's very, very worthwhile to see our children learning to read," Wolcott said.

But not everyone praises "Success for All," or other structured programs like it. Some educators decry grouping readers by ability all the way through sixth grade, saying it labels and limits them. Others say depending on a schoolwide curriculum created outside the school stifles teachers' creativity and professionalism.

Wolcott has heard those arguments, but says they have not proved true at Pope. The ability groupings are reassessed every eight weeks to make sure no child is held back, she said. "Students move up to new groups all the time."

And although some Pope teachers were initially reluctant to follow an outside lesson plan, they changed their minds upon seeing it worked and that they could apply their own ideas within a basic framework, Wolcott recalled.

The most serious concerns center on whether early gains made by "Success for All" students last past the fifth grade.

There is conflicting research on that point. With less than two school years in the program, Wolcott can't say for sure.

But her experience as an educator, including 11 years as principal at Blanche Pope, tells her that the students are getting a long-lasting foundation.

Experts say there's no one best way to teach reading and no single curriculum that will work in every school, with every student. Wolcott agreed that "Success for All" may not be for everyone, but does praise its systematic approach.

"I've come to believe that children need a consistent, systematic approach, and not just in reading," she said. "In the past we've given them a real variety of approaches depending on the teacher's particular way of teaching. What 'Success for All' does is build a very systematic approach to learning to read in the whole school."

And what of all those visitors to Pope Elementary last school year? Many were principals and teachers from other Hawaii public schools. This year about another dozen schools are trying the program, Wolcott said. "I hope they all show the gains we have. I think they will."

---

‘Starting Out Right’
gives reading tips

By Christine Donnelly
Star-Bulletin

Decades of sometimes conflicting reading research was synthesized last year by a special panel convened to define the essential elements in successful reading instruction.

The work resulted in a 390-page report called "Preventing Reading Difficulties in Young Children."

The findings were incorporated this year into a handbook called "Starting Out Right: A Guide to Promoting Children's Reading Success."

Here are some major conclusions of the panel, convened by the National Research Council:

Quality reading instruction in the primary grades is the single-best defense against reading failure, overcoming even the effects of childhood backgrounds that increase the risk of poor literacy. Effective instruction focuses on the relationships between letters and sounds, the process of obtaining meaning from print and practice for fluency. Ignoring any of those areas increases the chance that reading will be impeded.

Teacher certification requirements and teacher education curricula should be updated to ensure that all teachers understand how literacy develops in children and how teachers can best foster that development. Teachers need professional development throughout their careers to address reading instruction. Every school should have access to a variety of reading specialists who can provide special instruction for children having trouble.

Children must arrive in first grade with strong language and cognitive skills and motivation to learn to read. Home and preschool settings should therefore provide storytelling, read-aloud time, singing and word games and other activities that highlight the relationship between print and speech.

Hurrying young children with limited English proficiency into reading in their new language can be counterproductive. If feasible, children should be taught to read in their native languages while learning to speak English, after which they can extend their skills into reading English.

Copies of both the guidebook and the larger report are available by mail (call 1-800-624-6242 for information) or on the Internet at books.nap. edu/catalog/6023.html