Students at H.E. Bourgoin Middle School are hooked on books.
Thanks to the Accelerated Reading (AR) program and Star Assessment, youth at the school are growing their reading abilities and their passion for it as well.
“I like doing Star reading because it will test my reading comprehension and shows your personal reading range,” said Grade 5 student Chloe Eberly. “Every time you do a Star reading, your reading level will change. For example, my reading level has went up a lot from reading and this program. I went up two grade levels.”
Grade 5 students from H.E.B., along with their teacher Kacie Nault and librarian Cheryl Edwards, were at the Northern Lights Public Schools (NLPS) board meeting on May 30 to inform division staff and trustees about the benefits of the program.
Since first implementing the program, Edwards said they’ve seen impressive results.
“We saw a 17 per cent increase of students reading at or above benchmark. The one that makes my heart burst with pride is with our urgent intervention students. We went from 22 per cent of our Grade 5 students, and we had a decrease of 14 per cent down to eight per cent. Every student passed an AR quiz. Some students had never passed a test or a quiz or anything in their life. This gave them the opportunity to taste success, and they liked it.”
An online resource, the Star Assessment program allows teachers to track their students’ growth in reading and comprehension. Using the results, Nault explained that she forms guided reading groups in her class based on which areas students need help in.
“When you pull some of these reports, they give you strategies on how to help the students within those guided reading groups,” Nault told the board.
She added, “We do three different assessments throughout the year, and that’s how the kids will know they’re growing. They know what colour sticker to pick in the library, so that colour coordinates with a reading level.”
AR is also an online program through the same company, Renaissance. Through AR, students choose a book title and, upon completion of the story, they’re given a short quiz to complete. Once all the questions are answered, the students receive instant feedback on how well they did and which questions they got wrong.
“As a parent, rather than having to wait for your student to tell you how they’re doing, or a teacher to get in contact with you, you can actually sign up for email notifications. As soon as your child takes a quiz you get an email with results,” explained Edwards.
The program took off in classrooms at H.E.B., and has continued to grow. As of last Tuesday, the school had collectively read and completed quizzes on 8,067 books – about twice as many as they read in their first year running AR.
“At the start of this year, I struggled with reading. But, AR pushed me to read more often and I’m more confident in my reading now,” Grade 5 student Riley Cumby said.
AR goals are student-specific, and help to ensure the students are growing in not just the number of books they’re reading, but also improving their comprehension of what they’re reading. As a reward for reaching their goals, students get to go on trips such as to the bowling alley in Cold Lake or making pizzas at Express Pizza.
“I like AR because it pushes you to reach your goals and you get to go on fun trips if you reach it,” said Grade 5 student Javier Voyevoda. “Another reason I like AR is that it makes reading a fun challenge.”
Student Ameera Arabi added, “I like AR because it pushes me to reach my AR goal and read books at my reading level. Another reason I like it is because we each get our own individual goals and if we reach it, we get to go on fun trips.”
For Nault, she gets emotional when she sees the leaps and bounds her students have made in their reading abilities and their passion for books.
“The reason that I like AR, the biggest reason, is that the students in my class want to read,” she told the board. “My kids eat and breathe AR in my class. We have an AR board and we probably update it three times a day. If I don’t update it for a couple of days, they’re asking me, ‘Can we update it? Can we update it?’”
While it’s a subscription service that the school pays for, Edwards said when you see how much it’s helped students with their reading, it’s “priceless.”
