The Literacy Coach's Handbook, First Edition: A Guide to Research-Based Practice PDF
Preview The Literacy Coach's Handbook, First Edition: A Guide to Research-Based Practice
THE LITERACY COACH’S HANDBOOK SOLVING PROBLEMS IN THE TEACHING OF LITERACY Cathy Collins Block, Series Editor RECENT VOLUMES Reading to Learn: Lessons from Exemplary Fourth-Grade Classrooms Richard L. Allington and Peter H. Johnston A Sound Start: Phonemic Awareness Lessons for Reading Success Christine E. McCormick, Rebecca N. Throneburg, and Jean M. Smitley Organizing and Managing the Language Arts Block: A Professional Development Guide Lesley Mandel Morrow Teaching Strategic Processes in Reading Janice F. Almasi Exploring the Literature of Fact: Children’s Nonfiction Trade Books in the Elementary Classroom Barbara Moss Literacy and Young Children: Research-Based Practices Edited by Diane M. Barone and Lesley Mandel Morrow Concept-Oriented Reading Instruction: Engaging Classrooms, Lifelong Learners Emily Anderson Swan Struggling Readers: Assessment and Instruction in Grades K–6 Ernest Balajthy and Sally Lipa-Wade Explaining Reading: A Resource for Teaching Concepts, Skills, and Strategies Gerald G. Duffy Rethinking Reading Comprehension Edited by Anne P. Sweet and Catherine E. Snow Exemplary Literacy Teachers: Promoting Success for All Children in Grades K–5 Cathy Collins Block and John N. Mangieri Assessment for Reading Instruction Michael C. McKenna and Steven A. Stahl Vocabulary Instruction: Research to Practice Edited by James F. Baumann and Edward J. Kame’enui The Reading Specialist: Leadership for the Classroom, School, and Community Rita M. Bean Multicultural and Multilingual Literacy and Language: Contexts and Practices Edited by Fenice B. Boyd and Cynthia H. Brock, with Mary S. Rozendal Teaching All the Children: Strategies for Developing Literacy in an Urban Setting Edited by Diane Lapp, Cathy Collins Block, Eric J. Cooper, James Flood, Nancy Roser, and Josefina Villamil Tinajero Conceptual Foundations of Teaching Reading Mark Sadoski The Literacy Coach’s Handbook: A Guide to Research-Based Practice Sharon Walpole and Michael C. McKenna The Literacy Coach’s HANDBOOK A Guide to Research-Based Practice Sharon Walpole Michael C. McKenna THE GUILFORD PRESS New York London To the literacy coaches with whom we have worked ©2004TheGuilfordPress ADivisionofGuilfordPublications,Inc. 72SpringStreet,NewYork,NY10012 www.guilford.com Allrightsreserved Exceptasnoted,nopartofthisbookmaybereproduced,translated,storedinaretrievalsystem, ortransmitted,inanyformorbyanymeans,electronic,mechanical,photocopying,microfilming, recording,orotherwise,withoutwrittenpermissionfromthePublisher. PrintedintheUnitedStatesofAmerica Thisbookisprintedonacid-freepaper. Lastdigitisprintnumber: 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 LIMITEDPHOTOCOPYLICENSE Thesematerialsareintendedforuseonlybyqualifiedprofessionals. ThePublishergrantstoindividualpurchasersofthisbooknonassignablepermissiontorepro- duceallpagesforwhichpermissionisprovidedinafootnote.Thislicenseislimitedtoyou,the individualpurchaser,forusewithyourownclientsorstudents.Itdoesnotextendtoadditional professionalsinyourinstitution,schooldistrict,orothersetting,nordoespurchasebyaninsti- tutionconstituteasitelicense.Thislicensedoesnotgranttherighttoreproducethesematerials forresale,redistribution,oranyotherpurposes(includingbutnotlimitedtobooks,pamphlets, articles,video-oraudiotapes,andhandoutsorslidesforlecturesorworkshops).Permissionto reproducethesematerialsfortheseandanyotherpurposesmustbeobtainedinwritingfrom thePermissionsDepartmentofGuilfordPublications. LibraryofCongressCataloging-in-PublicationData Walpole,Sharon. Theliteracycoach’shandbook:aguidetoresearch-basedpractice/SharonWalpole,Michael C.McKenna. p.cm.—(Solvingproblemsintheteachingofliteracy) Includesbibliographicalreferencesandindex. ISBN1-59385-034-4(pbk.:alk.paper) 1. Reading(Elementary)—UnitedStates. 2. Literacyprograms—UnitedStates— Administration. 3. Groupworkineducation—UnitedStates. I. McKenna,Michael C. II. Title. III. Series. LB1573.W3642004 372.41—dc22 2004003282 About the Authors SharonWalpole,PhD,isAssistantProfessorintheSchoolofEducationattheUniversityof Delaware, where she teaches graduate and undergraduate courses in literacy education. UpongraduationfromtheUniversityofVirginia,shespent3yearsasafull-timeschoolad- ministrator working with elementary teachers to develop schoolwide reading programs. She has worked with literacy coaches in Iowa, Virginia, Georgia, and Delaware as part of the Reading Excellence Act and Reading First Reforms. She was a member of the Center forImprovementofEarlyReadingAchievementresearchteamstudyingthecharacteristics of Beat the Odds schools. Her research interests include the design, implementation, and evaluation of schoolwide