Making Summer Reading Personal

Hello Royal Readers! This week we are discussing the book Summer Reading by Richard Allington and Anne Mc-Gill-Frazen. Yesterday, Andrea shared how one principal took her summer reading program on the road. You can read that post {here}. Today, we'll focus on chapter six.

Making Summer Reading Personal and Local

This chapter takes an in-depth look at one district's personal and local approach to summer reading.

Summer reading loss has the potential to become a huge problem for children and school districts. Consider that a child can lose up to three months reading achievement each summer, which can accumulate to a gap of nearly 2 years by the end of sixth grade.  Wow, as a reading teacher I find that terrifying!

A Summer Books Program

One district rallied together to find a solution to the summer reading loss problem.  Principals, reading specialists, special education teachers, and building staffs studied Allington's work and developed a plan.  Here's what they did:

• Created a student interest survey for students to complete. The first year of the program, they began with first grade, adding a grade each year until the program serviced first through fourth graders.
• Developed a list of books to purchase based on the student interest survey.  
• Negotiated the best prices with shipping included.
• Purchased a large quantity of books (roughly 20 per student).
• Invited student to "shop" for their summer books prior to the end of the school year. 
• Challenged students to read 1000 minutes over the summer and document their minutes.
• Provided incentives (treats, surprises, postcards, phone calls, and a hotline to hear a special message) to maintain motivation throughout the summer.  
• Held a community event, a mid-summer reading reunion, to exchange books for fresh reading material.
• Collected the books and calculated the minutes upon the start of the new school year.
• Assessed students reading levels.

Funding

I'm sure you are wondering how much this program cost. It was expensive, but the district had the mindset of "pay now or pay later".

So how did they pay for it?  They raised the money by writing grants, enlisting the help of their PTO, and forming community partnerships.

Local businesses sponsored the mid-summer reading reunions. For example "Burgers and Books" was sponsored by Bob's Big Boy, and Outback Steakhouse sponsored the "Go Outback and Read BBQ and Book Exchange". Local newspapers promoted and covered the events.

Results

Nearly 80% of children who participated in the summer books program maintained or grew over the first summer.

The program has expanded over four years to serve grades 1-4. The current fourth graders, who received the books for three consecutive summers, have had the highest degree of success.

The success with special education population was especially impressive.

The program has become wildly popular. The whole community gets involved, parents are educated on the importance of summer reading, students look forward to receiving the large bag of books, and the mid-summer book exchange continues to grow each year.

Question for Discussion

What elements of this summer reading program could be used to improve the program at your school?  Share your thoughts in the comment section below.  

Stop back tomorrow as we conclude our Summer Reading book study with Chapter 7: Where Do We Go from Here?

OTHER SUMMER READING BOOK STUDY POSTS:

• FIVE REASONS POOR CHILDREN SUFFER MORE FROM SUMMER LEARNING LOSS
• WHY I WILL NOT PICK MY STUDENTS' BOOKS FOR THEM ANYMORE
• MAKING SUMMER READING PERSONAL
• SUMMER READING: CHAPTER 7
• WHAT'S IN THE TRUCK? ~ A DIFFERENT APPROACH TO SUMMER READING
• PREVENTING SUMMER READING LOSS: WHAT REALLY WORKS?
• SUMMER READING: GETTING BOOKS IN THEIR HANDS

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What's in the Truck? ~ A Different Approach to Summer Reading

Hello, everyone!  It's Andrea from Reading Toward the Stars again with some more insight into summer reading through the book Summer Reading by Richard Allington.

Imagine this scene:

It's a hot July day, and kids in rural areas are outside playing and enjoying some fun with family.  This old truck comes up the road and stops right in front of their house.

They come running to it with excitement!

The teacher gets out of the truck and begins talking to the children and adults at the house about the books they read the past week.  After the children return their books from the week before, they choose five new books they can and would like to read for the next week.

Smiles light up everyone's face during this visit!

This is exactly what one high poverty rural county in Florida has done for many summers.  Their teachers work together to ensure that students have access to appropriate reading material by driving the "bookmobile" into these rural areas.  Before the children choose new books, the teacher surveys them about what they read, liked, and didn't like.  Then the students choose 5 new books to read for the next week.

What were the findings?

1.  Students who participated full time (7-10 weeks) showed the most progress.

2.  Though it didn't increase fluency or sight word knowledge, it did affect the self-concept of each child probably because they were able to choose their own books at the appropriate level.

3.  Comprehension scores of full time participants saw gains.

4.  Though students did not achieve on grade level gains by the end of the summer, they still made gains, which eliminated the "summer slide".

Is this effective?

