NANKIN — Shelby MacKenzie stood at the front of her kindergarten classroom at Mapleton Elementary School and told her students they’d be unlocking a new sound, learning to use the letter “f.”
“What do you notice about my mouth when I say that letter?” MacKenzie asked her students.
Hands shot into the air. One observed her teeth touching her bottom lip. Another said her mouth was pretty much closed, but there was a line for the sound to come out.
Students watched a video about the letter, practiced writing it in the air with their fingers and then put pencil to paper, learning where to place it on a lined sheet.
Then, MacKenzie put the word “fit” on the board. Students tapped their arms and sounded the letters out, putting it all together to figure out what the word was.
MacKenzie, along with other kindergarten and elementary teachers, have the important job of helping their students learn to read.
Tessa Gilmer, another kindergarten teacher at Mapleton, said she sees students grow in their reading from the beginning to end of the year.
“[When] kindergartners come in, they legitimately don’t even know their full name,” Gilmer said.
“Then, by the end of the year, my parents are messaging me like, ‘Wow, I can’t believe how much they’re reading.’ Like, ‘I have to be careful what shows up on my phone, they’re reading my text messages.’”
In their classrooms at Mapleton Elementary School, MacKenzie and Gilmer both use a curriculum called “Amplify: Core Knowledge Language Arts” to teach students how to read.
The curriculum is based on research that’s been around for decades, but that some states — including Ohio — are just starting to require teachers to use in their classrooms.
The “science of reading”
Known as the “science of reading,” the approach emphasizes sounding words out the way MacKenzie’s students do in their lessons. It also has students focused on reading for comprehension and understanding what words mean.
Obviously, comprehension is never going away. If you’re not reading for comprehension, then why are you reading?
Tessa Gilmer, Kindergarten teacher at Mapleton Elementary School
It differs from the balanced literacy approach that’s largely been used over the last few decades to teach students to read.
In that approach, students learn to read through three-cueing. That method has them use visual cues to help them determine a word.
It focuses less on letters and sounds, as those are the least helpful indicators of a word.
Gilmer said when she attended Ashland University in the late 2000s, the three-cueing approach was a focus in her classes. It’s not that way anymore, according to multiple professors at the school.
But Gilmer said the biggest difference between teaching three cueing and the science of reading is a larger emphasis on phonics.
Still, she said there’s more to it than that.
“Obviously, comprehension is never going away,” Gilmer said. “If you’re not reading for comprehension, then why are you reading?”
Ohio’s governor and state legislature have mandated school districts to implement these types of curriculums, focused on the science of reading.
The state Department of Education has also implemented a Plan to Raise Literary Achievement, which focuses on “improving language and literacy outcomes for all students.”
The change with implementing science of reading curricula hasn’t come without controversy.
A group called the Reading Recovery Council of North America, which advocates for a balanced literacy approach to teaching students to read, has a challenge to that mandate in court.
Still, the state’s biennial budget saw over $160 million pushed toward efforts to build science of reading curricula into Ohio’s schools.
There is $86 million going toward professional development. Another $64 million will be doled out to purchasing instructional materials, with $18 million more helping to fund literacy coach positions across Ohio.
What does this mean for Ashland County?
Local school districts sit at the center of the state’s work to improve literacy via the new curricula.
Ashland City Schools’ superintendent, Steve Paramore, has repeatedly pointed to a literacy grant the district received from the state to implement and use the approach in school board meetings.
Supts. Jennifer Allerding, of Loudonville, and Cathy Trevathan, of Hillsdale, also told Ashland Source as 2024 dawns the approach would be the focus of literacy curriculums in both those districts.
In Mapleton Local Schools, the district has struggled with students’ literacy scores.
This year, the district came in under state standards for early literacy on its Ohio Report Card.
According to curriculum director Skip Fulton, Mapleton has worked to turn things around.
Fulton previously told Ashland Source Mapleton’s curriculum has seen changes over the last two years. His focus has been on consistency between grade levels — and the science of reading has been part of that push.
How is it working so far?
The district started using a curriculum based in the science of reading in its sixth through eighth grade classrooms in 2021. Last year, it implemented the approach across the lower grade levels.
Fulton said the district’s internal data for the lower grade levels so far shows improvements.
Those improvements are something he and the district’s literacy specialists agree are partially due to the curriculum.
They’ve implemented other supports to help students as they learn to read.
Cassie Newcomer and Cassie Swanson, both literacy coaches in the district, pointed to “WIN” groups. Swanson explained students take an assessment to see where they fall in their reading ability.
Then, they get placed in smaller groups and work with teachers on the skills where they need extra help.
Plus, with a grant-funded literacy team focused on students’ reading, more eyes are watching for student success, according to Newcomer.
Gilmer, the kindergarten teacher at Mapleton, said her students practice decoding words more since Amplify became the district’s curriculum.
She thinks it’s a good thing to move forward. But it hasn’t been without challenges for her and some of her peers.
“It was a little bit hard to go, ‘OK, this isn’t how we should be doing it,’” Gilmer said. “There was emotion to it because you don’t want to feel like, ‘Oh, I did something wrong. I wasn’t doing what was best for kids.’
“You’re worrying that you didn’t set them up for success, which of course is not something that’s a fault of a teacher. It’s just a matter of these things are developing and more research is being done and understanding.
“But that’s a hard feeling to grapple with for sure.”
Still, Swanson said it’s not that kids weren’t learning how to read before. It’s just that the method of teaching them wasn’t helping the largest number of students be successful.
According to Swanson and Fulton, the science of reading approach stands to make reading success more accessible for more students.
“The challenge is letting go of preconceived notions about how kids learn to read,” Fulton said.