reading programs. MichaelC.McKenna,PhD,hasbeenProfessorofReadingatGeorgiaSouthernUniversity since 1989. For 12 years prior to that, he was Professor of Reading at Wichita State Uni- versity.Hehasauthored,coauthored,oredited12booksandmorethan80articles,chap- ters,andtechnicalreportsonarangeofliteracytopics.HerecentlycoeditedtheHandbook of Literacy and Technology, and was awarded both the National Reading Conference’s Edward Fry Book Award and the American Library Association’s Award for Outstanding AcademicBooks.Hisresearchinterestsincludecomprehensionincontentsettings,reading attitudes, technology applications, and beginning reading. v Preface TheLiteracyCoach’sHandbookrepresentsabest-evidencesummaryofaseriesof topics that we have found to be essential to address in school-based reforms. For literacy coaches, we hope it is an informed overview of important aspects of their work and also a resource to guide their continued professional development. It is alsoaninitialefforttosummarizetheresearchthatismostusefultoourwork,the wisdom of practice that we are gaining from and with literacy coaches, and the challenges we still face. InChapter1,webeginwiththestoryofoneliteracycoachasshemovedfrom heruniversity-basedundergraduatetrainingtotheclassroom,toimportantprofes- sionalnetworks,andtoherjobascoachwithitsmanychallenges.Weknowmany coacheshavehadsimilardevelopmentalexperiencesandfewhavehadthechanceto reflectwithothersaboutthosetransitions.Thischaptercouldbecomparedwithrich descriptive studies of the experiences of other coaches in other settings. InChapter2,wedefineaschoolwidereadingprogramassomethingthatcan- not be bought from any vendor of literacy materials, however well constructed. We argue that a schoolwide program starts with an assessment system to identify the needs of the children to be served and then locates and allocates all available resources: time, groupings, and materials. The schoolwide program also addresses the needs of adults in the school by scheduling time and allocating resources to support their continued growth as professionals. This chapter could be compared with school-based case studies to examine the costs and benefits of different choices in allocating and coordinating resources. InChapter3,weidentifyandsummarizeimportantsourcesofresearch-based advice about literacy development that are useful in schools. This advice, while necessarytotheworkofaliteracycoach,willnotbecompletelysufficientwithout expansion. In fact, we hope that the research summarized in this chapter will be quickly expanded with new findings, as researchers learn more about what makes vi Preface vii a difference in the literacy lives of children and teachers. Therefore, we have also includedstrategiesforlocatinginformationinhandbooks,books,andjournals. Chapter 4 is a primer on assessment as it pertains to schoolwide initiatives. Assessment in schools is complex, and it is particularly so for the literacy coach. Viewed attheschoolandclassroom levels, assessment datacanestablish goalsfor schoolwide programs, and it can provide access to appropriate instruction and in- tervention for all children. Assessment can also prove divisive. We (and, we hope, others) will continue to examine this issue and to write about assessment systems that provide essential information to answer important questions about achieve- ment in schools and its impact on children and teachers. InChapter5,weaddresstheissueofinstructionalschedules.Weconsiderboth theschedulingofprotectedtimeforliteracyinstructionandinterventioninwhole- groupandneeds-basedgroupsacrossgradelevelsandthecontentofthatinstruction. Weprovidesomeschedulingchoicesthatwehavepersonallyusedwithsuccess,and thenwesharesampleschedulescreatedbyliteracycoachesdealingwithspecificre- sourcesinspecificschools.Weknowliteracycoacheswhoidentifythecreationofan elegant school-level schedule as one of the most crucial steps toward establishing theirreadingprograms.They(andwe)wouldbenefitfromevaluationsoftherela- tionshipbetweenspecificschedulingchoicesandgrowthinstudentachievementand additional case studies of scheduling successes and failures. Chapter 6 discusses scheduling issues within grade levels and classrooms. We identify essential components of instruction in a comprehensive reading program, and then nest them within grouping configurations and within the precious min- utes available for instruction. Our goal in this chapter is to provide a model that each literacy coach must revisit and refine time and time again, making it more and more specifically geared toward the resources in his or her reading program. Thischapterisaboutchoices;weknowthatitcouldbecomparedwithalternative options, and we invite others to publish those options. InChapter7,wetakeononeofthemanyobstaclesinschoolreforms—theis- sue of materials selection. While we identify