A literacy case study in Waterford schools
Waterford Education Association President Mary Craite has been teaching for 40 years. After completing the literacy training known as LETRS — which stands for Language Essentials for Teaching Reading and Spelling — she’s ready to teach another 40.
“LETRS is among the best professional development that I’ve had in my career,” Craite said.
The learning in LETRS provided “missing pieces” in her approach to teaching kids to read, she said, explaining that skilled reading is word recognition (decoding) multiplied by language comprehension (making meaning): Without both, “One times zero is still zero.”
A common misconception about the body of research known as the “science of reading” is that it only refers to phonics instruction, she said. However, it covers the five pillars of literacy instruction: phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension.
LETRS is “curriculum agnostic,” meaning it is not a program but a way of grasping and applying the science of reading — knowledge that can be used with any curriculum. Michigan is among at least 32 states contracting with Lexia, the company that houses LETRS, to provide teacher training.
The Waterford School District and the local union agreed to leverage federal COVID-relief funds and state literacy grants to pay a stipend for every K-5 teacher to complete LETRS, which is time-consuming. The district also adopted a new evidence-based curriculum, HMH.
The partnership between the district and union was critical in helping achieve nearly 100% staff completion of LETRS training, which has been “transformational,” Waterford Superintendent Adam Martin told attendees at the Michigan Literacy Summit in December.
“The staff in every one of my elementary buildings talks about how impactful the LETRS training has been on their ability to meet the needs of every student in their classes,” Martin said.
The result has been steady growth in NWEA assessments and state M-STEP scores in every building and grade level. There is no magic — only shared commitment, hard work and belief, agreed Waterford Assistant Superintendent Darin Holley.
“We really embraced our inner Dan Campbell,” Holley said, referring to the Detroit Lions coach known for his gutsy play calling. “It was fourth down and a mile to go, and we went for it.”
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