Evaluating the Effectiveness of Reading Recovery Program of Marva

Elementary School

A Case Study

by
Carl Laurence Almiranes
Ypriel Jane Luna
April Joy Darunday
Leonila Cornelia

Submitted to:
Ma’am Roselyn Clemen
2022

Introduction
 The more reading is practiced, the more powerful and adaptable it becomes as a
problem-solving and message-acquiring activity (Clay, 1998). Making sure that every
student learns to read fluently, independently, and with comprehension is one of the
main tasks placed before educators today. Nevertheless, even in the best
circumstances, some students find it difficult to learn to read, regardless of the
instructor, the plan, or the technique used.
Reading can be challenging for middle school students due to their varied and
wide-ranging primary learning experiences and abilities, which they bring to school
every day. Different teaching strategies and methods are needed in the classroom due
to the wide range of student needs and abilities. Over time, scholars and teachers have
sought to determine the effectiveness of various reading techniques and strategies in
assisting students in developing their reading skills and becoming independent readers
(Slavin, 1995). These initiatives served as the starting point for discussions and
arguments about whether intervention or corrective programs have a positive or
negative impact on students' reading outcomes. There is widespread agreement among
researchers that early intervention is preferred to remediation among the discussions
and disagreements (Aldridge, 2000).
A Reading Recovery program was implemented by the administrators and
reading teachers of this middle school in an effort to raise reading proficiency among
seventh-graders during the spring semester. The intervention consisted of a thorough
reading program that used effective teacher preparation along with research-based
teaching techniques. Since 1999, classrooms all over the nation have been using the
Reading Recovery program. Study after study demonstrated that this Reading Recovery
program improved students' reading abilities. The issue was a lack of knowledge about
the Reading Recovery program's efficacy. The Reading Recovery program was put in
place by the program administrators to assess and raise the reading proficiency of at-
risk students.
It has been demonstrated that emergent literacy and intervention programs like
Reading Recovery and Success for All are very effective with elementary school
students who are performing below grade level (Allington, Stuetzel, Shake, & Lamarche,
2000; Clay, 1998;Donmoyer & Kos, 1996; Perfetti & Curtis, 1995; Pinnell, 1996;
Reutzel, 1999). At the moment, there is a dearth of thorough research on effective
reading instruction programs for at-risk adolescents. This study adds to our
understanding of adolescent literacy. According to VanKleeck (1998), the literacy
development of a 12-year-old in middle school or a 17-year-old in high school is as
serious a concern to society as the literacy development of a child in preschool or a
child in the elementary grades. Consequently, little will change to support and extend
the literacy development in these older students without significant changes in the
planning and implementation of curriculum programs.
This study's objectives were to specify requirements for and assess the efficacy
of the Reading Recovery program for at-risk middle school students. The results were
used for program improvement based on the evaluation and literature review findings,
and they will serve as a future reference for educators and administrators. The program
was created with a lot of work from central office administrators, reading coordinators,
principals, reading specialists, teachers, and a parent liaison. This applied dissertation
also looked at information that might be useful for evaluating the program or planning
future curricula.

Questions and Answers

 Interviewee: Jingky Surue Dimaano
Reading Coordinator
Question 1: What is the Reading Recovery Program?
Answer: It is an intense one-on-one intervention program used with the lowest-scoring
readers in the first grade.

Sub 1: How effective is the program?

Answer: It is a highly effective short-term intervention of one-to-one tutoring for low-
achieving first grades.

Sub 2: Who is/are involved in the reading recovery?

Answer: The persons involved in the reading recovery program are the reading
coordinator who facilitates the program and teachers who undergo training for Reading
Recovery Program who perform the assistance in the pupils in terms of reading.

Sub 3: How do you select the pupils that are going to participate in the program?
Answer: We ran a pre-test wherein we measure the ability of pupil to read through
reading test and then I select all student one by one according to their level of reading
ability.

Question 2: What are the alternatives you impose?

