This document summarizes the strategies used by Granger High School to improve literacy among its students. The school implemented a three-pronged approach: 1) A reading intervention program called Second Shot Reading to provide small group instruction and repeated readings. 2) A read-a-lot initiative through sustained silent reading and an accelerated reading program. 3) Teaching reading strategies across all content areas through staff development on info-text. Through these interventions and an emphasis on reading practice, the school was able to close the achievement gap and increase the percentage of students meeting state reading standards from 30% to nearly 90%. The principal played a key role by knowing students' reading levels and emphasizing the importance of reading.

1. Presentation at
Taking Charge of Change
Effective Practices to Close Gaps
and Raise Achievement
The Education Trust National Conference
November 4-6, 2010
Arlington, VA

2. Raising Reading Levels:
lessons from a high-poverty
high school
Presented by William S Roulston
& Ricardo LeBlanc-Esparza

3. We were a struggling high school
 Ricardo did his first evaluation of an
English teacher in a freshman class. She
was passionate, prepared and she cared.
Her students were not and did not.
18 of 21 students were failing the
class.
“How can I teach them Romeo and Juliet?” she asked. “They can’t read.”

4. Look at the skill level of her students:
When her freshmen had taken our statewide WASL test just a year and a half
earlier in April of their 7th grade year, these were their skill levels. Was it any
wonder why this teacher was frustrated? Why our students were frustrated?

5. A high school depends on elementary and middle schools
Academic History of Our Students: Reading
100.0
% Met Standard on WASL
90.0
80.0
70.0
60.0
Reading 4th Grade
50.0
40.0 3 7 .8 Reading 7th Grade
2 9 .8 3 1.9
30.0 2 1.4 2 1.2
17 .9 2 0 .4
20.0 11.5 15 .6
11.1
10 .0 10 .8
10.0 2 .2 0 .0
8 .1
0 .0
0.0
05
03
04
06
07
08
09
10
0
0
20
20
20
20
20
20
*2
*2
Graduating Class * 4th grade testing began with class of 2005
We had a single elementary & middle school that fed our high school. Until
Ricardo’s 8th year, they never sent us a class with more than 30%
proficiency in reading. Our students were often 4 to 5 years or more behind.

6. The writing skills of our incoming students were also low.
Academic History of Our Students: Writing
100
% Met Standard on WASL
90
80
70
60
Writing 4th Grade
50
40 Writing 7th Grade
3 1.3
30 2 2 .2
2 7 .6
18 .6 19 .8
20 14 .5
17 .2
12 .2
9 .7
10 2 .2
7 .0
2 .8 4 .6 6 .4
0 .0 0 .0
0
03
04
07
08
09
10
05
06
0
0
20
20
20
20
20
20
*2
*2
Graduating Class * 4th grade testing began with class of 2005
One thing is clear by our scores: we had a lot of work to do to try to
help our students gain the literacy skills they needed. Blaming the
schools that sent them to us would not get the job done.

7. We began to implement strategic
interventions based on core beliefs
 We had from September of our students’
freshman year until April or March of their
sophomore year to prepare them for the
Washington Assessment of Student Learning.
 We implemented:
– A locally developed reading intervention
– An emphasis on reading practice
– Strategies for reading and writing across the
curriculum

8. Here are our results in reading
Turnaround School Performance on Washington
Assessment of Student Learning: Reading
Scores
100
Percent Meeting Standard
77 77
80 69
61
60 4th Grade
47
7th Grade
38 38
40 34 32
30 10th Grade
20 21 21
18 20
20 12 16 11
10 11 8
2
0
*2003 *2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010
A comparison of reading scores between graduating
classes from 2003-2010

9. Here’s how we compared to
the State of Washington in reading
Granger High School Reading Scores Compared to
Washington State Average
Percent meeting WASL standard
100.00%
80.00%
60.00% GHS
40.00% State
20.00%
0.00%
2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008
Our demographics were 90% free and reduced lunch and 90% students of
color: we were the poster child for the Achievement Gap. But we effectively
closed the gap between our students and the state average.

