Indianapolis Public Schools 2012-2013 Orton-Gillingham Whole-class Pilot

1. JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL #51
RALPH WALDO EMERSON #58
Indianapolis
Public Schools
Orton-Gillingham Pilot
Program
2012-2013

2. The Need
 A significant number of students read below grade
level according to DIBELS and SRI data
 Core reading program was not meeting the needs
of most students*
 More students needed reading interventions than
could be serviced with resources available
 Reading interventions did not complement or align
to the core reading program
 Students’ inability to read grade-level text impeded
learning in all content areas
 *Dynamic Measurement Group defines an effective Core Reading Program as one that results in less than 20% of
students needing Tier II or Tier III interventions.

3. Why DIBELS?
Dynamic Indicators Basic Early Literacy Skills
 DIBELS is comprised of seven measures to function as
indicators of phonemic awareness, alphabetic principle,
accuracy and fluency with connected text, reading
comprehension, and vocabulary.
 DIBELS was designed for use in identifying children
experiencing difficulty in acquisition of basic early literacy
skills in order to provide support early and prevent the
occurrence of later reading difficulties.
 There is a high correlation between DIBELS scores and
scores of high-stakes assessments, such as ISTEP.

4. The Need
Getting to the Root of the Cause
 Analyzed student data (DIBELS and TRC) measures
for performance trends
 Compared SRI and DIBELS data to see if DIBELS
was a good predictor of later reading performance
 Selected a group of below-level readers in 4th-6th
grade to administer a diagnostic reading assessment
 Analyzed diagnostic data for trends

5. The Need
Diagnostic Data Revealed Students:
 Consistently confused short vowels
 Lacked an awareness of the six basic syllable
patterns
 Struggled to apply syllable division rules to decode
multi-syllabic words
 Did not have mastery of phonetically irregular, high-
frequency words

6. The Need
Diagnostic Data Revealed Students:
 Made more errors when prefixes and suffixes were
added to familiar base words
 Had difficulty understanding how morphemes
changed or enhanced the meaning of words
 Had issues with decoding that impeded fluency
and comprehension

7. What We Know
“Students who get effective intervention later (after
third grade) do not catch up in terms of reading
fluency. With intervention, they get close to their
grade peers in terms of accuracy, but fluency, even
though it improves over time, remains way behind
peers’ and represents a significant reading
impediment.”
Multisensory Teaching of Basic Language Skills, edited by Judith E Birsch, Paul H.
Brookes Publishing, 2011 (page300)

8. What We Know
Under the proper teaching conditions, even
students at the lower reading percentiles can
reach a threshold of accuracy and fluency by the
end of second or third grade. And then, going
forward, they remain on par with their peers in
accuracy, fluency, and comprehension. In other
words, it is possible to short-circuit the usual
year-by-year widening gap between average
readers and those with reading disabilities when
the “catch-up” occurs within the window of the
early school years (Grades 1-3).
Torgeson and Hudson’s (2006)

9. What We Know
We have evidence that curriculum
matters. Instruction that’s guided by
a systematic and explicit curriculum
is more effective, particularly with
at-risk learners, than instruction
that does not have these features.
Elissa J. Arndt, M.S. CCC-SLP, Florida Center for Reading Research. July, 2007

10. What We Know
Longstanding evidence reveals a striking
difference in the number of practice repetitions
different children require to reach a reliable level of
word reading accuracy… teachers (should)
differentiate the intensity and frequency of practice
to meet students differing needs:
 Four to fourteen repetitions for average young
readers
 More than 40 repetitions for those with reading
difficulties
Joseph Torgensen 2001

11. What We Know
 Phonics instruction works
 Not all phonics instruction follows the same
pedagogy or is created equal in terms of
effectiveness
 The National Reading Panel (NRP) recognizes five
different approaches to teaching phonics:
Analogy
Analytic
Embedded
Phonics through Spelling
Synthetic Phonics

12. Phonics Approaches
Analytic
This approach is often thought of as whole to part. Students are given a
set of words with a common unit. They are to break the words down
into syllables and then individual sounds. Their goal is to find the
common feature and make a connection between the sound and
symbol.
Analogy
This is a form of analytic phonics that uses the concept of word
families. Students learn a series of word families. When they encounter
unfamiliar words, their goal is to identify a common word family within
the word to help them decode.
Phonics through Spelling
This approach teaches phonics through spelling and writing that they
are to apply in reading.