Yes, it is effective to some extent!  There were some gains with this model, but there needs to be more intensive interventions to make significant gains in students in poverty.

Where do we go from here?

The school that started the program has continued to have weekly book visits but have also incorporated a one-on-one tutoring intervention.  This has been extremely effective, both economically and for the students.

How might this model suit your school?

Would your colleagues share in helping you with a project like this?

Let us know what you think in the comments below.  And join us again tomorrow as we continue our book study of Summer Reading:  Closing the Rich/Poor Reading Achievement Gap by Richard Allington.

OTHER SUMMER READING BOOK STUDY POSTS:

• FIVE REASONS POOR CHILDREN SUFFER MORE FROM SUMMER LEARNING LOSS
• WHY I WILL NOT PICK MY STUDENTS' BOOKS FOR THEM ANYMORE
• MAKING SUMMER READING PERSONAL
• SUMMER READING: CHAPTER 7
• WHAT'S IN THE TRUCK? ~ A DIFFERENT APPROACH TO SUMMER READING
• PREVENTING SUMMER READING LOSS: WHAT REALLY WORKS?
• SUMMER READING: GETTING BOOKS IN THEIR HANDS

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Preventing Summer Reading Loss: What Really Works?

Hello Royal Readers! This week we are discussing the book Summer Reading by Richard Allington and Anne Mc-Gill-Frazen. Yesterday Andrea shared the what the research says about summer reading and economically disadvantaged children. You can read that post {here}. Today, we'll focus on chapter three.

What Have We Learned about Addressing Summer Reading Loss?

This chapter takes an in-depth look at summer reading programs and the potential they demonstrated in addressing summer reading loss. Each summer program was conducted as a study with a treatment group and a control group.

In the first study, students from high poverty elementary schools were invited to attend spring book fairs.

The project targeted books that students could read at their independent level (99% accuracy with phrasing and expression).

Additionally, the books fit into four broad categories: popular series, popular culture, culturally relevant, and curriculum relevant.

Children were given free rein to select the books they wanted to read during the summer.

Overall this program demonstrated that providing self-selected summer reading materials improves reading achievement.

Another study was conducted with summer school students.  One group of the students participated in a summer reading club for 30-60 minutes of the day while others did not.

The reading club participants gained more in reading levels, reading accuracy, and fluency than their counterparts.

In yet another study, books were mailed out to students weekly over the summer. Prior to the start of summer, one group of students participated lessons at school that modeled oral reading and comprehension strategies.

Results of the study showed that students in this group scored significantly higher than the control groups.

What Does It Mean?

The findings of these studies suggest that voluntary summer reading may help close the rich/poor reading achievement gap. By increasing the amount of voluntary reading children did over the summer months summer reading loss was eliminated and growth was made.

Discussion Question

How could information presented in this chapter be used to improve the summer reading program at your school?  Share your thoughts in the comment section below.  

Stop back each day this week for additional information on Summer Reading: Closing the Rich/Poor Reading Achievement Gap.

OTHER SUMMER READING BOOK STUDY POSTS:

• FIVE REASONS POOR CHILDREN SUFFER MORE FROM SUMMER LEARNING LOSS
• WHY I WILL NOT PICK MY STUDENTS' BOOKS FOR THEM ANYMORE
• MAKING SUMMER READING PERSONAL
• SUMMER READING: CHAPTER 7
• WHAT'S IN THE TRUCK? ~ A DIFFERENT APPROACH TO SUMMER READING
• PREVENTING SUMMER READING LOSS: WHAT REALLY WORKS?
• SUMMER READING: GETTING BOOKS IN THEIR HANDS

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Summer Reading ~ What the Research Says

Happy summer, everyone!  It's Andrea from Reading Toward the Stars!  Even though my summer is coming to a close, I am still enjoying every moment I can of it.

Yesterday, Carla shared reasons that children in poverty suffer more from reading loss over the summer from the book Summer Reading by Richard Allington.  You can read that post by clicking {here}.

Today I will focus on chapter 2, which shares research findings for interventions that brought some help with summer slide to students in poverty.

After using rigorous methods to find research that had already been conducted, they came up with these 8 categories for the outcomes.

1.  attitudes toward reading

2.  motivation to read

3.  reading behavior

4.  basic language skills

5.  emergent literacy skills

6.  reading performance

7.  writing performance

8.  general academic performance

The bottom line

So...

From all of the many research the authors dug through, they used the most rigorous ones to show their data.  They found what we all probably already know:

"Providing books and magazines to children - either by lending the materials to them or by giving them the materials to keep - improves their attitudes toward reading, the amount of reading that they do, their acquisition of basic literacy skills, and their reading performance."  (Allington, 2013)  

In the next few posts, find out how different studies in different schools worked for their communities and how the children fared with their summer reading.  I love some of the ideas and how the interventions worked for these communities, so you won't want to miss them!