Answer: Reading can be time-consuming and a strain on the eyes. Here are the seven
alternatives to becoming smarter in reading.
 YouTube videos
 Online
 Textbook
 Audiobooks
 Reading materials
 Story
 Poetry

Sub 1: What strategies and interventions would you use to help struggling readers?
Answer: Know individual students. Effective teacher knows their student
 Plan according to the developmental levels of students
 Assess students throughout the lessons.
 Provide consistent one-on-one or small group intervention.

Sub 2: Which is the most effective reading method?

Answer: The best reading technique are the following, scheming, scanning, active
reading, detailed reading, and structure proposition evaluation.

Sub 3: What makes remedial activities active?

Answer: Activities and programs aimed at helping students with learning difficulties or
supporting students that may need to develop better learning skills as well as master
content.
Question 3. How does your school conduct the evaluation of the reading recovery?
Answer: Conduct independent evaluation. Present a summative process and outcome
evaluation of reading recovery. The pre-test we conduct before the Reading Recover
and post-test after a week also helps us in evaluating. The scores of the two tests were
then compared and analyzed and come up with a result.

Sub 1. Who are involved in the evaluation?

Answer: Reading-teachers on reading evaluation and evaluation coordinator.

Sub 2: How many hours and days does the evaluation take?
Answer: Marva ES. evaluates a week after the Reading Recovery for a week of
observation to complete the evaluation and then determine if the Reading Recovery
program is a success.

Sub 3: How many stages are there in the reading recovery?

Answer: The reading recovery partnership operates on three levels specially trained
teachers work with individual grade one students for part of their teaching day. Three
stages combined form is known as stages of reading. Besides, reading influences how
much an individual remembers and understand the text. The three stages of reading are
pre-reading, through reading, pose reading.

Sub 4: What are the results of the evaluation?

Answer: There has been an increase in the level of their reading ability to almost all of
the graduates but 1 out of every 10 pupils were not able to meet the passing score of
the post-test being conducted.

Sub 1: What changes have you observed in pupil’s participating in the Reading
Recovery program as they work in the classroom?
Answer: They have more confidence in trying to read and excited and interested in
books and reading compared to before the Reading Recovery Program happened.

Sub 2: What do parents of Reading Recovery pupil’s say about the Reading Recovery
program.
Answer: The parents commented that the program helps their child in improving
reading ability and that kind of activity must be regulating more often to continue their
child’s development in reading even when little by little.
Sub 3: How has Reading Recovery affected your pupil's experience in school?
Answer: They become more participative and attentive in the discussion.

