what saying embodies how you live and what you return to?

my husband, david, gave me this advice: “follow your passion, the rest will follow. the income will follow. do what you love and make a difference in the world.”

i had started out in a business career. i did my undergraduate work at lawrence university, and then i went to harvard business school. i had a five-year business career in fortune 500 companies, but the industry was not great for women back then, some 40 years ago.

eventually, i found myself at a crossroads in my career. i was at a point where i was wondering if i should continue my work in business or if i could pursue my real passion for education and, in particular, literacy. my husband, david, and i had a two-income household and really relied on my salary.

those words of advice from david gave me courage. they led us to found 95 percent group, and they are the words that i live by and return to often. we founded the company in 2005 with a vision to provide literacy to every child.

how did your son inspire your life’s work?

our first child, brandon, was five years old and had trouble reading. he got to first grade and said, “why am i in the highest math group but in the lowest reading group?”

we talked to his teacher and that was the beginning of a major shift in my life. brandon’s teacher said brandon was fine, but i knew that he was frustrated. finally, in the spring, i said to the teacher, “he’s not fine.” and she replied to me, “he’s not a year behind so i can’t refer him for testing yet.” i was amazed and said to myself: “we really have to wait and have him continue to feel badly about himself?” so, i had him privately evaluated, which a lot of people can’t afford to do. we received a diagnosis that he is dyslexic, which led me to the international dyslexia association (ida).

i did a lot of research to try to figure out how to help him learn to read, and i realized i was touching on a big problem in our country. it also touched on my passion. i found myself at a turning point of not just wanting to help my son but also wanting to help every child learn to read well. i was an “activated parent,” but it was also important to me to advocate for all children.

i started exploring special education to figure out what was missing, but i quickly realized this was not just a special education problem. this was a general education problem related to how we were teaching children in the classroom. it was not the teacher’s fault; the system was not built to support teachers learning how to help children who struggle to read.

so, i needed to know more. i needed to learn more. as leaders, we are expected to have the answers, but it is okay to be vulnerable and say, “i don’t know!” it’s okay to recognize we don’t know what we don’t know. i wanted to know more about reading and reading intervention. i wanted to understand what it’s like for teachers and schools to teach reading.

i started my master’s in education, attended ida conferences, and volunteered in schools. and on that journey, i met louisa moats and became one of the first national trainers of letrs® (language essentials for teachers of reading and spelling, the professional learning program founded by dr. moats). she agreed to coauthor with me the book straight talk about reading: how parents can make a difference during the early years (1999). this was huge, and she was a huge role model in my work.

i believe that those things did not happen as a coincidence. it was a line of events that started with my son. the steps from there put me in the right place at the right time.

what were pivotal moments as you blazed your path?

i wrote my next book, i’ve dibel’d, now what? (2006) and, because of it, i was invited to present in a number of districts and schools. and this led to the turning point that was the beginning of 95 percent group.

one of the districts that asked me to come and do training with them on the book was seminole county in florida. i worked with them for two years. i worked closely with the district literacy leader. i trained all of the reading coaches. every single month i was a speaker for this district, and we worked on different topics. at the end of the two years, the literacy leader said to me, “can we take that lesson-plan format that is in letrs that you helped write and get the reading coaches and help them to write lesson plans on each of the skills that are in your continuum?”

i agreed to do this, and it was going to be a culminating and critical step. but we only had one day and wanted to give them all the tools they needed. so, we had all the reading coaches in the room and conducted the daylong session. the coaches were paired up to write the lesson plans with word lists. i was walking around the room and trying to answer questions and help them. after the day wrapped up, the district literacy leader and i sat down and started reading the coaches’ lesson plans. we got into them a little ways and we cried—we really cried! the lesson plans were not usable.

even with as much training as we had done, the coaches were not able to create actual lessons they could implement in the classroom. it was devastating. but it gave me a huge aha moment too: even a highly trained educator is not necessarily able to take training and translate it into writing lesson plans. that is a different skill set. we can’t expect a to equal b. that was a huge moment for me.

the district literacy leader looked at me and said, “susan, you have to write these lesson plans with your team.” and that was a turning point. i went back home and said, “wow! i had never thought of writing curricula.” i didn’t even dream that i would do that one day. but it’s important to ensure that others have access to what you know, and this would be my way of accomplishing that.