10. Our results in writing
4th, 7th & 10th Grade Writing Scores
100.0
90.0
Percent meeting standard
80.0
67 66 67
70.0
60.0 52 51
50.0
37
40.0 31
28
30.0 24 22
20.0 15
19 17 20 4th Grade
11 12
7 10 5 6 7th Grade
10.0 2 3
0.0 10th Grade
*2003 *2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010
A comparison of Writing scores between
graduating classes 2003-2010
But one other important factor needs to be considered in our
improvement scores…

11. Our students kept improving!
 Beginning with the class of 2008, our state
required that students pass the reading and
writing proficiency tests in order to receive a
diploma.
 Students who failed the test as sophomores
were encouraged to keep working and try again.
 We kept working with the students to help them
improve their skills.
 Students had up to 5 more opportunities to
retake the test during their junior and senior
years.

12. And the results?
Percentage of Class of 2008 meeting state
standards at the 4th, 7th, 10th & 12th grades.
100 89* 87*
4th Grade (2000)
Percent Meeting
80 69 67 7th Grade (2003)
Standard
10th Grade (2006)
60 12th Grade (2008)
40 30
21
20 6
17
0
Reading Writing
*this is the total percentage of students in the class w ho met the proficiency
standards by passing the WASL in 2006, 2007 or 2008 and w ere thus eligible for a
high school diplom a if they had also m et credit requirements

13. In other words…
 When they were 4th graders, only 30 % of our
students could meet 4th grade reading standards
and only 6% were on-level in writing.
 As 7th graders, only 21% of them could meet 7th
grade reading standards and only 17% were on-
level in writing.
 By the time they graduated, nearly 90% of our
students met 10th grade standards in reading &
writing.
 Our graduation rate had also improved from
roughly 38% to a five-year average of 90%.

14. How did we do it?
We followed a 3-pronged approach
to turn around our students
Make reading easier Change negative beliefs/attitudes
Intervention
Develop broad Teach strategies to unlock difficult
vocabulary, knowledge text
& language
Read-a-Lot Info-Text
Develop specific vocabulary,
knowledge & language
Create lifelong learners

15. Our strategies and the decisions we
made were based on core beliefs about
how to best teach reading to struggling
high school students.

16. Core Beliefs about Struggling High School Readers
 Affective is as important as cognitive
– Discouraged learners have negative beliefs, attitudes and habits
that affect their ability to improve their reading and writing and
we have to take that into account when working with them.
 People avoid doing what they are not good at
– Thus our students have avoidance behaviors towards reading
that must be overcome.
 You get good at whatever you do a lot
– If you don’t spend a lot of time reading, you won’t get good at it,
which is hard to do if you don’t like it.

17. Core beliefs for literacy turnaround (cont)
 We have to use strategies that look different
than what students have seen before
– Students become inoculated against instruction that
hasn’t worked in the past, if not cognitively, then
certainly psychologically.
 Reading has to be real
– Good readers choose to read for two reasons:
pleasure or power (knowledge). Struggling readers
haven’t experienced that, so we need to give them a
big dose consistently.

18. Core beliefs for literacy turnaround (cont)
 To improve reading skill you have to improve language
skill
– Poor readers have typically read less and have been exposed less to
the elegant language and specific vocabulary of higher level books than
good readers have. It’s not enough to provide word-recognition
assistance or comprehension strategies. We must recognize the
impoverished language and need for vocabulary building (background
knowledge) of our poor readers.
 Reading is best taught by humans
– Language skill is developed through interaction and modeling.
Computers are far less enriching than human conversations. Computers
are good for discrete tasks, not connected, free-flowing, responsive-to-
the-moment talk.
 Real change needs real results, not hope and pretty words.
– Discouraged kids need to see fast results. Consistently. Then they will
believe they can do this hard job that only they can do. (PS teachers
need to see results, too!)

19. Prong 1: Our primary intervention
Second Shot Reading
 Locally-developed model
 Small group instruction
 Centered around
– fluency timing
– modeled reading
– discussion
– repeated readings
– summary writing
– individual help

20. Second Shot (cont)
 Groups led by teacher or paraeducators
 Held in English 1 and 2 classes
Activity: Demonstration of Second Shot

21. English Curriculum
 We decided to attack the reading problem
first through our English courses
– English 1: 9th and 10th graders reading below 5th grade
level
– English 2: 9th and 10th graders reading between 5th and
8th grade level
– English 3: above grade level.
 Students were expected to improve 2
reading levels in one year’s time. We
moved them to next class as soon as they
had improved their skills.

