Significant independent reading progress with struggling readers!

Sheridan Elementary School is part of District 87 in Bloomington, Illinois.  It is a K–5 elementary school and most of the student population is at-risk.  Over the past 25 years, Sheridan Elementary has implemented many initiatives to improve reading skills. When asked about what part Scholastic Reading Counts!™ has played in these school-wide incentives, Ms. Fuller a third grade teacher at Sheridan Elementary School says, "one of the best things we have done is to incorporate Scholastic Reading Counts! into our daily instruction."

As a result of Scholastic Reading Counts! students in Ms. Fuller’s class read at least three "extra" Reading Counts! books a week at home and/or school, and test on these each week.  They are eager to re-tell the stories they read to mentors, tutors, teachers, and parents to work towards passing quizzes. They have classroom and school-wide contests based on the number of Scholastic Reading Counts! points students earn.

Students with IEP’s for Learning Disabilities are reading and achieving at their level.  Illinois State ISAT test scores increased dramatically at last year.  Ms. Fuller believes that of all the factors that may have played a part in this, "the most important one is all the practice that students received weekly on Scholastic Reading Counts!" 

Parent involvement and awareness is higher than ever before.  Parents receive quarterly printouts of their child’s accomplishments at parent-teacher conferences.  Students with all ability levels are thrilled at the progress they are making, as well as their parents.  Ms. Fuller exclaims, "I have sent books home for 25 years so that students could read them at home. Even when kids did book reports or had parents sign reading logs, I never knew if they really read the book and comprehended it.  Now I know!  Every Friday, students take quizzes on the books they have read and I get a printout that tells me if they are doing the work or not.  More importantly, it tells me if they are comprehending what they read."

All of the classroom libraries and the school Learning Center have books labeled with Reading Counts! quiz labels.  Students are encouraged to take home books at their Lexile to ensure they are reading within an appropriate range.  According to Ms. Fuller, this  prevents frustration and motivates kids to succeed, "Students now know where they are in terms of reading level, where they need to be, and how to get there."

Ms. Fuller always used to have problems getting students to read independently while she pulled a small group to work with her.  Now, since the start of the Scholastic Reading Counts! program last year, students have been reading independently so they could pass quizzes!  Students are having great conversations about using strategies to raise their "colors"-the system they use to indicate Lexile levels on books. "When I read the first few pages of a book on a topic we are studying, and then return it to our class library, students are eager to borrow the book and take a quiz on it. They often read it with a partner or partners so that they can take a quiz soon.  I seldom had this happen in the past, " says Ms. Fuller.

While Ms. Fuller has always loved teaching reading, she mentions that now, she loves being able to say, "I KNOW where students are reading instead of taking an educated guess."  Many of the stories that Sheridan Elementary School students read in their anthology and reading curriculum have quizzes installed and as a result, teachers love the fact that it has been very little work to incorporate it into what they were already doing in their reading program. 

Ms. Fuller ends with a story.  "I was working with a young man who struggled with reading - and was a big-time Star Wars fan. He found out that there were Star Wars books available, but that he could not take them out because they were way above his Lexile.  He was reading at the high 100’s and low 200’s when he began 3rd grade.  He told me that he was going to do whatever it took to read at a Lexile that would allow him to get his hands on the Star Wars books.  This year, in 5^th grade, he is reading at a 1,000 Lexile, and currently has 200 points already this quarter in Scholastic Reading Counts!  I made a deal with him.  I told him I would buy him the Star Wars trilogy if he could reach that level.  Buying him that book was one of the most fun purchases I will ever make!  What was even more fun, was to be on door duty and to see him and a group of boys sitting outside the school examining the Star Wars Encyclopedia I bought to include in our bet and to hear the other boys tell this young man how lucky they thought he was to be able to read "that stuff"!  Words cannot express how excited I am about using Scholastic Reading Counts! with my 3rd grade students!  Thanks so much for allowing me to use this powerful tool to motivate students and help them make the progress that will allow them to enjoy reading as much as their teacher does!"