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Proposed reading cut alarms Edgerton teachers

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Photo by Al Hoch

Travis Fuller takes notes on a story in his 8th grade reading class at Edgerton Middle School.

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Photo by Dan Lassiter

Marissa Sayre, left, and Maddie Friend discuss a story in the book Voices of the Holocaust in their 8th grade reading class at Edgerton Middle School.

EDGERTON — Julie Skalecki was excited to start teaching reading at Edgerton Middle School this year after two years teaching other subjects.

“It’s so rewarding as a middle school teacher to see those students who are struggling and don’t think they’re a good reader, to see them become enthralled with something,” she said.

So Skalecki was crushed to learn the school has proposed cutting reading class starting in 2009-10 as a way to reduce its budget.

Principal Jerry Roth doesn’t like the idea any more than Skalecki, he said at a recent school board meeting. But the school has to eliminate two teaching positions, and cutting reading class is the most efficient way to do it, he said.

Although the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction requires middle schools to address reading as part of their curricula, it does not require separate reading classes, said Jacqueline Karbon, reading consultant with the state department.

Many schools combine writing and reading classes, she said. Other schools integrate reading in several content areas.

For example, a social studies class could discuss strategies for reading historical documents, she said. A science class could read about experiments as it discusses creating hypotheses.

That’s what Edgerton is planning to do, Roth said.

The school will set aside money next year to train teachers to integrate reading instruction in their classes, he said.

But Skalecki worries learning in both reading and other subjects will suffer if teachers who don’t specialize in reading are forced to incorporate it into their classes.

“Reading is more than just summarizing and finding the main ideas and the details,” Skalecki said.

In a recent reading class, Edgerton eighth-graders filled out a worksheet based on stories they read about the Holocaust. They identified quotes and wrote how each quote shows a root or cause of the Holocaust.

The assignment was part of a class unit on analysis, Skalecki explained.

“That’s exactly what you’re doing on this sheet, breaking the stories down into smaller pieces,” she told the class.

One of Skalecki’s most important jobs, she said, is helping students understand and connect with literature.

That’s especially important in middle school, when students tend to drift from the solid reading habits they learned in elementary school, said Rob Baudhuin, seventh-grade reading teacher at Edgerton Middle School.

“One thing we know is there’s a serious decline in reading in the middle grades,” he said.

The federal government views reading as so important that it’s one of two subjects (math is the other) that must be tested every year in the No Child Left Behind Act.

Traditionally, Edgerton students have scored above state averages in both reading and writing, which is tested in fourth, eighth and 10th grades, said John Schuster, a language arts teacher. He worries test scores will drop if reading is spread among other subjects.

“You can only shove so much into a box before the box breaks,” he said.

That’s a concern for Roth, too, he said.

“Obviously that’s something we’ll have to keep an eye on and address,” he said.

But some teachers said they hope the district finds a different way to achieve the cuts. Schuster proposed keeping reading class in sixth grade as a way to ease the transition.

As a former administrator, Baudhuin sees the problem from both sides, he said. The school is hesitant to cut electives because middle school is supposed to be a time for students to explore what they’re good at and what they like to do.

The only other option he sees is asking the taxpayers for more money through a referendum, but it’s probably too late for that, he said.

“The real tragedy is the limitations that we have in public education,” he said.

About the cuts:

The Edgerton School District must cut $500,000 in faculty and staff budgets in 2009-10 because of declining enrollments and a new formula for state funding, Superintendent Norm Fjelstad has said.

The middle school has to cut about $160,000 or the equivalent of two teaching positions and a support staff position.

To achieve that, Principal Jerry Roth has proposed cutting reading as a separate class and eliminating two of the school’s three reading teachers. The third teacher would remain to teach Read 180, a remedial program.

Under the proposal, the school would create a new class, applied arts, that would meet every other day and teach subjects that have seen cuts over the years, such as reading, health and career education. It would shift some core and elective classes to make up for the loss of two teachers.

Teachers also would integrate reading instruction into other subject areas, Roth said.

The middle school plans to set aside money next year to train teachers to include reading in their instruction, he said.

The school board will approve or reject the cuts in the fall.

What do other schools do?

The Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction doesn’t track how many middle schools teach reading as a separate subject, but it knows many schools do not, said Jacqueline Karbon, reading consultant.

Of six districts polled by The Janesville Gazette, two offer separate reading classes for each year of middle school, and two more offer separate reading classes in sixth grade. Two districts do not offer separate reading classes at all in the middle schools.

Here’s a more specific look at what local districts do:

-- Albany: Sixth-graders take separate classes in language and literature. Seventh- and eighth-graders take one language class each year.

-- Brodhead: Sixth-graders at Brodhead Middle School take a language arts class and a reading class, while seventh- and eighth-grade students take a language arts class that incorporates reading, writing and grammar. Principal Charles Urness is hoping to add a nine-week reading class to the seventh-grade curriculum next year, he said.

-- Delavan-Darien: Reading and writing skills are integrated into one language arts class for students in grades six to eight at Phoenix Middle School. The school also has a reading specialist to assist students who need extra help.

-- Janesville: The Janesville School District eliminated reading class at its middle schools several years ago, said Donna Behn, director of instruction. Reading has been integrated into the language arts curriculum, and every teacher is expected to be more of a reading teacher, she said. The middle schools also offer the Read 180 program to help struggling readers.

-- Milton: Students take separate language arts and literature classes in seventh and eighth grade at Milton Middle School. (Sixth grade is at the intermediate school.)

-- Parkview: Students have one period each of composition and literature in seventh and eighth grade at Parkview Junior High School. (Sixth grade is at the elementary school.)

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Edgerton Middle School’s plan to eliminate reading as a separate class and integrate it into other subject areas is gaining popularity in the education world, said Jim Beane, a retired professor from National-Louis University.

Beane has worked with middle schools since the birth of the middle school reform movement in the 1960s, he said. The movement encouraged middle schools to form “teams” of teachers representing all academic areas—one teacher for math, one for science, one for social studies and one for language arts. Each team is then responsible for one group of students.

Several local districts, including Edgerton, use the team approach, Beane said.

From the start, few schools included reading teachers in their teams, he said.

“Most often, reading is considered one of the language arts, so the language arts teacher on the team would have major responsibility for working reading into the language arts curriculum,” he said.

More recently, teachers have been integrating reading not just into language arts classes but other subject areas as well. Many middle schools employee one reading teacher to coordinate literacy efforts throughout the school, Beane said.

“More and more at middle schools, there’s an expectation that every teacher is a reading teacher,” he said.

That’s exactly what Edgerton Middle School is planning to do, Principal Jerry Roth said. If the cuts are approved, every teacher would incorporate some reading instruction into his or her class. The school would keep one reading teacher to implement the Read 180 remedial reading program.

Beane is in favor of such integration, as long as teachers are trained properly in teaching reading strategies, he said.

“One of the reasons kids struggle in science and social studies is they can’t read the material,” he said. “We need to have science teachers and social studies teachers who understand the teaching of reading.”