When I was in kindergarten, I was the oldest of four kids with a stay-at-home mom.  Picture it: a five-year-old,  four-year-old, two-year-old, and a newborn.  (And my brothers were, shall we say it, a handful, but that is a story for a different blog.)  My dad worked long hours, and so taking care of us was my mom’s domain.  It was a lot–overwhelming in fact.  My mom would never say it because she was of the Irish, stoic stock that didn’t talk about such things; she just got it done.  In hindsight, I cannot imagine how hard this was for her.

In those days, kindergarten was half day, and it was optional.  I went to school for half the year in the afternoon, and then mid-year, my class was switched to the morning session.  When I attended in the afternoon, my mom walked me to school after lunch with a stroller and my preschool siblings, then took them home for afternoon naps.  After the switch, my mom had to get me to school by 8:00 in the morning, with my three younger siblings in tow.  She decided it was more than she could manage, so I became a kindergarten drop out.  My mother didn’t know it at the time, but she put our family’s mental health, our social and emotional well-being, first.  I finished the year at home and moved on to first grade next year.

A kindergarten drop out.  Can you even imagine it? In this time of mandatory, full-day kindergarten, it seems unfathomable that a child would not attend kindergarten.  How would I be ready for first grade? Granted, the academic standards in those days were not as rigorous; kindergarten was mainly a social experience to prepare children for how to behave in school.  Yet, I am happy to report that I suffered no long-term effects from the sudden end to my school year.  I was ready for first grade and by all measures, this experience did not keep me from  being a successful student, making friends, going to college, or future success.

I have shared this story recently because the closure of schools brought this memory to mind.  Our children have missed a portion of their current school year.  It was not a full half of the year, but it was a significant chunk of the year.  Students are mourning the lost time with their classmates and with beloved teachers.  Parents are worried about the lost instructional time and the exaggerated summer slide that students may experience.  To be honest, we all are worried and anxious about what the future may bring.  Unlike my story in which I stayed home but kindergarten went on, the abrupt departure from school is a collective experience for our children.  Also unlike my story, our children are continuing their school year, though in a unique and unprecedented way.  They are seeing their classmates and teachers via Google Meet or Zoom, and are continuing learning online.  While the online learning environment is no substitute, it is still providing connections and experiences.

I guess that the reason I have shared my story is to reinforce for anxious parents that it is going to be OK.  This too shall pass, and our children will be alright.  Just as I emerged from the supposedly significant gap of missing half a year of kindergarten, our children will emerge from this collective crisis and be fine.  I learned from my mother, through unspoken message, that not going back to kindergarten was fine, and I was going to be fine.  And I was.

When we return to campus-based learning, teachers will embrace our children, meet them where they are, teach them, and grow them.  We as educators will take stock, figure out what children need to learn next, and move them along in their learning paths.  While our children may need a bit of help reinforcing academic skills, they will emerge from this experience with lessons that we could never provide in school: patience, selflessness, empathy, resilience, persistence.  This experience is a part of the stories of our children’s lives, part of the fabric of experiences that will shape them into the people they will become. Let’s make those stories ones that we want to share for generations to come.

It’s Not a Race to Z…

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Right now, teachers across the country are assessing students using the Fountas & Pinnell Reading Benchmark Assessment System (F&P). If you are not familiar, it is an assessment system which levels different books from A to Z with A being an early Kindergarten level and Z being upper middle school. The assessment gathers a lot of information because the teacher  sits down and listens to the child read, marks their reading accuracy/errors, and then asks  questions about the text. Questions vary from literal, directly stated in the text to inferential to  beyond the text. Teachers can find out lots of information about a child as a reader from this assessment—their ability to track text, use pictures for cues, decode, to read fluently, and to comprehend, and sometimes more.

The window is quickly closing, and a new one will open: parents wanting to know what their child’s reading level is. I am always reluctant to share the letter that indicates the reading levels with parents. Of course, we share the information when requested, but I still worry that it is just one little sliver of information and can often be misinterpreted.

What are my concerns with sharing F&P with parents?

First, this assessment system was created by Irene Fountas and Gay Su Pinnell to benchmark readers in their guided reading instruction. It is essentially a guide to help teachers know when to move students along in the continuum of guided reading books that they use in small group instruction. Each letter-level represents a set of skills that readers have and need to work on.  The materials come with very explicit descriptions of what readers should know and be able to do at each level and what strategies and skills are appropriate for them to learn. In short, the benchmarks were intended to be used to guide instruction, not as a method to report to parents.

One Single Measure

Even though this is a thorough and intense measure that may take a teacher 30 or more minutes to complete, it is still only one measure. On one day. With one book (or maybe a few books). because the F&P is administered individually, it can cause students to become nervous. Students can also get tripped up by the topic of the book; if they don’t know anything or don’t have any interest in a particular topic, it can affect their performance.  There are very few things in life that rely on a single measure to determine excellence, pass, fail, etc. Even though the Superbowl is one game, previous performance is what drives the teams to get there.  We cannot use one performance to be the deciding factor in how we perceive a student’s reading performance.

