Monthly Updates

March - April 2008 Uniontown Area School District Winter’s grasp held tight through February in Western PA!  This wreaked havoc on intervention schedules so maximizing existing instructional time was paramount.  MP³ staff worked closely with teachers to ramp-up interventions by balancing basic skill instruction with strategy instruction to improve students’ morphemic analysis and comprehension skills.  Two additional intervention activities added to lesson plans included: explicit syllabication lessons developed by our research associate Maria based on her work with Dr. Isabel Beck and colleagues and structured partner reading activities from the Vaughn Gross Center for Reading and Language Arts.  Teachers report that these additions provide terrific reinforcement and practice opportunities for students to apply the skills introduced in the various standards protocol programs used.  Students’ limited comprehension skills continue to be high priority for teachers.  Unfortunately, comprehension intervention materials are scarce in the district.  Therefore, MP³ staff is working with district administration and PaTTAN to purchase and provide training on more comprehension-specific programs and train teachers on effective meaning-building strategies across grade levels.  As April approached all attention turned to scheduling and preparation for the PSSA.  Given the immense pressure for accountability and students growth, principals and teachers felt it necessary to cancel interventions for the duration of the assessments.  These schedule adjustments allowed principals to decrease student to teacher ratios for test administration by reassigning intervention teachers to 3rd, 4th, and 5th grade level classrooms to facilitate small group monitoring and reinforcement during testing.  The postponement of interventions occurred at some schools from March 31st-April 11th resulting in multiple lost intervention days and sometimes lost intervention plus lost core instruction days for many students.  Similar schedules occur in May during Science testing. Despite these set-backs, two exciting professional development opportunities occurred in April that will surely have long-term positive impact on the district’s growth.  First, the MP³ team was honored to present two lectures at the 2008 Council for Exceptional Children’s International Convention and Expo in Boston, MA.  Kathy and Eileen facilitated the first presentation, which explored the significant impact the adoption of a core reading program had on Lafayette’s literacy growth during year one.  For the second, Dr. Zigmond and Amanda were delighted to be joined by Uniontown superintendent, Dr. Charles Machesky, to discuss the critical roles of administrators in RtI implementation.  Audience members were inquisitive, engaged, and vocal.  Most exciting were some attendees’ requests to visit the UASD to learn more about practical model implementation in struggling schools with a history of resistance to change.  Congratulations to each of our presenters for a job well done and thank you for your hard work in preparing for and participating in the conference! The second highlight of the month was the arrival of new Palm pilots for the 3rd and 4th grade teachers at the MP³ schools.  Many, many thanks to PaTTAN for supporting our efforts to bring this technology to the teachers!  In mid April, Uniontown technology staff, MP³ team members and Step By Step Learning consultants furiously scrambled to get the Palms up and running and effectively train the teachers to use them in time for end-of-the month progress monitoring.  Sincere thanks to all!  Special thanks to Kelly Judy of SBSL for developing a specialized training for the teachers.  A personal thank you to Maria Barron for handling all last-minute training details when Amanda unexpectedly ended up in the hospital with poor health.  Above all, however, deepest thanks to the teachers in attendance for participating in workshops long into the evening after two exhausting days at school.  Thank you for all you do to improve instruction for your students! Amanda Kloo, Ph.D. - Project Coordinator, University of Pittsburgh Back to Monthly Updates Main Page