i trained thousands of teachers in letrs®. it was so important. it led me to understand that excellent 世界杯足球2022亚洲预选赛 is one part of what we need in our schools. but we also need to give teachers tools so they can implement this training in practice—and that is why 95 percent group was formed. it was because i had trained so many teachers that i knew teachers needed professional learning and then they needed to be equipped with the right tools.

how did teachers react to the initial lesson plans you developed?

we started with a curriculum on phonological awareness and then we developed what is today the 95 phonics lesson library™. teachers were so appreciative of these resources. equipping them with lesson plans meant freeing them up to listen carefully to what the student was saying and doing. the lesson plans we created, and that 95 percent group sells today, include replicable, repeatable routines that allow teachers to focus less on the process and more on the response. and they also allow students to focus less on the process and more on their learning. i finally really understood that we were doing teachers a service by giving them a set of routines—and we were doing students a service too. everyone can be more effective, and more learning can happen, with easy-to-use routines.

there was some early reaction against this approach, such as: “oh, it’s insulting to the teacher to give them scripted lessons.” i didn’t agree with that. we never, ever dishonored the teachers. the teacher was very much the center of instruction. as one of my 95 percent group colleagues, judie caroleo, said, “lesson plans are the framework from which teaching occurs.” that’s absolutely right.

and, in fact, many of the products subsequently developed at 95 percent group have been driven by the teachers who have said, “we need this” and “please do this.” we have really listened to the voice of the teacher, both the many educators inside the company and from our school partners, those people who are out there in the world helping inform what we do. that is really what allows us to take that teacher-centric approach.

what tips can you offer other changemakers?

1. follow your heart and the rest will follow.
2. seek out community; find your collaborators.
3. persevere respectfully.
4. be ready to pivot; be open to the need sometimes to change at a turning point.
5. keep learning; keep up with the science about helping children learn.
6. it’s not just what you know, but what you do, that matters.
7. share your contributions as widely as you can.

what are your takeaways from some of the most courageous leaders you’ve observed?

i learned along the way from other leaders how to create change in schools and in districts. and i appreciate the people who allowed me to learn with them, including deb warner from seminole county public schools in florida, deb lyons from brevard public schools in florida, and sharon dunn from panama-buena vista union school district in california. and these are not the only leaders that i learned from. believe me: i learned from a ton of leaders. the way i learned about how to affect change in a school and district was watching it happen in so many different places. as an observer, i could see where change was occurring, and where change was not occurring; then i could study and think about what the leader was doing to make that happen.

what was some good advice you received?

joe torgesen gave me some of the best advice. he said, “you seem determined so let me give you a piece of advice: get real. we are not going to be able to have the most qualified teachers working with struggling students. that is not a school model. so, we have to do better for all of our teachers. we need to equip every person working in schools and working in those small reading groups with what they need to help every child learn to read.”

here are susan’s 10 principles of effective leadership:

#1 data is critical.

data is critical. you need data. if you don’t have data, you can’t really get started. but it needs to be the right data.

learning shouldn’t be one person’s view of how well students are doing versus another person’s view. as a leader, always ask for data to verify that a classroom method or resource actually works in the classroom, support data collection on student learning, and seek out new data from the field.

follow up with teachers about their data and talk to them specifically about their classes. ask them, “what can i do to help you improve this data?

#2 choose new resources carefully.

you need to decide which new programs and materials to use—and it’s important to choose carefully. there are many products that purport to be based in the science of reading and they are not. we have to be wise consumers. educators don’t have a lot of extra resources so we want to make our investment count. talk to other educators and find out what works best for them. look for efficacy studies and key validations for your resources, such as essa levels and evidence for essa.

#3 get the teachers in your school to go along with you.

the leaders that i have seen in my career who have created literacy change go with the “goers.” they even choose the grade-level teams that they think will “go” with them first. so, they literally figure out and give some thought to “who are the ones who are the go-getters? who are the ones who will follow my lead?”

also, be open and supportive of different grade-level teams. yes, we want to start with the lowest grade-level teams because change happens faster and results happen faster there. but, sometimes, your kindergarten team may not come along with you right away, so don’t feel you have to start with kindergarten. you need success. success breeds success. go with the goers first.