Reading Growth is a Meandering Path

Reading is complex, and often students do not make steady, incremental progress up the levels in F&P.  The benchmarking system indicates a recommended level for students beginning and ending each grade and benchmarks in between. These are approximate levels, and we have found that all students do not go through the levels at the same rate. In early grades, students typically go through the levels/letters more quickly. In first grade, for example, students typically can jump several levels in the school year. By fifth grade, they typically only go up about two letters. While the continuum suggests a typical amount of growth, many students do not follow this normal path. Sometimes students jump several levels in a short time and then slow down.

Some students take a slower path to firmly own the skills in a particular level. Sometimes students struggle with one aspect of reading (for example, decoding multisyllabic words) and that “stalls” them at a particular level. Often students who are early readers “level off” on or near grade level and don’t continue to make the large gains they had in early grades.  Sometimes students are growing in skills that are not measured on F&P.  Sometimes the particular book or topic of a level is difficult for a student, or sometimes students make gains in other skills that are not monitored by F&P, such as basic comprehension and retelling or their writing skills.

Competitive Reading

I am particularly disturbed by a recent trend we have observed in elementary schools. When a teacher passes out books for a small guided reading group, many immediately flip the book  over to see what the letter is on the sticker on the back of the book. Parents quiz their children on what that letter is. We have turned reading into another competitive sport; students want to outdo their competitors and have the highest-level books. We have, in effect, created a Race to Z–a competition among children to get to the highest F&P level possible. This race is causing anxiety and frustration and taking the joy out of reading. 

Elephant in the Room: Test Giver Variance

This is the one factor of F&P (or any other individually administered assessment) we don’t like to talk about: different test administrators also can cause some differences in scoring and interpretation. Although we do everything we can to minimize that, the mere fact that each classroom teacher sees things in slightly different ways can impact how they score students’ responses, especially students’ responses to the comprehension portion. So, if one teacher scores particularly “easy” and another is looking for more details and information in responses, it can alter the final “letter.”

The Letter Does Not Say It All

While the letter leveling system takes many factors into account, it is not perfect and definitive system. Relying on a single letter to define a student as a reader is misleading because reading is so much more than that. Just as we as adults read books that are easy for us and hard for us, it is appropriate for students to read books the same way. Literature is rich and wonderful, and teachers are masterful at using terrific books to teach students to comprehend and think. We need to expose students to a wide range of books, and not be limited by the letter on the back.

Inquiring Minds Still Want to Know

So, despite all this, many parents still want to know how their children are doing in reading. Many parents know that schools use F&P, and are going to want to know the level.  What should teachers share?  First, I am not advocating withholding information requested by parents.  I do think it is important to share specific information that will help parents.  Instead of just stating the instructional level/letter, describe for parents what that letter or level represents.  Here are some questions parents could ask and teachers could answer about students’ reading performance.

Does the student:
  • struggle, meet, or exceed grade level standards and skills?
  • answer questions in writing or on worksheets at the same level as they answer questions verbally?
  • demonstrate any particular strengths?
  • prefer fiction or nonfiction or some particular genre or series of books?
  • have any skills that will be targeted in guided reading?

It is our job to work with parents as partners in our children’s education. Providing information that parents can use is the key to working together.

Tales from a Reluctant Writer

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A few weeks ago, I spent the better part of a Saturday avoiding writing.  Actually, it was avoiding revising. I sat at the dining room table, thinking.  Then I did laundry. And the dishes.  I may have cleaned out a drawer or two.  I’m an avid writer; I enjoy writing for fun.  Why was I avoiding revising my writing so much?  Why was I so loathe to put fingers to keys to make the necessary changes?  Key word: necessary. I had to make revisions to a paper based on feedback from a reviewer from the program I was enrolled in.   I had thought I was done. I turned it in. And then, I got the email with…feedback.  It was written feedback in the sidebar of a word document.  Just a few notes with suggestions (or requirements) for changes.

There were only a few suggestions that I had to address, yet it took me the better part of a Saturday.  I made the changes and eagerly sent my fourth draft on, crossing my fingers that it would pass muster and I would officially be done.  No such luck!  By the following weekend, I got an email from my chairperson that the reviewer wanted to have an online meeting to discuss the revisions.

At this point, a lot is running through my mind. How bad could my draft be? What else could I possibly revise? I had the meeting on Monday night.  In just a few short minutes, the reviewer was able to explain to me some simple ways to reorganize one section of my paper.  Eureka! It was crystal clear! The revisions took me a very short time and I was able to submit my paper successfully.

The feedback that I received during the online meeting was similar to the written feedback that I was given. But it took hearing it–having an actual conference–to understand and be able to use the suggestions successfully.

How often do we just make written notes on students’ writing and not take the time to talk with them about it?  I think about some of the comments I have written or seen on student papers:  Add more details here. What do you mean by this?  This part is unclear.  Each of these comments is equally vague and, let’s face it, unhelpful to novice writers.

I thought about my “writing conference” and realized that my teacher/reviewer started by complimenting my work and saying that I only needed some simple changes. She took me directly to the section of my paper that required work, clearly explained what I needed to do and then clearly explained why I needed to make the changes.  I was able to easily make the necessary changes, successfully completing my program. That, my friends, is an effective writing conference.