Jessica Gorman, Greenville Elementary School Assistant Principal
Children come to school each year with so many different reading abilities. Our staff at Greenville Elementary come to school each year equipped with different teaching strategies and new training to support those children. The literacy coaches at GES work collaboratively with the classroom teachers and intervention specialists to come up with a plan that makes the students most successful. In their weekly meetings with one another they produce schedules, they coach one another, share ideas, and reflect on students’ progress.
I sat down with one of our three literacy coaches, Tammie Riffle, and talked about what her day looks like. Mrs. Riffle has been trained by the Ohio State University on Literacy Collaborative where she then coaches classroom teachers and intervention specialists on a daily basis. She begins her day by practicing High Frequency words with small groups of first graders and then meets with teachers in between her morning and afternoon small intervention groups. Mrs. Riffle meets with at least two teachers and/or intervention specialists each day and talks about what strategies they are using in their classroom, how they are collecting evidence, word work they are using with students, and reflecting upon their teaching.
Heather Crews and Amy Shilt are Greenville Elementary’s other two literacy coaches that work tirelessly with small intervention groups, K-2 teachers, and intervention specialists. Mrs. Crews is also trained in Literacy Collaborative where she instructs and models reading and phonics strategies to both students and teachers. She coaches teachers each day and works primarily with kindergartners. Ms. Shilt is a Reading Recovery teacher leader who works with first graders, teachers, and intervention specialists. Reading Recovery is a research-based reading and writing program to help first graders become more successful in the classroom.
Our literacy coaches do a tremendous job at helping our K-2 students with so many different phonics and reading strategies. They spent the first few weeks of school assessing our students, getting to know them, and then coming up with a plan of action that will benefit our students to become better readers. When they are not coaching teachers and holding weekly teacher-based team meetings, they are working with students in small groups on many different skills. The skills they work on in small groups involve activities such as name puzzles, identifying letter activities, one-to-one matching, letter sounds, and practicing name writing. They also reinforce with the small groups what the teachers are teaching in their classrooms.
The K-3 reading teachers use Orton-Gillingham as their core instruction for spelling and phonics. Teachers use OG to teach new concepts in a three-part drill where they provide visual, auditory/kinesthetic, and blending activities to support the new concepts. Teachers use Fountas and Pinnell guided reading groups for individualized small reading group interventions in their classrooms. With the help of literacy coaches, they use the Literacy Continuum (from Literacy Collaborative) as intervention in their classroom and during Wave Time. All students have a specified 30 minutes during their daily schedule where they receive Wave Time intervention from intervention specialists, literacy coaches, classroom teachers, and paraprofessionals.
We are so lucky to have specially trained staff to help our students each day. As parents and guardians, please reach out to your child’s teachers for any help or suggestions in reading. Families can also ensure their children’s reading success by taking them to the local library, and reading with your child each night. For example, a first grader should read with an adult for about 15 minutes a night. Make sure they are also hearing your wonderful reading voice and please model for your child how a good reader should sound. Your child will be more successful at reading when they are working hard both at home and at school!