Related Studies
 Investigating the Effectiveness of a Reading Recovery Program for At-Risk
Students in an Alternative School Setting. Alderman, Clyde E., Jr., 2008: Applied
Dissertation, Nova Southeastern University, Fischler School of Education and Human
Services. High Risk Students/Child Behavior/Reading Research/Grade 7/Grade 8 This
applied dissertation was designed to evaluate a Reading Recovery program at an
alternative school in Florida. The Reading Recovery program was used as an
intervention for improving students’ reading skills and performances on the Florida
Comprehensive Assessment Test (FCAT) that is given each year to students in Grades
7 and 8. The researcher used the students’ scores on the FCAT reading and English
language arts tests to evaluate the effectiveness of the Reading Recovery program as
an intervention in the researchers’ school district. Each year, students were placed in
the remedial reading class because they failed to achieve a passing score on the test in
the previous years. Prior to this study, no data had been available to evaluate the
effectiveness of a Reading Recovery program of at-risk students’ academic
performances. As a result of this applied dissertation, the researcher sought to assist
the school in becoming more effective and efficient in implementing the Reading
Recovery program. This study represents the school’s attempt to evaluate the
effectiveness of a Reading Recovery program implemented by every teacher in Grades
7 and 8. The evaluation results suggested that a Reading Recovery program was
successful in reducing the number of at-risk students. The researcher was able to
determine that the school had decided what needed to be done in order to improve the
at-risk students’ FCAT scores. Also, the researcher found that the majority of the
teachers implemented the program as it was designed. The findings also suggested that
the teachers who participated in the program viewed it as beneficial. The findings further
indicated that the teachers now view assessments as an important piece in identifying
individual student needs. (Alderman, Jr., 2008)
Traditional solutions to reading problems have not adequately addressed reading
difficulties. Many students in the lower 20% of the reading level of their class have far
reaching academic and social problems that lead to dropping out of school, entering
special education classes, becoming frustrated, and possibly becoming discipline
problems. This study examined the Reading Recovery Program at Main Street School
in Shelbyville, Illinois. Specific study objectives were measurements of student test data
and progress for the 1992-1993 school year. Measurements were performed using a
pre- and post-testing method. A survey questionnaire was used to gather data from
Reading Recovery teachers. Measurability climaxed when a student "graduated" from
the program and returned to a regular classroom reading class at average or better
level in reading. The effectiveness of the program was evident through the success of
children gaining reading skills, including reading accuracy, self-correction, identifying
letters, and using concepts about print. All terms relevant to the Reading Recovery
program were addressed and defined within the study. Delimitations were imposed on
the Shelbyville sampling. (Hohenstein, 1994)
There are so many different intervention programs for educators to use to
increase the reading achievement of below grade level students, that it can often be
difficult to choose the appropriate one for the students. Most programs are scripted and
are used with small groups of students. Reading Recovery is not a scripted program
and is taught in a one on-one setting. It is often criticized for its effectiveness due to the
smaller number of students that are able to receive services. It becomes a matter of
quantity of students over the quality of the instruction. The casual-comparative design
was used with a quantitative research method to determine the effects of the Reading
Recovery program on first grade students

. The MAP test for the 2014-2015 academic year was the measuring tool used by
the researcher for this study. The MAP test was given in the fall, winter and spring. The
gains from the fall to spring of Reading Recovery students and students who received
services through another program were compared. The results of the research showed
that students who received Reading Recovery as their intervention program made
higher gains in reading than students who were taught using another program. (Case,
2015)
To compare the efficacy of instructional programs for adult learners with basic
reading skills below the seventh grade level, 300 adults were randomly assigned to one
of three supplementary tutoring programs designed to strengthen decoding and fluency
skills, and gains were examined for the 148 adult students who completed the program.
The three intervention programs were based on or adapted from instructional programs
that have been shown to benefit children with reading levels similar to those of the adult
sample. Each program varied in its relative emphasis on basic decoding versus reading
fluency instruction. A repeated measures MANOVA confirmed small to moderate
reading gains from pre- to post-testing across a battery of targeted reading measures,
but no significant relative differences across interventions. An additional 152
participants who failed to complete the intervention differed initially from those who
persisted. Implications for future research and adult literacy instruction are discussed.
(Jardine, 1992)
It is imperative that students learn to read in the early grades, yet many fail to do
so in developing countries. Early grade reading interventions have emerged as a
common means to attempt to address this problem. This paper presents a definition of
early grade reading interventions as interventions that employ a combination of five
components: at a minimum, they must train teachers to teach reading using simplified
instructional techniques and evidence-based curricula. In addition, they typically include
in-class coaching and the provision of instructional guidelines, instructional materials, or
tools for student assessment. To develop a better understanding of the effectiveness of
the interventions, the paper summarizes evidence from 18 early grade reading
interventions, occurring across a large variety of contexts, including four World Bank
regions and three World Bank income groups. The study finds that early grade reading
interventions are consistently effective, although not infallible. The large majority had
highly significant impacts on at least one reading subtask. However, only for a few
interventions were effect sizes large enough to equate to more than a year's worth of
schooling or create fluent readers on average. The cost of implementation varied
widely, but some programs were highly cost-effective. Some programs failed to achieve
impact altogether, although these programs were in the minority. In short, early grade
reading interventions are not a guaranteed means to improve reading, and they rarely
lead to fluency over a short span of time, but they are a mostly reliable means to make
significant improvements in literacy over a short period of time. (Graham, Jimmy; Kelly,
Sean., 2018)