#4 if the culture is damaged, coach people out.

there are always doubters. you can’t always get everybody to go with you. here’s my advice, which i learned from the leaders i watched: kill them with kindness and support. be kind and supportive to the doubters. but there may also be a time when you have to admit, “whoa, okay! never mind!” and the point is this: if the doubters are doing things behind the scenes to damage the culture and trying to undermine what you’re trying to accomplish, it is time to do something about it. one of the principals that i admire is a person who had to coach teachers out the door. this principal would talk to them and say: “you don’t seem to be on board with this. this is what we’re doing at this school. if you’re uncomfortable, you may want to think about transferring.”

#5 set measurable goals.

set measurable and clear goals, such as “by the end of x date, 85 percent of first graders will be in the green or blue zone.” be very concrete and then keep checking in: “are we going to make 85 percent? what will it take to make 85 percent?” set goals for each grade-level team and do this with them.

#6 be everywhere.

be everywhere. this is what i learned from lots of the principals whom i got to shadow: be everywhere. expect that you will walk the classrooms.

for instance, i had a principal who i worked with in florida, and she was  the leader of a huge building with 10 grade-level classrooms at each grade level. i asked her, “how do you keep track of when intervention is happening in each grade?” she pulled out of her pocket this little card with a schedule on it, and she said, “i keep this in my pocket every day when i walk through this building and visit the classrooms.”

you know instantly if the principal is walking the building, because if she walks in a room and everything stops, or all the kids turn around, she doesn’t walk the building very much. but if everything keeps going on all the time, regardless of whether she’s in the back of the room or not, you know she is doing this regularly.

so, you have to walk the building and walk during reading intervention time or the literacy block. you’ve got to walk. you have to attend grade-level team meetings. not all of them. you can’t
attend them all—but pick key ones.

#7 don’t take on too many initiatives.

literacy is the most important thing we can do. so focus on it. we do our teachers such a disservice when we take on too many things and ask them to take on too many things. ask them: “how can i help you clear off your plate all of the other things that are going to come your way? how can i help so you don’t take on too many initiatives at once?”

support them and help find really creative ways to celebrate successes too. we all need those small celebrations along the way.

#8 leaders should never stop learning.

keep reading all the time. learn with your teachers.

and here’s something else i’ve learned from district-level leaders: often we forget to invest in the 世界杯足球2022亚洲预选赛 of administrators. hire a one-on-one coach for the principals whose data does not reflect progress. try to help them help their building improve. it’s the same as with teachers: provide your principals with lots of support and lots of kindness.

#9 provide ongoing coaching.

teachers need coaching if you want implementation, and if you want change. coaching is the way to go, in addition to either online courses or workshops. at the district level, set goals just like you do at the building level. set goals with your principals. make sure that they have goals for each grade level. make sure they have literacy goals for the percent of students who will reach or exceed benchmark levels. then, hold your principals accountable.

#10 always keep students at the center.

make sure your decisions are student-driven. it helps in making tough decisions, and it helps you explain these changes.

what’s next for you, susan?

there are two key areas i am working on currently. the first is higher education. i want to give back in this area and especially support first-generation high school students who are going to college. i also want to give back through donations to colleges to support their important work. my second area is that i want to mentor women business owners who are finding their way and pursuing their passions like i did.

watch on demand: courageous leaders webinar series!

join laura stewart, chief academic officer of 95 percent group, as she hosts courageous leaders, a transformative webinar series featuring insightful discussions with prominent literacy changemakers. whether you’re a practiced literacy leader or newly aspiring to this role, our sessions on courageous leadership will provide the knowledge, tools, and inspiration to empower the next generation of readers and lifelong learners.

register and watch now!

presenting the one95 literacy ecosystem:

stewart provided a high-level overview of the one95 literacy ecosystem and featured some of its leading benefits, including:

1. consistency of academic language across all tiers

2. scope and sequence of skills is the same; intensity of instruction differs.

3. consistency of instructional routines allows for students to focus cognitive energy from process to learning.

4. consistency of instructional routines allows teachers to focus on student response.

