Introduction to the Foundational Skills to Support Reading for Understanding in Kindergarten Through 3rd Grade 

https://ies.ed.gov/ncee/wwc/Docs/practiceGuide/wwc_foundationalreading_040717.pdf  

Student Performance Fall VALLSS 2024-2025:

K-21 (26.25%)High risk

28 (35 %) Moderate

31 (38.75%) Low Risk

First grade

35 (44.87%)High risk

20 (25.64%) Moderate risk

23 (29.49%) Low Risk

Second Grade-

27 (42.19%) High risk

22 (34.38%) Moderate Risk

15 (23.44%) Low Risk

Third Grade 2024-2025 Star Math-

12 (60 %)High Risk

8 (40%) Moderate

0 Low risk

Fourth Grade Star Math

20 (33%) At or Above

10 (16%) On watch

15 (25%) Intervention

16 (26%) Urgent Intervention

Fifth Grade Star Math

32 (50% At or Above

15 (23%) ON Watch

10 (16%) Intervention

7 (11%) Urgent Intervention

Sixth Grade Star Math

At or above

On Watch

Intervention

Urgent Intervention

Provide reading interventions for grades 4-8 https://ies.ed.gov/ncee/WWC/Docs/PracticeGuide/WWC-practice-guide-reading-intervention-full-text.pdf https://ies.ed.gov/ncee/wwc/PracticeGuide/29   

Tier of Evidence: ​Strong​ 

Details of #1

Build students’ decoding skills so they can read complex multisyllabic words 

• Identify the level of students’ word-reading skills and teach vowel and consonant letter sounds and combinations as necessary  

• Teach students a routine they can use to decode multisyllabic words 

• Embed spelling instruction in the lesson 

• Engage students in a wide array of activities that allow them to practice reading multisyllabic words accurately and with increasing automaticity 

• Provide purposeful fluency-building activities to help students read effortlessly 

• Routinely use a set of comprehension building practices to help students make sense of the text. 

• Provide students with opportunities to practice making sense of stretch text (i.e., challenging text) that will expose them to complex ideas and information 

EBI- Mathematics

Student Measure #2:  

• By May 2025, the number of students performing math on grade level will grow as measured by the Star Math Test and unit assessments. 

• Baseline data K-2-VKRP (K)

By midyear, students in grades 3-8 will increase their grade equivalent score by at least 0.5. 

Baseline Date for grades 3-8: 

Tier 1: 7 Students 

Tier 2: 164 Students 

Tier 3: 279 Students 

Staff Measure #2:  https://ies.ed.gov/ncee/rel/regions/central/pdf/REL-CE-South-Dakota-ask-an-Expert-Slide-Deck.pdf  

• Make sense of problems and persevere in solving them.  

• Reason abstractly and quantitatively.  

• Construct viable arguments and critique the reasoning of others.  

• Model with mathematics.  

• Use appropriate tools strategically.  

• Attend to precision.  

• Look for and make use of structure.  

• Look for and express regularity in repeated reasoning. 

By May 2025, 100% of K-8 math teachers will participate in professional development sessions focused on computation, math models, reasoning abstract and quantitative problem solving. 

practices outlined in Recommendation 3 had

positive effects on word reading and encoding outcomes for diverse students. T

2. When introducing new concepts and procedures, use accessible numbers to support learning.

3. Sequence instruction so that the mathematics students are learning builds incrementally.

4. Provide visual and verbal supports

5. Provide immediate, supportive feedback to students to address any misunderstandings.

PANEL’S ADVICE: The panel is not suggesting teachers create materials that align with the steps in this recommendation. Instead, the panel suggests using these steps as guidelines for evaluating curricula to adopt.

Work with a team (such as a mathematics coach and special educator) to look for materials that come with a scope and sequence of instruction which build from one lesson to the next to a learning outcome. Evaluate the lesson scope and sequence to determine if there are clear procedures for introducing new content, ample opportunities for students to respond, and built-in feedback procedures.