22. An incredible program, but…
 As one large research study of the
effectiveness of reading programs put it:
“…multiple studies conducted by multiple researchers
across the nation provided no clear evidence of the
superiority of any one reading series or any particular
approach to teaching reading.” -Bond & Dykstra (1967)
“In other words, nothing worked everywhere and
everything worked somewhere.”
-Dr. Richard Allington (2002),
commenting on Bond & Dykstra’s results
Bond, G.L. & Dykstra, R. (1967). The cooperative research program in first-grade reading instruction. Reading Research Quarterly, 2(4), 5-142.
Allington, R.L. (2002). Troubling times: a short historical perspective. Big Brother and the National Reading Curriculum: how ideology trumped
evidence. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann. p. 16

23. Do programs teach reading?
“If the concentrated effort of highly competent and well-funded
sponsors with a few sites cannot produce uniform results from
locality to locality, it seems doubtful that any model program could.”
House, Glass, McLean & Walker (1978)
“…one consistent finding in educational research: Programs don’t
teach, teachers do.”
-Allington (2002) commenting on House, Glass McLean & Walker
As good as we think Second Shot Reading is, we don’t think
of it as a magic program.
House, E.R., Glass, G.V., McLean, L. & Walker, D. (1978). No simple answers: critique of the Follow Through evaluations. Harvard Educational Review,
48. 128-160.

24. The real magic of Second Shot:
Our position is that Second Shot Reading provided
the structure for our teachers and paraeducators
to help students experience immediate success.
Then, it kept students engaged in real reading
while our instructors gained more expertise in
helping individual students overcome the
obstacles that hindered them from becoming
excellent readers. The better we became at
teaching reading, the better our students
became.

25. Prong 2: Read-a-lot
 We used Sustained Silent Reading in advisory
classes to get our students reading more.
 We used Accelerated Reader in English 1 & 2
classes to encourage reading.
 We made clear to students that reading
intervention was not enough. They had to read a
lot if they wanted to improve.
 We beefed up the library budget through special
levies and built up classroom libraries, too.

26. Prong 3: Info-Text
 We used our once-weekly staff
development time to explore content area
reading strategies and practiced
implementing them in our classrooms.
 We used books and Will’s expertise rather
than bring in outside consultants.
 Later, we worked on writing across the
curriculum in the same way. (Reading &
writing are intimately connected!)

27. Our secret weapon: the principal
 Ricardo knew all students’ reading levels and
talked to them about what they were reading and
how they were improving… even at lunch!
 He did informal fluency test with new students
and families when they first enrolled & talked to
them about the importance of reading.
 He set up challenges to read more and did
things like climb a 14,000 foot mountain when
the school read 14,000 books.

28. Final Points
 Our literacy turnaround was part of a
comprehensive turnaround (detailed in our
upcoming Solution Tree Press book). It’s
hard for us to isolate which elements
made the difference. In our view,
everything was necessary. It was
synergistic.

29. Final Points (cont)
 We’re “still crazy
learning after all these
years.” Keep updated and share in our
learning at
www.turnaroundschoolbook.ning.com

30. Despite the title of this
presentation…
Raising reading scores is not as important as
raising readers. –Will Roulston
If we teach reading skills, but don’t teach students
to love reading, it doesn’t really matter if they
pass state tests. What matters is that they
become self-sustaining learners who use
reading for their own pleasure and power. We
must never forget this.

31. Contact
 Will Roulston
 willroulston@gmail.com
 Will is a literacy & language acquisition specialist who helped set up the
literacy program at Granger High School and then joined the staff for
several years as a lead-teacher.
 Ricardo LeBlanc-Esparza
 leblanc-esparza@gmail.com
 Ricardo is an administrator who led the turnaround at Granger High School
from 1999-2008. He is currently a principal at a turnaround elementary
school in Denver, CO & completing his doctorate. He and Will are co-
authors of an upcoming book (Solution Tree Press, 2011) on how the
turnaround at Granger was accomplished.