How has your school handled summer reading?  

What are some things you can do to help prevent summer slide?

And don't forget to come back tomorrow and the rest of the week to read more!

OTHER SUMMER READING BOOK STUDY POSTS:

• FIVE REASONS POOR CHILDREN SUFFER MORE FROM SUMMER LEARNING LOSS
• WHY I WILL NOT PICK MY STUDENTS' BOOKS FOR THEM ANYMORE
• MAKING SUMMER READING PERSONAL
• SUMMER READING: CHAPTER 7
• WHAT'S IN THE TRUCK? ~ A DIFFERENT APPROACH TO SUMMER READING
• PREVENTING SUMMER READING LOSS: WHAT REALLY WORKS?
• SUMMER READING: GETTING BOOKS IN THEIR HANDS

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Summer Reading: A Book Study

I know for many of us our summers have been filled with fun, sun, busy days, lazy days, and....book studies!  Well your Literacy Land ladies have been no different.  One of the books that we dove into this summer was "Summer Reading: Closing the Rich/Poor Reading Achievement Gap" by Richard Allington and Anne McGill-Frazen.

Okay...your first thought may be, "Why would I read a book about summer reading when the new school year is about to begin?"  Good question.  I had the same one; however, I have the answer.

This book is filled with ideas to help our students through those summer months of (let's face it...for many) very little learning.  Allington and McGill-Frazen share research that (even though I know it to be true) was still stunning about the achievement gap and summer slide.  Different scenarios, research studies, and practical actions are explained.

But again...why read this now?  Because I now understand that it will take the year to get to know your students and what kinds of books will drive them to read over the summer.  It will take the year for you to plan how you can implement a learning program that will work for you and your students.  This book has already changed some school routines that my building will be implementing next year.

With that being said, we would LOVE for you to join us on this journey of closing the rich/poor achievement gap through summer reading.   We hope to hear your thoughts, ideas, practices, or frustrations as we work our way through the chapters.  Here is our schedule:

July 27--chapter 1

July 28--chapter 2

July 29--chapter 3 

July 30--chapter 4

 July 31--chapter 5 

August 1--chapter 6 

August 2--chapter7

We look forward to studying this book with you!

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5 Ways to Motivate Kids to Read in the Summer

Hello, everyone! It's Andrea from Reading Toward the Stars!  It's hard to believe that summer is here for me.  You may still have some time left, but it won't be long!

My son has already started to tell me that there is "nothing to do" after being two days in!  Guess what?!  He is wrong! There is an entire world out there, and so much of it can be found in books.   I am here to share five ways to motivate your students or children to read this summer.

Read on to see the five ways I motivate my own children to read, read, read!

The first thing I do every summer is visit the library.  Just going to the library allows children to choose their very own books from so many books.  They are free, so if your child doesn't like a book, there is no money lost.  And most libraries have a summer reading incentive program where children can earn prizes for reading.

Finding that magical book or series is the moment that defines reading for students. Giving children choice helps them embrace that love of reading too.  We were given a suggested list to read, which my son turned his nose up to.  He already has his books ready for the summer. Here are a few he plans to read this summer.

My son has to have the right place to read.  One summer he took this old box and made his reading nook.  He loved doing this and spent much of his reading time there.  He also enjoys reading in the comfort of his own bed.

Another summer he hurt his legs at the beach and found that the beach was a perfect place to read.

The places are endless!  Go outside, stay inside, anyplace is a good place to read!

Reading socially is great for children, especially as they get older.  Now that my son can text, he and his friends can have book discussions and give recommendations.  Our next door neighbor is a middle school teacher and gives her son and my son different books to read.  After they read them, they switch and discuss.  How cool!

Another way to get kids to read socially is to form a little book club with a play date.  Children can discuss the books they have read.  Last year, Emily wrote a great post about hosting a book swap at your house or at school. This is another great way to discuss books and get new books at the same time!

Children can read anything to be reading!  My daughter is so excited when I read directions to her, and she can help me make something.  We had so much fun making this simple wand with household items while reading directions.  It was fun, and we were able to spend time together.

 

Get books that have some summer learning experiences with them.  Go outside and learn! If your family is going camping, read about what you need to do go camping.  Does your child like Legos or Minecraft?  There are books for those too!

But, to make it fun, it can also just be fun to read and enjoy it.  No projects or essays ~ just the pure enjoyment of reading, wherever and whenever they want!  That is the best motivation!

Enjoy your summer, and don't forget to read, read, read!

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