The Waterford Institute’s i3 Summer Slide Study e Waterford CURRICULUM Participating Rural School Districts Beaver District, Daggett District Duchesne District Emery District Garfield District Grand District Kane District Millard District North Sanpete District North Summit District Piute District Rich District San Juan District Sevier District South Sanpete District South Summit District Tintic District Wayne District Background ‘The “summer slide” is acknowledged by educators as a very real concern. While children make great learning progress in school, if they do not continue to have access to learning resources or activities during the summer, they can lose much of what they have learned during the school year, (the estimated loss can be as much as three months). On the other hand, children who do have ‘access to educational resources and opportunities can maintain what they have learned and even progress in their knowledge! ‘The Waterford Research Institute currently is the recipient of an i3 Validation grant that had two goals: preparing children for Kindergarten and maintaining what they learn in school during the summer months. Children from Utah’s 18 most rural school districts have recently completed their pre-K year and have started Kindergarten. Now Waterford is turning toward the summer learning portion of the grant which will happen in the summers of 2016, 2017, and 2018. We are turning to Kindergarten and First grade teachers to assist with recruiting children to participate. All teachers need to do is make parents aware of the opportunity either at parent/teacher conferences or in general by sending home information to parents and guardians. Waterford and the grant-funded district liaisons will take it from there!About Waterford Early Learning Programs ‘The Waterford Institute, a non-profit research center founded in 1976 with the goal of providing high-quality educational models, programs, and software, began developing its Waterford Early Learning programs in the early 1990s. For example, the Waterford Early Reading Program (WERP), first released by the Institute in 1998, offers a comprehensive computer-adaptive reading curriculum for pre-kindergarten through 2"-grade students. WERP is divided into three levels, each of which is designed to address reading skills at a specific grade level; children encounter material from earlier or later levels if they demonstrate themselves to be behind or ahead of other students in their age group. The WERP software presents a wide range of multimedia-based activities in an adaptive sequence tailored to each student's initial placement and his or her individual rate of growth. Its instructional “strands” include phonological awareness, phonics, comprehension and vocabulary, reading fluency and language concepts (print concepts, grammar, and mechanics of written and spoken language). ‘According to some researchers, it is the cumulative, sequential nature of reading skills that accounts for much of the difficulty lower-performing students experience when trying to catch up to their peers (Bast & Reitsma, 1998; Snow et al, 1998). Fluent reading and comprehension require students to have acquired a core set of early skills, many of which build on one another and need to be learned more or less in order (Heuston, 2008). In order to account for this complex but largely sequential process, the Early Reading Program adapts its instruction both within and between activities; the program is capable of delaying the introduction of new concepts if sufficient progress has not been made in other areas, even if the two are not in the same instructional “strand.” Effectiveness Studies The program has been formally assessed in a variety of schools and districts of varying size, location, and socioeconomic status. While the methods, sample sizes, and measures of these studies differ widely, the results are consistent in supporting the software's considerable effectiveness. Recent studies have tested the program among kindergartners living in poverty (Hecht and Close, 2002), English-language-learning kindergartners (Powers & Price-Johnson, 2006), suburban kindergartners. (Cassady & Smith, 2003), and suburban first graders (Cassady & Smith, 2005). The program has demonstrated remarkable strength and adaptability under this renewed and broadened scrutiny.° Hecht and Close (Florida Atlantic University) a eeu keen eet Effect Size (ES) Nene age and Smith oe acum tate University) ‘The following page includes a brief overview of the summer slide program. We hope you will feel free to contact us or your i3 District Liaison with questions. We will be producing a program flyer and sending the information to you in early fall when your district liaison meets with you to discuss your observations of the children who were in the UPSTART pre-K program. Thank you for yourv v Other than and the i3 District Liaison will take care of everything! Thanks for your help, ‘The Waterford Summer Slide program will be available for three summers for children: Y completing Kindergarten in May 2016 ¥ completing 1" grade in May 2017 Y completing 2 grade in May 2018 Up to 70% of the children in these groups are eligible to participate. (Note: Because of their small size, Piute, Daggett, Tintic, Wayne, and Rich Districts may have 100% participation if there is interest.) Children who participated in UPSTART pre-K will be given priority if there are more children interested than there are slots for the summer. Parents/Guardians can choose for their child the Waterford reading software, the math/science software, or BOTH (with the “both” option, the reading must be done first). A short training (either in-person or virtual) is required, but there is no “graduation.” Children will NOT be tested by Waterford; district DIBELS scores will be used to evaluate the program. Children must use the program 15 minutes a day, four or five days a week for the three summer months. Parents/Guardians can fill out a simple paper form or call or email Waterford to indicate interest in participating. ‘The summer program begins June 1 and ends August 31. “Registration” for summer study must be completed by April 15 to allow time for Internet, connection by program start date. Waterford is responsible for registering the children, Internet and a Chromebook can be provided by the grant for the three months of the program. In early Fall 2015, a program overview will be sent to teachers to use in parent conferences or to send home with children. -ussing the program with parents, there is nothing required of teachers. Waterford Claudia Miner Ann zo {3 Grant Director Managing Director of UPSTART (801)349-2348 (801)349-2307 claudiaminer@waterford.org annizzo@waterford.org