OBSTACLE: Slowing down instruction for intensive instruction will mean they don't cover all of the grade-level material.

PANEL’S ADVICE: Intervention is an opportunity for students to build understanding in the most critical grade-level topics. Students are receiving intervention because they need more time and more frequent work with an adult to learn grade-level mathematics. Structure the pace and topics in intervention in such a way that promotes learning the mathematics more deeply; this often means taking more time.

By collaborating, intervention teachers and general mathematics teachers can ensure that the intervention complements grade-level mathematics instruction. In particular, teachers can identify together what the students in intervention need to work on and understand in order to access grade-level content.

develop spelling and language skills, students should use invented spelling less frequently and should be prompted to use the learned patterns.

sessions lasted 20 to 30 minutes.

1. Listen for the Stop Sounds-schwa sounds at the end of letter sounds

2. Using Elkonin boxes to teach sounds and focus on each box represents a distinct sound

3. Students can

   also use their knowledge of the meaning

   of different word parts to infer meaning fora multisyllabic word. (teaching word parts)

4. Provide students with opportunities to practice the letter sounds and sound–spelling patterns taught in the classroom using word lists, decodable sentences, short decodable texts, or texts that contain many examples of words spelled with recently learned letter sounds or sound–spelling patterns.

5. Teaching high frequency words with plenty of practice (Heart word routine) & monitoring

6. Review text before hand and pull non-decodable words that appear frequently and introduce the the spelling and meaning

-Data shows where our scholars are academically

-Evidence Based Interventions (EBIs) will provide a systematic approach to assist scholars in their appropriate grade levels

-EBIs are explicit recommended research based practices that will support to improve scholar academic success (pacing and resources)

Lesson Plan Audits: The team will review lesson plans to ensure alignment with VDOE and NPS standards and goals.

Observations: Regular classroom observations will be conducted to assess teaching practices and student engagement using the Coaching Cycle.

Walkthroughs: The leadership team will perform walkthroughs to gain insights into the learning environment and the effectiveness of instructional strategies. As well as use the Coaching Cycle for feedback.

These measures will provide valuable feedback and ensure continuous improvement in the educational practices in reading and mathematics.

#2. When introducing new concepts and procedures, use accessible numbers to support learning. (Direct Instruction)

#3. Sequence instruction so that the mathematics students are learning builds incrementally. (Planning, pacing, scaffolding of "I do, you do, we do")

#4. Provide visual and verbal supports. (Anchor charts, Concrete representations, word walls)

#5. Provide immediate, supportive feedback to students to address any misunderstandings. (CRA, correcting misconceptions during whole group and small group so that it's caught before intervention is needed. Focus on Tier 1 instruction).

1. EBI 1: Systematic Instruction includes effective interventions for improving the mathematics achievement of students with mathematics difficulties. This instruction includes elements that intentionally build students’ knowledge over time toward an identified learning outcome(s). Systematic intervention materials are designed to develop topics in an incremental and intentional way, and the instruction provided supports student learning.

• Created strategic schedule for University Tutors, Departmentalized grade teams for Tier 1 Math Instruction across grades, Title 1 Math support push-ins, small group support, and plannings.

2. Systematic Instruction should be used in conjunction with incrementally building knowledge is illustrated in Recommendation 3 (Representations), Recommendation 4 (Number Lines), Recommendation 5 (Word Problems); and Recommendation 2 (Mathematical Language).

A few of my students can read multisyllabic words pretty effortlessly but perform poorly on reading tests because of weak vocabulary and difficulties in comprehension.

1. Ask students probing or scaffolding questions to promote thinking.

2. Model going back to the text to find supporting details.

3. Have students justify their responses to increase engagement.

4. Have scholars make connections between the text, what they read, or learned.

5. Have scholars participate in discourse and share their experiences.

6. Provide question stems and allow time for scholars to generate who or what questions.

Obstacles:

1. Scholars make irrelevant connections to their world of knowledge.

2. Scholars are struggling with generating questions.

3. Systematic Instruction includes

   1. Review and integrate previously learned content throughout intervention to ensure that students maintain understanding of concepts and procedures.

