WRC Reading Power Review Training for WRC Members 19/20

Welcome to WRC’s Reading Power review for WRC members.

Reading Power is designed to be implemented by all WRC sites in the fall of 2020, but January 2020 through August 2020 is the testing time for the new Reading Power lessons. During this current phase we are testing the new Reading Power lessons out so we can work out any glitches for the upcoming implementation for all WRC sites in the fall of 2020.

The Reading Power lessons and tools are very useful for you as a WRC member: if you are interested in learning more about literacy tutoring, want to have more techniques to help your students at your school improve their reading skills and you also tutor of at least one kindergarten or first grade student, as the curriculum is designed for kindergarten and first graders.

If you find, after watching this training video that you want to start implementing the tools provided by Reading Power at your school please talk to your site staff supervisor today about wanting to try it out. All WRC site staff supervisors will also be receiving training on this Reading Power by the end of January 2020, so they should have familiarity with Reading Power.

As a current WRC member, you should already have been given the WRC Reading Power lesson book and received the training by OSPI on the last day of the WRC Training Institute in November 2019. However, if you started serving for WRC after the Training Institute, please contact your program coordinator to see how you can get the Reading Power material you need to try it out.

In today’s training, we will review Reading Power’s lesson structure, play a 14 minute training video by Molly Berger, the English Language Arts Specialist at OSPI, review data tracking for Reading Power and provide an optional resource for practicing the basic sound symbols with your students.

As we begin today, it’s important to note that WRC’s Reading Power was designed to provide additional tools for members and not replace your school’s current literacy intervention.

• We value the current interventions and reading curriculum that schools have in place and that are been taught to you, the member, so we are intentionally keeping 2/3rds of your time open to support each school’s unique literacy intervention.

• Only 1/3rd of a members’ time will be devoted to WRC Reading Power and its data tracking. So, it does not replace your school’s current literacy curriculum. It will merely provide you, the member, with additional tools, resources and lesson plans to help struggling students

Let’s start by reviewing how WRC’s Reading Power is structured.

• WRC Reading Power’s basic lesson structure is set for twenty minute one-to-one tutoring sessions for students three times a week.

• OSPI and the Education Service Districts wrote the lessons for the “Reading Power: A Tutoring Program” lesson book. There are 36 lessons designed for kindergarten through first grade. At this time, the program just has curriculum for kindergarten through first graders, but in future years there will be lessons for other grade levels too. These lessons are also grouped in rotation sets of three utilizing three types of lessons:

• Lesson type one is Phonemic awareness and decodable reading lessons• Lesson type two is letter and word making with writing lessons• And Lesson Type three, includes student book choice and “Do You Know These?”

alphabet song lesson• Assessments on student progress will also only be given once every 8 weeks by WRC

members to see how students are progressing.

Which students will be served and selected for Reading Power?

• Reading Power like the WRC program itself, is designed for students who need an extra boost to get to grade level. So, it will be up to the school site to determine, what

1/3rd of their WRC program students will get the Reading Power lessons. The guidelines for student selection is how it is for all WRC programs in that students should be Tier 2 and are below grade level and in need of intervention, but do not need special education delivery.

Let’s take a look on how performance data will be tracked for the Reading Power.

You, the WRC member are the one who will be tracking the data. WRC members will be entering the time each student spends in Reading Power tutoring each day in the online “weekly tutoring logs” in the America Learns system.

• Then about every 8 sessions, you will give your Reading Power students a progress monitoring assessment, and record the scores in America Learns. This will happen 5 times, over the course of the program.

• Student scores and time in tutoring over the course of the 36 sessions will be analyzed to inform program improvements and to better assist student development.

• To determine WRC program impact, change in student progress monitoring scores over time could potentially be compared with scores of students not receiving WRC tutoring.

• Rather than using student names, in order to ensure confidentiality, each student will be identified with a unique code created by the member. The code will begin with a member-specific 3-digit number and end in the student’s initials. Members will need to keep track of which code is for which student. The use of initials in the code is intended to simplify this without identifying the student.

• At the Training Institute this year, our Data Analyst, Andrew Kuka showed members how to enter this data into America Learns. Members also have access to a digital instructional manual and instructional videos that will walk them through how to manage student online profiles, and report data.

• You can find these instructions video links in this training module under resources one of the resource links will take you to the: “Reporting Student Data with America Learns” which is a step by step guide on how to enter student information and complete weekly tutoring guide: https://washingtonservicecorps.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/WRC-Reading-Power-Reporting-Instructions.pdf

• The other link will take you to a Vimeo video, created by AmericaLearns staff and it

will take you though the process on how to review tutoring data in AmericaLearns. • https://vimeo.com/showcase/6600710/video/374972266

If you have any questions about imputing the Reading Power data in AmericaLearns, please contact Andrew Kuka at akuka@esd.wa.gov

Now, let’s watch the 14 minute OSPI’s video by Molly Berger on how to use Reading Power.

Molly Berger’s video from OSPI does not have a transcript. If you have any question about the material as Molly mentioned in the video, please contact her at: molly.berger@k12.wa.us

I hope you found Molly’s Reading Power review helpful.

Another optional resource you may find helpful when working with phonics or sound symbols is located in the Spell Links website founded by Dr. Jan Wasowicz a PhD with over 30 years’ experience with literacy. Her website has a handy resources including a recorded review of the pronunciation of

phonemes including consonants, long vowels, short vowels and syllabic vowels. Once on the website if you click on the arrow below the image a recording will play with the correct pronunciation.

• We will also provide the link to Spell Links handy guide on a resource page in this training’s module. https://www.spell-links.com/resources-pronunciationchart/

This concludes our training on WRC’s Reading Power.

We hope you found this information beneficial and that you are interested in trying out these lesson plans with your site to help boost student’s literacy skills. Have a chat with your site staff if you are interested in trying it out.

And if you have questions, or concerns, please don’t delay in reaching out to us! You can always contact your WRC Coordinator with questions, or you can call our general phone line at 1-888-713-6080 or email us at wscmail@esd.wa.gov and we will help.

Have a wonderful day and thank you for taking the time to learn more about WRC’s Reading Power.