13. Phonics Approaches
Embedded
This form is often used in conjunction with a whole-
language approach. Phonics instruction is not direct or
intentional, but designed to be a teachable moment.
Students and teachers observe patterns in the story, very
similar to the word family approach in Analogy Phonics.
Synthetic
This approach is named for it’s emphasis on students
synthesizing, or pulling together sounds to create syllables
and words. This approach is a part to whole approach that
uses direct instruction to introduce a specific phoneme and
grapheme pattern. This pattern is then used to blend
syllables and words.

14. What We Know
The National Reading Panel Reports:
“This type of phonics instruction [synthetic] benefits
both students with learning disabilities and low-
achieving students who are not disabled. Moreover,
systematic synthetic phonics instruction was
significantly more effective in improving low
socioeconomic status (SES) children’s alphabetic
knowledge and word reading skills than instructional
approaches that were less focused on these initial
reading skills.”

15. What We Know
The National Reading Panel Reports:
• “The ability to read and spell words was
enhanced in kindergarteners who received
systematic beginning phonics instruction.”
• “First graders who were taught phonics
systematically were better able to decode
and spell, and they showed significant
improvement in their ability to comprehend
text.”

16. What We Know
Impact of Multisensory Instruction
 Instruction that is direct and meaningful is
not effective if students don’t have the
capacity to retain and apply the skills in
context.
 Instruction that employs a multisensory
approach is effective in engaging students’
permanent memory.

17. What We Know
What is Multisensory Instruction?
Simultaneous deployment of visual,
auditory, kinesthetic, and tactile
sensory modalities that supports the
connection of oral language with visual
language symbols

18. What We Know
Impact of Multisensory Instruction
 Exposure to stimuli through multisensory
experiences results in superior recognition
of objects compared to unisensory exposure
 Simultaneous visual, auditory, and
tactile/kinesthetic stimuli develops superior
memory capacity
Benefits of Multisensory Learning: Ladan Shams and Aaron R. Seitz).

19. What We Learned
Analysis of the Current Core Reading
Program Revealed
 A combination of embedded and analogy phonics
lessons
 Gaps in instruction consistent with the diagnostic
data collected
 Limited opportunities for students to practice phonics
skills in text
 Instruction was unisensory

20. The IPS Plan
Goals of the IPS Pilot
 Implement a whole-class Orton-Gillingham approach
to reduce the number of students in Tier II and Tier
III interventions.
 Enhance the current core reading curriculum to meet
the needs of all students.
 Improve reading instruction by providing professional
development for classroom teachers, and
instructional support staff.

21. The IPS Plan
Enhance the Core Curriculum
 Ensure phonics instruction is systematic, direct and
explicit
 Develop daily lesson plans for whole-class
implementation within the 90-minute reading block
 Increase the opportunity for repetition
 Provide scaffolded support through fair and
decodable text
 Evaluate progress to design lessons that are
diagnostic and prescriptive

22. The IPS Plan
Provide Instructional Support
 Train kindergarten through second grade teachers in
the Orton-Gillingham approach
 Provide training in multisensory teaching
 Organize monthly grade-level specific professional
development opportunities
 Assign an Orton-Gillingham coach to both schools
for modeling, co-teaching, and side-by side coaching

23. Training
 Teachers attended a three-day training in the
summer, prior to the beginning of the 2012-2013
school year.
 Training was modified from the more traditional
Orton-Gillingham approach to include whole-class
adaptations.
 The content of the course was primarily in lesson
components and procedures, versus lesson content.
The IPS Plan

24. The IPS Plan
Budget
 Professional Development
 Teachers were paid a $20.00 hourly stipend for attending summer
training
 In-house trainer eliminated cost of contracting out training
 Materials
 Per classroom
 Card deck
 Decodable readers
 Per building
 Additional decodable readers
 Phonological awareness kits (kindergarten only)

25. Impact Statement
 Both pilot schools made notable growth from BOY to
MOY in DIBELS
 Growth at pilot schools was well above the district
average in kindergarten and first grade
 At BOY only 22% of all kindergarten students had
met benchmark goals. At MOY 92% had met
benchmark goals.
 At the MOY benchmark a significant number of
kindergarten students had already reached the EOY
benchmark goal*
*EOY comparison is possible when calculating the MOY composite score on EOY criteria.

