Lessons Learned in Dreamland

Abstract

Charter school administrators weathered start-up woes, among them challenging students with unmet needs, verbal assaults, dwindling student enrollment, and a first-year budget deficit exceeding $200,000 to implement a reading improvement strategy that holds promise for helping at-risk students read better, a point particularly underscored considering the poor reading performance of far too many urban students. Despite alarming results that convey the need to rethink reading instruction in urban settings, missing in too many urban schools are effective research based practices that are embraced and delivered by urban teachers and that are understood, implemented, and supported by urban school administrators. This reality prompted a team of experienced school administrators to design a charter school rooted in reading research to test its impact on students’ reading competence, in particular, that of students with poor reading skills. Based on cognitive science research trials, Reciprocal Teaching, a metaco...