5. evidence aligned to the principles and research of the science of reading (the 95 percent group litmus test)

keywords: cohesion and alignment

dr. mary dahlgren shared what the tools 4 reading team has been finding as they work with kid lips and build sound walls in classrooms. reiterating laura’s focus on cohesion and alignment, mary explained, “when children can retrieve that information easily, they can also talk about comparisons and contrasts of the sounds in our language. and we’re also developing some metacognitive skills there, which is really exciting.”

she clarified the metacognitive aspect. “in kid lips, the idea is that we have more information to retrieve by talking about what i’m doing when i’m making those gestures with my tongue in my teeth, in my lips. and our students then are able to easily connect that speech to the print.”

these are things that most teachers have not learned in their undergraduate or teacher prep programs. dahlgren emphasized that tools 4 reading products were designed to be easy to “grab and go” so teachers don’t have to spend hours learning it. the idea is they can pick up kids lips and sound walls and use these in their classroom or small group setting.

watch the replay

watch the replay to see a demonstration of the sound wall and its components and learn how the consonant chart and vowel valley work together. also understand the differences in instruction across grades and how 95 core phonics program can support students during their critical learning years. during the webinar, stewart provided a walkthrough of a lesson in the 95 phonics core program®, demonstrating the explicit instructional language in teaching the phonics closed syllable patterns with /ch/ and /sh/ consonant digraphs. she also shows a transfer-to-text process in passage reading. watch now!

learn more

are you interested in learning about how you can bring an effective and efficient structured literacy approach, grounded in the science of reading, to your school or district? contact us today.

what implementation results look like

wicomico initially piloted 95 percent group products during a hybrid school environment in 2020-2021. the school team had started the pandemic school year worried that it would be a very challenging year to try anything new like this.

“we thought the challenging school year would reap low performance in reading, no matter what we tried. but we were very pleasantly surprised,” said hall. “we saw strong progress and continue to see strong performance in student literacy scores.”

the district ​​subsequently rolled out the products to all schools the following year in 2021-2022, based upon impressive results and satisfaction with the products overall. independent efficacy studies conducted during two years demonstrated that the impact of using 95 percent group products (the treatment group) was twice the magnitude of the comparison group who used other literacy tools during 2020-2021, with effect sizes of .64 and .31 respectively. (read the efficacy reports on grades k-1 and grades 2-3.) notably the kindergartners in the treatment group saw a substantial increase of 5.5 points on their literacy scores during hybrid learning. results from 2021-2022 demonstrated that the treatment group outperformed the comparison school group in both grades.

today hall is focused on keeping up the momentum. at the beginning of the 2022-2023 school year, hall and her colleagues gave students the iready diagnostic tests and were impressed with results from their original, pilot elementary school school in particular.

“students had made strong progress and did not even have the summer slide that we thought they may,” she said.

why a literacy ecosystem? coherence, alignment, acceleration

for wicomico, the use of multiple products from the one95® literacy ecosystem®, across tiers of instruction, helped bring important efficiencies for students and educators that catalyzed student progress.

“we love that, no matter what a student needs or where they are in their reading, they learn in the same instructional routines with one95 products,” she said. “our kids are part of whole-class instruction with 95 phonics core program and then, if they need more focused help, they use the intervention materials that employ the same methods. for students, this connected experience is so much smoother. it’s like being able to talk in the same language.”

hall also commented on the benefits of the assessments, the 95 phonological awareness screener™ for intervention and the 95 phonics screener for intervention™, which help teachers pinpoint exactly where the student is with their literacy skills. teachers can then map a student’s needs directly to which resource and which lesson each student needs to work on.

“for years we had talked about intervention that is personalized and that truly meets the needs of student deficits. and this does,” she said.

she also appreciates that teachers have trust in what they’re using, knowing their approach and materials have been proven to help accelerate the development of literacy skills.

“knowing these resources are aligned with the science of reading gives our teachers great confidence in their instructional methods,” she said. “i hear all the time from our teachers how excited they are about how much progress our kids are making.

one veteran teacher in particular turned from a skeptic to believer.

