Anangrychip

Who did you look up to when you grew up?

I did an Arby's AMA. I didn't need permission

I know I'm late for the AMA, but I am posting in hopes that I may get a reply.

Mr. Colvard,

My mother is a public elementary school teacher who teaches 4th grade in the state of Wisconsin. She has been teaching for over a decade. She has taught all grades and is extremely dedicated to her profession.

She is one of the hardest working teachers I have ever met. However, she is constantly under immense amounts of stress year after year in attempt to raise the reading levels of the children to to get them to a 5th grade reading level by the end of the year.

She must report on these and they will directly affect her performance reviews.

One issue that she always sees at the beginning of the year is that most children that come into her grade are at a 3rd grade level or below. This greatly impedes her work and adds extra steps in order to bring these kids back to a standard reading level. She has seen this happen not only on a 4th grade level but at all grades. It seems like there is not a large focus on students reading levels. It feels like the states standardized tests and requirements focus more on mathematics and science.(At least in her school district)

Miraculously, she is able to bring kids reading levels up to fifth grade and beyond. A large portion of her success comes from "table time" where she groups all the low level readers and helps them with their struggles. She then teaches them to help one another and cooperate together. In most cases, all the students in the group are able to recover and can read at grade level.

So this is my question for you. How do you propose to implement this "Phoneme farm" into a elementary school platform?

It seems like a large issue is that there is a trend where these children are starting at below reading level at the beginning of the year, and barely pass by at the end of the years.

Would you implement this as early as a kindergarten or pre school level? I know you say you aren't an educator however I am curious to see you professional standpoint on this because this seems like it could greatly help the reading level of any student across all ages.

Thank you for taking the time to read this