Erie 3rd-grade reading scores are improving as 'marathon' toward proficiency continues
Reading scores for Erie third-graders are improving.
And that's good news for their future prospects in school and beyond.
Third grade is a kind of watershed year in education. Through third grade, children are learning to read. After that, they are reading to learn — about math, science, history, geography and other subjects, according to the Children's Reading Foundation, a national nonprofit dedicated to helping children read well.
"Reading is the most crucial academic skill because it is the foundation for learning," according to the reading foundation.
Children struggling to read after third grade might face significant hurdles ahead, in school and even in later life. They're almost six times more likely than proficient readers to drop out or not finish high school on time, according to a landmark multi-year study by the Annie E. Casey Foundation in 2011.
Researchers found that 23% of children reading at below-basic proficiency in third grade failed to graduate with their peers, compared to 9% of children with basic reading skills and 4% of proficient readers.
And that can translate to lower earnings as adults.
How Erie third-graders scored
Students' reading skills are ranked as below-basic, basic, proficient or advanced based on their scores in the Pennsylvania System of School Assessment English language arts test given in third through eighth grade.
In 2022-2023 testing, 34.6% of Erie third-graders scored below-basic standards for reading proficiency, according to data presented to Erie school directors in September.
About 42% scored in the basic range.
Twenty-two percent scored as proficient.
Just over 1% scored as advanced.
Numbers on the rise
The scores aren't great. But the numbers are improving with fewer students scoring below basic and advancing toward proficiency in recent years:
Below-basic
34.6% in 2022-23
40.4% in 2021-22
41.4% in 2020-21
Basic
41.9% in 2022-23
40.5% in 2021-22
37.9% in 2020-21
Proficient
22.1% in 2022-23
18% in 2021-22
18.9% in 2020-21
Advanced
1.4% in 2022-23
1.1% in 2021-22
1.8% in 2020-21
"We've seen pretty nice shifts and growth in that third-grade group and are seeing significant gains in kids moving from below-basic into basic," said Karin Ryan, Erie School District's director of educational services. "And obviously we want kids in the basic range to move into proficient and advanced."
It won't be accomplished overnight.
"It's like a marathon," Ryan said. "You're not going to finish a marathon just by lacing up your shoes and taking a lap or two around the block. Racing 26 miles isn't that easy. It's kind of the same thing with schooling and (proficient) test scores."
Pandemic effect may linger
While third-grade reading scores are improving, they haven't rebounded to pre-pandemic levels.
Thirty-four percent of Erie third-graders were proficient or advanced readers in 2018-29, before COVID-19 required the shift to remote learning. At the other end of the scale, fewer students, 29.9%, scored below-basic in reading proficiency compared to later years.
Last year's third-graders were in kindergarten when the pandemic began and may have been the most adversely affected by interrupted learning.
"During the pandemic, one of the things that was the most difficult for educators across the country was teaching children how to read," Ryan said.
"Last year's third-graders were out of school part of their kindergarten year, had a wonky first-grade year when they were back in school and then out again, and then were finally back in second grade. They had a lot of interrupted learning, and yet they're starting to make these gains."
What's being done to help kids: Curriculum and training
Just before the pandemic, Erie School District approved a new core curriculum based on the "science of reading," or worldwide research on how we learn to read.
Erie teachers and administrators were trained in the science of reading, also called structured literacy.
"We've been working really hard, not just to get these materials in front of our teachers and leaders but for them to understand how the brain learns to read," Ryan said.
Instruction focuses on sounding out and recognizing words and coupling that with instruction in language comprehension — the background knowledge and vocabulary needed to make sense of words.
"They're two strands of the rope that have to come together to make proficient readers," Ryan said. "There's the phonics or word recognition strand and the language comprehension strand of building a robust vocabulary, knowledge and background.
"You need both strands for proficient reading," Ryan said. "If I can't recognize words, if I can't pull words from a page, it doesn't matter how much knowledge and background I have. And if I can pull words from a page but don't have any glue for them to stick to, my comprehension is going to be poor."
K-2 students work on sounding out and recognizing words for an hour each day. For another hour, they learn about Egypt, pyramids and ancient civilizations, for instance, to increase their knowledge and vocabulary. In third grade, children weave the strands of learning together in a two-hour block of literacy instruction.
The district is ahead of the curve on the new approach. The Pennsylvania Legislature last year mandated structured literacy training within three years for all educators involved in teaching students to read. The law also requires colleges and universities to teach structured literacy to education students.
