"Straight A's: Public Education Policy and Progress" is a biweekly newsletter that focuses on education news and events both in Washington, DC and around the country. The following articles are included in this issue: (1) Time to "Learn": Comprehensive Literacy Bill Introduced in Congress; (2) "Teaching for a New…

"Straight A's: Public Education Policy and Progress" is a biweekly newsletter that focuses on education news and events both in Washington, DC and around the country. The following articles are included in this issue: (1) Urban Renewal: New Alliance Research Shows U.S. Urban Economy Will Grow By Billions of Dollars If High School Dropout…

This document represents a summary of the report, "Five States' Efforts to Improve Adolescent Literacy." "Five States' Efforts to Improve Adolescent Literacy" describes efforts by five states (Alabama, Florida, Kentucky, New Jersey, and Rhode Island) to improve adolescent literacy. Highlighting common challenges and lessons,…

NaturalReader (http://www.naturalreaders.com/) is a new generation text reader, which means that it reads any machine readable text using synthesized speech without having to copy and paste the selected text into the NaturalReader application window. It installs a toolbar directly into all of the Microsoft Office[TM] programs and uses a mini-board…

Fluent reading is an important goal of reading instruction and is becoming a significant measure of reading development. This article describes the fluency coach model--a model for improving reading in the classroom. The fluency model incorporates these elements of successful practice and effective instruction, including: (1) modeling fluent…

The parents of students who attend Decatur High School thought that there was little hope of their kids going on to college. After a year or so in Decatur's reading program, their sons and daughters were both transformed and college bound. In this article, the author describes how Decatur was able to successfully transform their students. Seven…

When Stephanie Smith became the principal of Seaford (Delaware) Middle School four years ago, she was told to accept the fact that the school would never be able to change its status as a school that needed to improve. She did not accept that. To improve performance levels, she set the expectations high. Her defiance paid off: the school is now…

The socioemotional factors, which influence students' trajectories on their pathways to reading success, are often overlooked in literacy screenings and reading instruction. This article outlines the connections between personality factors, in particular resilient personalities, and early literacy success. It also offers teachers a series of six…

Annotating is a writing-to-learn strategy used for reading and rereading. Annotation skills makes comprehension of difficult text much easy and it encourages active reading.

Evidence indicates that secondary level students are not making adequate reading progress to meet the requirements of No Child Left Behind (NCLB) by 2013-2014. According to The Education Trust, reading skills of African American and Latino high school seniors are not commensurate with the reading skills of white middle school students. The 2005…

Clausen-Grace and Kelley believe that when it comes to independent reading, the question is not whether to use it, but rather how we can implement it to get the most benefit for our students. Here, they discuss the supporting research, defuse potential problems, identify characteristics of effective SSR programs, and outline their own action…

The purpose of this article is to outline four categories of issues that are fundamental to understanding the efficacy of technology for enhancing reading performance. The four categories of issues include: (1) What does it mean when we say a person is a reader or a nonreader?; (2) Instructional methods: Lessons of the achievement gap; (3)…

This annual report highlights SREB's recent achievements and how its services are helping the 16 member states rise to the challenge of improving education at all levels. The report also includes remarks from the Board Chair and President, acknowledges chief contributors and lists members of the Board, Legislative Advisory Council and SREB staff.…

The discussion provides insights into reading problems with the help of research. The interested educators will find the ample information about reading research on the web.

This article features the Project of Excellence, a program that was designed to engage families in an interactive community-based school literacy program. The authors discuss how they created the Project of Excellence. Although the goal of the Project was to improve the reading skills of young children, the focus of the Project was directed toward…