“one of our second-grade teachers was really hesitant at first,” said hall. “but as she got into the instructional method, she fell in love with it and clearly saw her students make substantial progress. she now says—don’t you dare take this away!”

three tips for educators

for her colleagues in other schools, hall has three tips:

1. focus on providing strong professional learning for all of your k-3 teachers and try to personalize it. meet the needs of the teachers where they are, just as you do for your students. also educate your administrators. this change requires leadership’s understanding of the science of reading and science of learning too.
2. look at your state funding. you probably have the funding you need to make this change and support it well.
3. put your trust in the science and don’t look back. in our district, i see phonics being taught from here on. this is a long-term change, and it’s so worth it.

learn more

are you interested in learning more about wicomico county publlic school’s story? watch our on-demand webinar now: “what is a phonics ecosystem & why does it matter?” laura stewart, chief academic officer, and joni maville, director, content development, join renee hall, supervisor of k-5 reading, and barbara karsnitz, second grade teacher with wicomico county public schools in maryland, to share their literacy success story.

about dr. renee r. hall

dr. renee r. hall is the supervisor of reading and media (k-5) for wicomico county public schools, overseeing the ela curriculum in the 17 elementary schools. with a passion for reading and student achievement, she has served in this role for five years. she has been a building leader as a principal and assistant principal at various schools in wicomico county for 14 years. prior to wicomico county, she was an instructional coach, facilitator and classroom teacher in dorchester and queen anne’s county. dr. hall completed her undergraduate work at salisbury university receiving a bachelor’s degree in elementary education. she returned to salisbury university to complete her master’s degree in educational administration. finally, she accomplished her doctoral degree in educational leadership at university of maryland eastern shore. dr. hall and her husband, josh, are the proud parents of three boys, mason, parker and landry.

two key changemakers: coaching and materials

tx reads has been working with teachers, administrators, and superintendents to implement structured literacy in classrooms since 2017. starting in 2020, texas k-3 teachers and elementary principals are required to attend the texas reading academies to learn the science of teaching reading. this “macro effort” by the texas legislature is intended to drive change in instruction and materials from balanced literacy to structured literacy. the texas reading academies, however, are not a panacea. the reading academies provide teachers with extensive information about the science of teaching reading. they do not address the breadth or depth of campus and district support required to replace balanced literacy with structured literacy. in order to bridge the science of reading to classroom instruction, teachers need a range of implementation supports including instructional coaching and classroom materials that align with the science of teaching reading.

understanding the cognitive science

district leaders, including superintendents and school board members, often play central roles in establishing the district-wide environment that impacts classroom teachers and instruction. leaders and administrators must be versed in the science of reading in order to address the complex challenges associated with implementing structured literacy. in why so many kids struggle to learn natalie wexler points out that “teachers continue to be trained in ways that ignore the findings of cognitive science.” this includes leaders. understanding the cognitive science behind learning to read is critical to embracing why schools must move away from balanced literacy to structured literacy. leaders also need to be willing to tackle complex multi-year system change because structured literacy implementation truly is a heavy lift. tx reads recommends leaders create and implement a comprehensive literacy plan addressing all variables required for a successful and sustainable district-wide structured literacy implementation.

most education leaders are not trained in the science of reading. tx reads is working with our partners to develop products and services that explicitly meet the needs of leaders based on their role within the district. each training pathway systematically integrates with the other pathways to streamline efforts across the district. this vertical and horizontal alignment of efforts at various levels within the organization reduces conflicts and increases efficiencies.

individual and incremental training solutions for educators will not produce the change required to address the “economic imperative” to create a literate workforce. tx reads is therefore dedicated to providing affordable and scalable solutions that make a range of science-of-reading training and tools accessible to educators who serve critical roles within school districts. this, of course, is exactly what structured literacy is intended to do for children.

learn more

if you are interested in learning more about 95 韩国vs葡萄牙欧赔 , please contact us today.  to learn more about districtwide structured literacy implementation, contact tx reads.

about pamela toman

pamela toman cofounded literacy san antonio, inc./tx reads to systematically improve children’s reading outcomes. literacy san antonio, inc. (dba tx reads) is ranked in the top 5 of non-esc texas reading academies. tx reads uses reading data, reading research and advanced business systems to develop and administer effective and affordable 21st century learning programs and services for in-service educators. she has worked with university faculty, reading researchers, public school administrators and elementary teachers to systematically change early reading instruction to align with the science of teaching reading.

about laura stewart

laura stewart, chief academic officer, is a nationally recognized science of reading and structured literacy advocate and expert who serves as the company’s spokesperson and continues to build its thought leadership position in the literacy market. stewart has dedicated her career to improving literacy achievement at leading education companies including the reading league, highlights education group, and rowland reading foundation.