Focused after-school and summer programs
New in the Erie School District last school year were after-school and summer school programs geared for children struggling to read.
"We re-evaluated our after-school programs and our summer programming," Ryan said. "What we chose to do is gear them for kids that are not reading at grade level and also to be more strategic in recruiting the kids who need the programming the most.
"It was no longer, hey, if you want to come, come."
The "Anchor" after-school program, offered Tuesday through Thursday from 2:45 to 5 p.m., included 45 minutes of small-group instruction in word recognition and language comprehension coordinated to the lessons that children were working on in school.
"If they were learning about pyramids in school, after-school readings had to do with pyramids so that they were getting more vocabulary and background knowledge," said Holly Northrup. Northrup and Melanie Miller are supervisors of elementary content for Erie's 10 elementary schools.
After-school sessions also included programs and activities, including visits by planetarium and children's museum staff, to help children boost their vocabulary and comprehension.
The six-week "Sail" summer program held Monday through Friday from 8:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. at all 10 Erie elementary schools also provided word recognition and language comprehension instruction as well as enrichment activities.
And as in the after-school program, students were rewarded for attending.
"Especially through the summer, a lot of things can be enticing to families, so we had the extra challenge of how to get children to our buildings every day," said Miller. "And so we built in student and also family incentives in appreciation for parents who got their children to the program every day."
Incentives included bookbags, T-shirts, water bottles, and Erie Zoo and Splash Lagoon tickets. Field trips, including outings to the zoo, Presque Isle, a roller rink and bowling alley, also encouraged students to attend the non-mandatory summer session.
"We can do programming until the cows come home, but if kids don't attend they're not going to be as successful," Ryan said.
What parents can do to help
Parents can help children sound out and recognize words and improve their language comprehension by reading to and with their kids.
Imagination Libraries at most schools provide free books that parents and children can read at home.
Erie families also have access to grade-appropriate books through a CKLA Hub on the children's school laptops. Individualized "Boost" programs to help children improve reading skills are also available on the laptops.
Parents of K-5 students will be able to see how their children are performing when results of benchmark literacy assessments are sent home three times through the school year.
"Parents should expect reports to come home from school on their child's individual reading progress," Ryan said. "When parents get the reports, they should contact their child's teacher for more information and actionable ideas on how they can help their kids."
Results of the first assessment are expected to be sent home to parents by the end of September.
The most recent state data for other districts
The Pennsylvania Department of Education has not yet finalized PSSA test results statewide for 2022-23 and is still collecting data, according to a department spokesperson.
In 2021-22, the most recent results finalized by the Department of Education, here's how third-graders in other Erie County school Districts scored in reading. In districts with more than one elementary school, individual school scores were added and averaged to find district-wide scores. Scores were rounded to the nearest whole number.
Corry Area
Below basic: 24%
Basic: 27%
Proficient: 43%
Advanced: 5%
Fairview
Below basic: 7%
Basic: 24%
Proficient: 51%
Advanced: 18%
Fort LeBoeuf
Below basic: 6%
Basic: 20%
Proficient: 52%
Advanced: 22%
General McLane
Below basic: 7%
Basic: 24%
Proficient: 53%
Advanced: 15%
Girard
Below basic: 13%
Basic: 26%
Proficient: 48%
Advanced: 13%
Harbor Creek
Below basic: 9%
Basic: 20%
Proficient: 53%
Advanced: 19%
Iroquois
Below basic: 22%
Basic: 30%
Proficient: 37%
Advanced: 10%
Millcreek Township
Below basic: 8%
Basic 25%
Proficient: 48%
Advanced: 19%
North East
Below basic: 7%
Basic: 29%
Proficient: 47%
Advanced: 17%
Northwestern
Below basic: 10%
Basic: 34%
Proficient: 38%
Advanced: 19%
Union City Area
Below basic: 15%
Basic: 23%
Proficient: 49%
Advanced: 14%
Wattsburg Area
Below basic: 13%
Basic: 29%
Proficient: 48%
Advanced: 10%
Statewide
Below basic: 18%
Basic: 30%
Proficient: 41%
Advanced: 12%
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Contact Valerie Myers at vmyers@timesnews.com.
This article originally appeared on Erie Times-News: Erie 3rd-grade reading scores are rising in 'marathon' to proficiency