   2. When introducing new concepts and procedures, use accessible numbers to support learning.

   3. Sequence instruction so that the mathematics students are learning builds incrementally.

   4. Provide visual and verbal supports.

   5. Provide immediate, supportive feedback to students to address any misunderstandings.

Participants: 243 grade 3 students with mathematics difficulties Setting: 120 classrooms in 1 urban school district in the southeast region of the U.S.

Duration: 20- to 30-minute sessions, 3 times per week; 13 weeks Content: Whole numbers Relevance to Recommendation: Instruction included review, feedback, and strategic supports. Mathematics content was sequenced to build incrementally across lessons. Students learned strategies to solve problems.

The instructional practices included:

 § Teaching foundational decoding skills such as vowel and consonant letter-sounds and combinations.

§ Teaching routines that provide simple steps for breaking multisyllabic words into parts and blending those parts together to sound out the word.

§ Providing practice in spelling words to reinforce learning of letter and sound combinations. § Teaching routines for breaking up words into syllables.

How to carry out the recommendation

1. Identify the level of students’ word-reading skills and teach vowel and consonant letter[1]sounds and combinations, as necessary.

§ Supporting students in reading high-frequency sight words.

§ Providing multiple exposures to multisyllabic words through practice with corrective feedback

2. Teach students a routine they can use to decode multisyllabic words.

3. Embed spelling instruction in the lesson

4. Engage students in a wide array of activities that allow them to practice reading multisyllabic words accurately and with increasing automaticity.

Math #2. The recommendations can be used independently or in combination to help teachers engage students in problem solving on a regular basis. 

Math #3. How to carry out the recommendation

EBI#1 - assist students in monitoring and reflecting on the problem-solving process

1. Provide students with a list of prompts to help them monitor and reflect during the problem-solving process. 

• The questions teachers provide should require students to think through the problem solving process.

• Ensure that the prompts help students evaluate their work at each stage of the problem-solving process, from initially reading and understanding the problem, to determining a way to solve the problem, and then to evaluating the appropriateness of the solution given the facts in the problem.

2. Model how to monitor and reflect on the problem-solving process. 

• Say aloud not only the response to each prompt, but also the reasons why each step was taken. Alternatively, say which step was taken, but ask students to explain why this would work

3. Use student thinking about a problem to develop students’ ability to monitor and reflect.

• The teacher-student dialogue can include guided questioning to help students clarify and refine their thinking and to help them establish a method for monitoring and reflecting that makes sense to them.

     EBI#2 - teach students how to use visual representations. 

1. Select visual representations that are appropriate for students and the problems they are solving. 

• teachers should select the visual representation that will work best for students and should use it consistently for similar problems

2. Use think-alouds and discussions to teach students how to represent problems visually. 

• It also involves the teacher expressing his or her thoughts as he or she approaches the problem, including what decisions he or she is making and why he or she is making each decision

3. Show students how to convert the visually represented information into mathematical notation.

• After representing the relevant information in a problem visually, demonstrate how each part of the visual representation can be translated into mathematical notation

Math #4. Obstacles

EBI#1 - Students don’t want to monitor and reflect; they just want to solve the problem. Teachers are unclear on how to think aloud while solving a non routine problem.

EBI#2 - Students do not capture the relevant details in the problem or include unnecessary details when representing a problem visually. The class text does not use visual representations.

Math #5. Duration of time

EBI #1 - A total of 29 sessions, each lasting 50 minutes

EBI #2 - Between 17 and 20 sessions, each lasting 40–45 minutes 

Recommendation:

1. Build students' decoding skills so they can read complex multisyllabic words.

2. Provide purposeful fluency-building activities to help students read effortlessly.

   
   

   Duration:

   Approximately 30-50 minutes 4-5 days per week with varying group sizes.