Apprentice Reading – Equipping Parents to Prevent the “Summer Set-Back”
Format
Individual Presentation
First Presenter's Institution
University of Georgia
Second Presenter's Institution
NA
Third Presenter's Institution
NA
Fourth Presenter's Institution
NA
Fifth Presenter's Institution
NA
Location
Plimsoll
Strand #1
Academic Achievement & School Leadership
Strand #2
Family & Community
Relevance
Strand 1 (academic) - This proposal describes a research-proven method to prevent and even reverse the summer reading set-back for struggling readers.
Strand 5 (family & community) - The Apprentice reading method of helping struggling readers described in this proposal uses parents or community volunteers as reading partners. Recent research with parent partners suggests that Apprentice reading not only benefits the target child, but can positively influence family reading practices and sometimes "spills over" to help younger children in the family as well.
Brief Program Description
Struggling readers typically lose reading skill over the summer, accounting for up to 80% of the “achievement gap,” especially for poorer children. Learn how parents or volunteers, with only limited training and support, can use Apprentice Reading, a natural, enjoyable, research-proven method, to effectively prevent “summer set-back,” and help many students actually gain reading skill and motivation over the summer, and throughout the school year.
Summary
In Apprentice Reading, a novice struggling reader reads self-chosen books or other reading materials with an adult “reading partner" for 20-30 minutes at least two-three times a week. The novice and adult partner alternate lines or pages, depending on the reading level of the text and the skill and confidence of the struggling reader; if reading skill is very low, the struggling reader can simply read all the words he or she knows, while the adult partner reads the rest. During his or her “turn” the adult partner models fluent and expressive reading and may call the novice’s attention to interesting pictures, characters, plot elements or themes in a natural way, just as any two people might discuss a book they are reading. While the novice is reading, the partner helps with the decoding of difficult words, provides explanations of unknown vocabulary or difficult passages, and in other ways scaffolds the reading experience so that the novice reader is able to accomplish the authentic task of reading a personally interesting text which would have been beyond his or her independent capabilities.
Essential elements of Apprentice Reading include:
- The child chooses whatever he/she wants to read!
- The child and adult take turns reading--lines, paragraphs, pages, even word-by-word, if necessary.
- During the child's turn, the adult (unobtrusively) supports the child's reading.
- They discuss, question, wonder, and enjoy the reading.
- The focus stays on what they are reading, not how the child is reading.
In this presentation, educators, librarians, and community activists will learn how to do Apprentice Reading themselves and how to teach and support parents in Apprentice Reading with their own children. They will also learn how to start an Apprentice Reading program using volunteers in their own schools, libraries or communities--including common ways to recruit volunteers, effective management tips, and ways to avoid pitfalls discovered by earlier implementers. Sample forms and materials to use with parents and volunteers, as well as an explanation of the extensive research base that supports Apprentice Reading, will also be provided.
Evidence
Eight studies of Apprentice Reading completed over more than a decade of research have demonstrated its efficacy with struggling elementary readers. The most recently published study (Author, 2016) involved 21 parents and 22 novice or struggling readers, recruited from one non-Title 1 and three Title 1 schools, who did Apprentice Reading at home for up to eleven weeks one summer. Based on pre- and post- standardized testing, only one child lost one month’s equivalent in composite reading skill, and two children remained at the same level, while 19 children showed average gains of two to five months in grade-equivalent scores during the summer.
In addition, the basic elements of the Apprentice Reading process are supported by a growing theoretical consensus among reading researchers about “what matters” in helping children, especially those who struggle, become skillful, confident, lifelong readers.
Biographical Sketch
Nancy Flanagan Knapp has been lucky enough to work in education as a teacher and scholar, learning from and with her colleagues and students, for over 40 years and in a variety of settings. At the University of Georgia now, she teaches pre-service and in-service teachers, librarians and other educators, and does research on innovative teaching methods, teacher professional development, and ways to motivate and help struggling students, especially in reading and writing.
Keyword Descriptors
Summer reading, struggling readers, parent involvement, volunteer programs
Presentation Year
2017
Start Date
3-8-2017 11:15 AM
End Date
3-8-2017 12:30 PM
Recommended Citation
Knapp, Nancy Flanagan, "Apprentice Reading – Equipping Parents to Prevent the “Summer Set-Back”" (2017). National Youth Advocacy and Resilience Conference. 136.
https://digitalcommons.georgiasouthern.edu/nyar_savannah/2017/2017/136
Apprentice Reading – Equipping Parents to Prevent the “Summer Set-Back”
Plimsoll
Struggling readers typically lose reading skill over the summer, accounting for up to 80% of the “achievement gap,” especially for poorer children. Learn how parents or volunteers, with only limited training and support, can use Apprentice Reading, a natural, enjoyable, research-proven method, to effectively prevent “summer set-back,” and help many students actually gain reading skill and motivation over the summer, and throughout the school year.
