Blanchard program's success with MAP scores draws attention of other schools

The education success puzzle has many pieces. Blanchard Elementary's My Sidewalks reading program is just one of the pieces, said the school's principal, Barbara Kohlfeld.

Blanchard Elementary was the only school in the Cape Girardeau School District that met targets in communication arts and math on the Missouri Assessment Program tests this year. Historically, it has landed in the middle of district scores.

Another Cape Girardeau elementary hopes to mimic that success.

Clippard Elementary principal Sydney Herbst is sending her teachers into Blanchard Elementary to see the My Sidewalks program. Herbst told the Cape Girardeau School Board on Oct. 17 she intended to review the program for possible use at Clippard as part of the improvement plan it is undergoing. The plan is a result of sanctions the school faces for not meeting proficiency targets under No Child Left Behind.

Clippard had 63.7 percent of students test proficient or advanced in communication arts this year. The school has met the communication arts target every year except 2010 and 2011.

Blanchard is in its second year of using My Sidewalks, which is the school's "response to intervention" program, or RTI, which is used to provide early assistance to children who are having difficulty learning. While all the schools have RTI, Blanchard third- and fourth-grade students scored 76.7 percent proficient or advanced in communication arts on MAP tests this year. In the past two years, not enough students tested proficient or advanced to meet the 67.4 percent target in 2010 or the 59.2 percent target in 2009. Under the No Child Left Behind Act, proficiency targets rise every year.

My Sidewalks is used in all grades at the elementary school.

Amber Walker, a third-grade teacher at the school, said her students look forward to the time each day when they pull out the books associated with the program.

"To them it's like getting to look through a cool magazine. What they don't realize is that they are building so many things by being able to engage in the material and answer the questions that go with it, " she said.

The reading materials come in a magazine format and have a concept teachers cover in one week with small groups of students during the time set aside each day for RTI. The material is set up so students build skills in drawing conclusions, comparing and contrasting, sequencing and understanding a main idea with supporting details.

According to Kim Crader, a first-grade teacher at Blanchard, the setup allows teachers to cover material quickly, which means a large amount of vocabulary and concepts taught to students in a small amount of time.

"The material is difficult, but it's put into a context that they can understand," she said.

According to a 2009 study by an independent research firm, the program helps elementary students struggling with reading achieve significant gains in areas such as enhancing reading fluency, vocabulary and comprehension. The study found that by the end of the school year, third-graders skills grew 1.8 grades' worth.

Kohlfeld attributes some of Blanchard's success in communication arts on MAP tests to the program but said other efforts by the school, like reading and math after-school clubs, practice of communication arts and math using technology once a week and social and behavior skills programs and methods also contributed to the school's success last year.

My Sidewalks is a program funded by federal Title I money for supplemental instruction. While it would be possible for Clippard Elementary to implement the program with Title I dollars it receives, another school in the district, Alma Schrader Elementary, does not have the same option because it does not have a Title I classification.

Alma Schrader had 72.8 percent of students test proficient or advanced in communications arts this year, the first year it did not meet the proficiency target.

According to the U.S. Department of Education, a school that qualifies as Title I typically has 40 percent or more of its students coming from families qualifying under the U.S. census' definition of low-income.

Alma Schrader is also undergoing changes for its school improvement plan, but principal Ruth Ann Orr said bringing My Sidewalks to that school would not be likely because the school wants to continue working with its current communication arts curriculum.

According to Theresa Hinkebein, the district's curriculum coordinator, a district-funded implementation of a program like My Sidewalks at non-Title I Alma Schrader would mean the district would have to foot the bill for supplemental programs at all the elementary schools.

The district's director of federal programming, Gerald Richards, said the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education enforces the federal regulation that prohibits school districts from funding a program in a non-Title I school with local dollars while letting the federal dollars pay for the same program in other schools.

My Sidewalks would cost upward of $4,000 per school, depending on the number of classrooms using it.

eragan@semissourian.com

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