many sources that literacy coaches mightconsultforinformationaboutcommercialmaterialsforliteracyinstruction, we actually argue that true coaching demands knowledge not of the “ratings” of materials but of their actual day-to-day contents. We provide a template for close examination of literacy materials that we have used to help coaches make in- formed choices and also to better understand the choices that they have made. Likemostofourcolleagues,wewantteacherstohavematerialsconsistentwithre- search and with best practice; however, we know that how materials are used is moreimportantthanwhattheyare.Thischapterwouldbenefitfromcomparisons withnewresearchontheeffectsofparticularinstructionalmaterialsonvariousin- dices of literacy achievement. Despitethebesteffortsofteachersandcoaches,somechildrenstillrequireinter- vention in order to achieve and maintain adequate literacy skills and strategies. In viii Preface Chapter 8, we summarize the work of researchers who have helped us to concep- tualizeinterventionandthenweprovideanoverviewofpotentialcontextsforinter- ventionduringandafterschool.Wealsodescribeinterventionsthathavebeensuc- cessful and provide sample intervention plans targeting specific areas of literacy achievement. This is an area in which new research is sorely needed, especially re- search on interventions for English language learners, special education students, and preschool children, and interventions that target vocabulary development. In Chapter 9, we review research on professional development and present our own conception of the literacy coach as designer of a professional develop- ment system responsive to the needs of adults and children. Such a system com- bines work outside the classroom to build knowledge of literacy achievement, literacy development, and literacy instruction with work inside the classroom in modeling,observation,andfeedback.Weplacethischapterclosetotheendofthis volume because literacy coaches cannot actually craft coherent professional devel- opment systems until they have addressed the issues identified in previous chap- ters. This chapter, though, is the heart of the literacy coach’s work—the part that is truly new and exciting to us. Unfortunately, compared to the other issues ad- dressedinthisbook,thisistheareaaboutwhichresearchgivestheleastdirection. Itwilltakethecombinedeffortsofmany,manyresearchersandmany,manyliter- acy coaches to produce descriptive and empirical evidence of the effects of differ- ent professional development systems on the knowledge and skills of teachers and on the literacy achievement of children. In our final chapter, Chapter 10, we introduce an issue which we have only just started to grapple with—the issue of levels of leadership and their interaction inthesuccessandfailureofschool-basedreforms.Weknowthatthemostsuccess- ful coaches with whom we’ve worked have established their own leadership, but we also know that they have done it in decidedly different ways. Some have as- sumed administrative authority, some are partners with administrators, and some are simply knowledgeable, flexible instructional role models. Identifying some po- tentialroutestosuccessfulleadershipisthegoalofthischapter.Oncetheseroutes are identified conceptually, we know that they could be investigated descriptively and empirically. Wearecommittedtolearningmoreaboutextensive,supportive,andeffective professional development efforts in schools—efforts that improve the work of teachers and the literacy opportunities of children. We maintain that literacy coaches can be change agents. However, we need to work harder to understand therolesthatcoachesmightplay,thechoicesthatcoachesmightmake,andtheef- fectsofthosechoicesonschools,teachers,andchildren.Weinviteyoutoaddyour voice to the voices of coaches quoted in this book (all of whom are real but pro- tectedbypseudonyms)andtoourvoices,bytacklingrealproblemsinrealschools and by writing about your successes and failures. That is the work that we have begun here. Contents CHAPTER 1. What Is a Literacy Coach? 1 LiteracyCoachasLearner 3 LiteracyCoachasGrantWriter 8 LiteracyCoachasSchool-LevelPlanner 11 LiteracyCoachasCurriculumExpert 14 LiteracyCoachasResearcher 15 LiteracyCoachasTeacher 19 TheLiteracyCoach:ANewRole 20 CHAPTER 2. What Is a Schoolwide Reading Program? 21 SchoolwideResearch 21 Assessment 24 Grouping 31 SelectionofCurriculumResources 33 AllocationofTime 36 CHAPTER 3. Reading Research 45 WhatIsSBRR,andHowCanYouGetSome? 46 PhonemicAwareness 47 Phonics 49 Fluency 53 Vocabulary 55 Comprehension 56 FindingAnswers 59 CHAPTER 4. Reading Assessment 65 TypesofTests 65 AnAssessmentStrategy 67 InterpretingGroupAssessmentScores 68 MultipleAssessmentHatsoftheLiteracyCoach 73 ImprovingGroupAchievementScores 77 AFinalWord 87 ix
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