Sign Up For Our Newsletter

I have been working at St. Anthony’s School in Milwaukee, Wisconsin since the 1996-97 school year.  I began as a classroom teacher in the 7th and 8th grade teaching Science, Reading and Religion.  In 2004, I accepted the position of Reading Coordinator for the school.  Our school participates in the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program and has been educating children since 1872.  Over the last 4 years, our school has grown from 420 students and 27 teachers to 974 students and 50 teachers. 

In our school, you will hear administration and classroom teachers saying, “We are here to teach students what they need to know to help them further their education.”  A large majority of our students come from Spanish-speaking backgrounds and Spanish-speaking homes.  They enter an English-immersion school with low oral English, comprehension, writing and vocabulary skills.  Some students come right from Mexico with little to no speaking, reading, or writing abilities in English.  Needless to say, it was a challenge for classroom teachers to teach reading to a student who did not speak English before the fall of 2004.  In the 2004-05 school year, we had 3rd graders who had been in our school 2 years, and were not close to reading at grade level.  Today, we have 3rd graders who have been in our school for 2 years, and are reading at a 4th grade level.  

So what changed?  As the application process for the federal Reading First grant was underway, our K-3 staff and administration starting looking for a SBRR (scientifically based reading research) program to implement to make the difference for our students, targeting kindergarten, first, second, and third grade students.  After presentations from different publishers, it was SRA’s Direct Instruction program, Reading Mastery, that was chosen by our faculty to be the program to bring our students success.  Before April 2004, no teacher in our school had a working knowledge of Direct Instruction (DI) or what an impact it could have in the life of a child.  Did all teachers accept the program?  No.  But did all teachers leave the school?  NO.  They embraced change, attended training, and have been making a HUGE difference in the lives of children.  In fact, we adopted DI for the entire school reading, spelling, math intervention and writing programs.

I think the most impressive aspect of the scripted DI program is the training of the teachers.  How many times does a surgeon have to practice sewing sutures before they go into their first solo surgery?  Why should first year classroom teachers be asked to teach our youth to read, and not be given an explicit training for the reading curriculum?  All teachers are trained for at least 20 hours in Direct Instruction reading before school begins in August.  In addition, they receive continuous training and feedback on their teaching throughout the year.  Lesson goals are set for teachers, and teachers are held accountable for teaching lessons to mastery and one-on one student testing.  This solid program ensures that no matter what classroom students are in, they will be learning how to read.    

Teachers are explicitly trained on how to teach reading by “following the script”.  The script is often a criticism of the DI program, but it is the greatest strength of the program for our students in our school.  The students know what they are being asked to do in reading class.  The script provides the structure for the academic language the students need to understand to learn new sounds and words.  They know when the teacher needs them to respond.  The students know they will be held accountable for learning the material.  The students build the fluency, and hear fluent reading modeled for them daily.  Each day in reading class they know what to expect and it builds the confidence in their reading abilities.  Even the groups of least experienced readers  know they are learning.  When these students see a new word, they have the skills to sound it out and read it.  If the students don’t get it right, the teachers correct them and provide them repeated practice until the skills are mastered.      

Being a DI school has really brought the teachers together to work as a team.  All students are screened and grouped according to reading ability, thus meeting the learning needs of the students.  Students move to different rooms, if necessary, for reading and are grouped with students at the same skill level.  Teachers don’t waste the student’s time.  If a student does not learn at the same rate of the others, there is always another group for that child to go to.  On the other hand, if a student is learning faster that the rest of group, that student, too, is moved to a different group.  The teachers explicitly teach the students what they should know.  

Without DI in our school, our students would not be receiving as solid as a foundation in reading as they are right now.  If you talk to teachers in our school, they will say that Reading Mastery IS for all students. The number of intervention groups we have in the 4th-8th grades drops every year.  Our students in grades K5-1-2-3 are testing better.  All students, English-speaking or Spanish-speaking, are learning the skills needed to decode and comprehend the English language.  Those students who are strong readers are learning vocabulary and reading stories that are high in science and history content.  Our teachers support the students and make them accountable for learning vocabulary and improving their rate and accuracy in reading.  I was at St. Anthony’s School ten years ago and saw where our students were performing.  I can’t wait to see what they can achieve in another ten years.    

Claire Brefka is the Reading Coordinator at St. Anthony’s School in Milwaukee.