Pilot Results Are In!
A month ago, I wrote:
So far, it feels like a summer of possibility. We are finding the kids who need specialized, high-intensity help. We are figuring out what they need and how to help them learn and grow. We’re optimistic that they’ll return to school reading more proficiently, with new strategies, increased confidence, and a growth mindset.
I’m delighted to share our preliminary results.
We had an independent psychologist conduct pre- and post- assessments of the Woodcock-Johnson Reading Mastery Test, a gold-standard clinical assessment. We focused on the “Basic Reading Skills” cluster – the ability of a child to read real words and also to decode pseudo-words.
We saw real growth:
Importantly, this is "percentile" growth, meaning we “hopped” the kids up to a higher curve on the growth chart.
(For the Standard Score aficionados, BRS mean grew from 80.7 to 84.3. That’s the same rate of growth per hour of intervention as delivered by one of the leading 1:1 center-based programs.)
Families loved what they saw in their children:
Confidence was one of the most common themes we heard. These were children who didn’t have access to print, who pretended to “read” books they’d memorized, who lacked strategies to attack unfamiliar words.
Working with HillRap and RAVE-O, our students learned strategies, practiced them to mastery, and worked on fluency. We did repeated reading, comprehension work, morphology … they gained confidence and parents noticed changes:
It was a small pilot. We wanted to sort out our multiple components, to smooth out small-group virtual, and to get to know our students and families.
We were lucky to have Maryanne Wolf and Margie Gillis join parent nights, talking about our instructional model and how to make connections and sustain growth at home. Thank you! We believe this work deserves — and depends on — community.
We were also lucky to work with some tremendous teachers this summer. Their backgrounds included Wilson, Orton Gillingham, special ed inclusion, reading intervention, and English Learners. They took the program training seriously, collaborated well, and learned a lot. Most of all, they loved their students and helped to build a Reading Future for each and every one.
Thank you: Mr. Wadlington, Mrs. Alberts, Mrs. Day, Mrs. Rhodes, Ms. Taylor, Ms. Fahy, Ms. Saliterman — you made such a difference this summer!
If you’d like to learn more about our summer pilot, you can watch this recorded webinar, including a description of our program, discussion of results, and feedback from one of our teachers.
More soon!