Discussion
 The study focused on determine through evaluation if the Reading Recovery
Program of Marva Elementary was effective and successful. Three (3) stages were
imposed during the program namely the pre-reading, through reading, pose reading.
The reading-teacher conducted a pre-test before the program was implemented and
then conduced post-test after almost a week of engaging in the normal classroom
discussion. The scores of the two tests were then compared and analyzed to determine
whether Reading Recovery students or students receiving intervention services improve
their reading ability.
Summative process and outcome evaluation of reading recovery also help the
reading-teachers and evaluation coordinator through individual evaluation and test to
affirmed that there has been an increase in the level of their reading ability to almost all
of the graduates of the Reading Recovery program. It was also determined that 1 out of
every 10 pupils were not able to meet the passing score of the post-test being
conducted. They also impose other techniques in helping their pupils on improving their
reading ability such as scheming, scanning, active reading, detailed reading, and
structure proposition evaluation.
Upon the result, the teachers at Marva Elementary School indicated that the
Reading Recovery Program is effective in combating the issue of difficulties in reading
of pupils in their school.
 Conclusion

This study represented the school’s attempt to evaluate the effectiveness of a

reading program that was implemented by selected teacher in kinder to grades 1-2. The
evaluation results suggested that the Reading Recovery program was successful in
reducing the number of pupils that are not able to read. The findings also suggested
that the teachers who participated in the program viewed the program as beneficial. The
findings further indicated that the teachers now view assessments as an important piece
in identifying individual student needs. There were a large number of students who did
achieve academic proficiency, the researcher concluded that the Reading Recovery
program did make statistically significant differences in improving the reading of the
pupils that are not able to read.
Through the different learning techniques, the said program become more
effective. Frequency of reading instruction did appear to impact student progress and
there seemed to be a relationship between teacher confidence and effectiveness. This
study also showed the need for further training in order to improve student progress in
reading. Special education teachers require specific skills and knowledge in order to
meet the literacy needs of students with difficulties in reading.
In the final analysis, care should be given for the pupils who have difficulties in
reading. There are pupils who have severe difficulties that may only be able to learn
functional reading through one on one teaching. However, conclusions as to ability
should not be formed without at least giving students at any age the chance to learn and
perform using a variety of methods and materials. Decisions about which reading
approaches to utilize, should be based on the needs, abilities, and desires of the
students. The study shows that students will benefit from a well-balanced, integrated
approach if only given the chance.
 References

Alderman, Jr. , E. (2008). Investigating the Effectiveness of a Reading Recovery

Program for At-Risk Students in an Alternative School Setting. The Keep Eastern Illinois
University: Institution Respiratory. Retrieved December 7, 2022, from
https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED506205.pdf

Case, M. (2015). The Impact of Reading Recovery on The Reading Achievement of

First Grade Students. The Keep Eastern Illinois University: Institution Respiratory.
Retrieved December 7, 2022, from https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED562327.pdf

Graham, Jimmy; Kelly, Sean. 2018. How Effective Are Early Grade Reading
Interventions? : A Review of the Evidence. Policy Research Working Paper;No.
8292. World Bank, Washington, DC. © World Bank.
https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/handle/10986/29127 License: CC BY 3.0 IGO.

Hohenstein, L. (1994). An Evaluation of the Reading Recovery Program at Main Street

School in Shelbyville, Illinois. The Keep Eastern Illinois University: Institution
Respiratory. Retrieved December 7, 2022, from An Evaluation of the Reading Recovery
Program at Main Street School in Shelbyville, Illinois (eiu.edu)

Jardine. (1992). Opportunities Provided by Reading Schemes for Becoming Familiar

with a Range of Clause Types. Educational Psychology: Taylor & Francis Online.
Retrieved December 8, 2022, from
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/0144341920120310?fbclid=IwAR0_ZOX-
_5M-59G5relluEaT544sQAT8gu7JZP7I6D2OAneU2p7JoQA-FYQ
 Documentation

The actual interview that was held in December 07, 2022.