The Greater New Haven Literacy Coalition sponsored a forum Wednesday, Nov. 19, on ways Connecticut communities, organizations, and families are seeking to cultivate and strengthen young children’s reading skills. Hosting the event in Hamden was the William Caspar Graustein Memorial Fund, whose executive director, David Nee (pictured), served as principal speaker and moderator of the ensuing discussion.
One topic was a new document, “Early Literacy Framing,” which Angela Frusciante of the Graustein Memorial Fund prepared http://www.discovery.wcgmf.org/resources/sps_resource_1141.pdf. With that document as a point of departure, he surveyed examples of what professionals, volunteers, and families themselves are doing to advance reading levels among young children and their families. Considered were the roles of schools, of families, and of other segments of communities.
David Nee spoke of the fund’s Discovery Initiative, which has been expanded and extended through the 2009 calendar year, and of developments in dozens of cities and towns. The tenor of the forum was consistent with the fund’s main goals, which include “to support Connecticut communities in improving education for their elementary and pre-school children. [Those at the Memorial Fund] think of communities both geographically and culturally, and mean to include teachers, parents, administrators, and others who have a concern for the lives of children.”
Among the matters that arose in the question and discussion period were:
‚Ä¢ How Connecticut’s schools and students might improve achievement reflected on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), particularly with respect to gaps in the average student scores by family income and ethnicity, where our state ranks near the bottom despite relatively high overall scores (no state has even half of its students meeting the demanding academic goals the NAEP has established, so there is room for improvement everywhere, and a lot of hard work underway);
• Efforts to restore Early Reading Success grants to Connecticut communities amid rapidly deteriorating federal, state and local budget conditions;
‚Ä¢ What Connecticut — whose early childhood cabinet led by Janice Gruendel is already considered among the national models but which still has thousands of young children going without high-quality early learning opportunities – might draw from the most promising trends in other states. David Nee suggested Pennsylvania, which is aiming better to integrate education and social services, and New Jersey — where the legacy of the Abbott v. Burke http://www.edlawcenter.org/ELCPublic/AbbottvBurke/AboutAbbott.htm decisions has included improved early childhood program access and quality – as examples of states whose lessons we could further synthesize here.
• Reading in the home, promoted by libraries including the New Haven Free Public Library Рrepresented by Stetson branch manager Diane Brown-Pettaway Рand involving grandparents in addition to parents, and free books from sources such as Read to Grow and the New Haven Reads Book Bank;
• Volunteer tutoring and mentoring, including through New Haven Reads, Literacy Volunteers of Greater New Haven, the New Haven Public School Foundation, the Jewish Coalition for Literacy, and the Experience Corps project of the United Way and Agency on Aging.
Those who attended an earlier, April 21 forum http://www.newhavenindependent.org/archives/2008/04/post_357.php, recalled that State Representative Toni Walker had advised, “Data is what drives everything right now.” She had emphasized the importance of documenting literacy providers’ waiting lists and service effects in order to address the “results-based accounting” used for budgeting.
Curtis Hill (who introduced David Nee and organized the event) and Cheryl Manciero of the Literacy Coalition’s board briefly spoke about the Coalition’s public awareness campaign. That effort includes her monthly series of “Reading Along” columns in the New Haven Register as well as articles like this one. She mentioned that her latest, November 20 column would address President-elect Barack Obama’s statements about literacy, with excerpts from his 2005 remarks to the American Library Association – and how various New Haven-area providers are pursuing measures he called for in that speech.
Participants in the Nov. 19 forum came from organizations ranging from Haskins Laboratories and the Worthington Hooker School PTA to Casa Otonal http://www.casaotonal.org, Junta for Progressive Action http://www.juntainc.org/en and the Connecticut Humanities Council.
A partial list, including some already mentioned, appears here:
‚Ä¢ Concepts for Adaptive Learning http://www.eachchildlearns.org, which equips and trains New Haven parents to use computers to support their and their children’s learning;
• Literacy Volunteers of Greater New Haven http://www.lvagnh.org/;
• New Haven Adult Education and the New Haven Public Schools http://www.nhps.net;
• Connecticut Association of Adult and Continuing Education, comprised of all the directors of adult ed. programs throughout the state;
• Jewish Coalition for Literacy, a project of the Jewish Community Relations Council, which brings volunteer tutors into several New Haven public schools;
‚Ä¢ New Haven Reads and its Book Bank http://www.cityofnewhaven.com/library/nhreads — which offers free books and tutoring;
• Yale-New Haven Teachers Institute http://www.yale.edu/ynhti, a partnership between Yale and the New Haven Public Schools that offers professional development http://www.newhavenindependent.org/archives/2008/01/post_351.php to district teachers in a collegial setting and whose resulting curricular resources are available online.
The Greater New Haven Literacy Coalition is an all-volunteer, nonprofit organization whose mission is to serve as a clearinghouse to promote, support and advance literacy for people of all ages in our region. Contact: [email protected] .
Earlier articles on the Coalition appear here:
http://www.newhavenindependent.org/archives/2008/04/post_357.php
http://www.newhavenindependent.org/archives/2007/05/a_day_for_liter.php
http://www.newhavenindependent.org/archives/2006/10/their_second_ch.php
Pictured: Tomas Miranda of Casa Otonal and Susanne Santangelo of Read to Grow, both Literacy Coalition board members, among others.
Curtis Hill of Concepts for Adaptive Learning; Doss Venema of Literacy Volunteers of Greater New Haven; and Cheryl Manciero, a consultant to the
East Haven Public Schools – all Literacy Coalition board members)
Ellen Thompson of the Connecticut Association of Adult and Continuing Education; Diane Brown-Pettaway of the New Haven Public Library’s Stetson branch; and Carol Kennedy, retired former principal of the Worthington Hooker School and Coalition board member.
Chris Alexander of New Haven Reads and of the Coalition board).
Curtis Hill, standing by David Nee.
Here's a novel idea. Provide kindergartens who's focus is developmentally appropriate. Read stories, poems, nursery rhymes, sing songs, clap rhythms, have a snack time and reinforce social skills such as sharing/conversing, play math games, work on basic reading skills, letter identification, basic sounds, etc. We are putting so much pressure on these babies coming into school that it is no wonder we are having so much trouble with students as they progress to middle school where they are generally well below grade level. They are tested to death and feel like failures and then they turn off to learning. These tests are not a motivating factor in their academic lives.
Maybe formal reading instruction should be put off a year or two until the kids are ready for it. Let's face it, most of students who come into school have not had the advantages of having been read to, spoken to, or and some not even given the basics of love and attention. They need to receive this in school inorder that they can grow socially and emotionally. Then introduce academic learning.
I know the decision makers in the Board of Ed will probably disagree with me but then they don't have to teach the students either. If they did, they would sing a different tune. Talk to the teachers, i'm sure most of them would agree.
JMHO!