26. Impact Statement
 Kindergarten students were able to blend simple
short-vowel words by the end of the first quarter as
well as read and write short-vowel words with
blends by the middle of the third quarter
 First grade students were able to read and spell
multi-syllabic words by the end of the first quarter
 While progress was also notable in second grade,
closing the achievement gap becomes more
difficult as student progress from grade to grade

27. BOY to MOY Growth
Kindergarten First Grade Second Grade
BOY MOY Growth BOY MOY Growth BOY MOY Growth
James Russell
Lowell
IPS #51
22% 92% 70% 47% 68% 21% 47% 63% 16%
Ralph Waldo
Emerson
IPS #58
41% 84% 43% 35% 61% 26% 47% 53% 6%*
Indiana Public
School District
Average
31% 62% 31% 48% 59% 11% 54% 62% 8%
BOY =Beginning of Year
MOY = Middle of Year
*Teacher retired in November. Substitute teacher was not trained in the approach.

28. Sample Kindergarten Class BOY to MOY Growth
Class A BOY Composite MOY Composite
Benchmark
26 122
Student 1 0 215
Student 2 0 220
Student 3 0 224
Student 4 0 181
Student 5 0 213
Student 6 0 232
Student7 0 200
Student 8 0 234
Student 9 0 195
Student 10 0 190
Student 11 0 195
Student 12 0 201
Student 13 0 273
Student 14 0 239
Student 15 0 236
Student 16 0 221
Student 17 0 236
Student 18 1 175
Student 19 2 233
Student 20 2 210
Student 21 3 204
Student 22 4 158
Student 23 11 228
Student 24 15 210
BOY =Beginning of Year
MOY = Middle of Year

29. BOY to MOY Growth
Findings
• At BOY 0% of the students had met the BOY
benchmark goals and 75% of the students had a
composite score of zero.
• This reflects that students were unable to produce any
letter names or provide the beginning sound in a word.
• At the MOY 100% of the students had met the MOY
benchmark goals.
• All but two students in one kindergarten classroom met
EOY benchmark goals at MOY
• This reflects that students knew letter names, could
recognize initial sounds, as well as segment and blend
CVC words.

30. Comparing MOY to EOY Composite
Class A MOY Composite
LNF+FSF+PSF+NWF
-FSF
Raw Score
EOY Comparison
LNF+PSF+NWF
Benchmark
122 *119
Student 1 215 -56 159
Student 2 220 -58 162
Student 3 224 -54 170
Student 4 181 -42 139
Student 5 213 -58 160
Student 6 232 -60 172
Student7 200 -60 140
Student 8 234 -40 194
Student 9 195 -56 139
Student 10 190 -35 155
Student 11 195 -54 141
Student 12 201 -60 141
Student 13 273 -57 216
Student 14 239 -44 195
Student 15 236 -60 176
Student 16 221 -52 169
Student 17 236 -49 187
Student 18 175 -60 115
Student 19 233 -56 177
Student 20 210 -45 165
Student 21 204 -55 149
Student 22 158 -60 98
Student 23 228 -53 175
Student 24 210 -57 153
*FSF is not included in
the EOY Composite

31. Resources
 Multisensory Teaching of Basic Language Skills, edited by
Judith E Birsch, Paul H. Brookes Publishing, 2011.
 National Reading Panel, 2000, Chapter 2, Phonics and
Alphabetics.
 Torgensen, J.K. (1995). Orton Emertitus Series: Phonological
Awareness. A critical factor in dyslexia. Baltimore:
International Dyslexia Association.
 Torgensen, J.K., Rashotte, C.A., Alexander, A., Alexander J.,
& MacPhee, K. (2003). Progress towards understanding the
instructional conditions necessary for remediating reading
difficulties in older children. In B. Foorman (Ed.), Preventing
and remediating reading difficulties: Bringing science up to
scale (pp. 275-298). Timonium, MD: York Press.