COVID-19 widened reading disparities
NIAGARA FALLS, N.Y. — Richard Evans makes his way through rows of his students in his thirdgrade classroom, stooping to pick up an errant pencil and answering questions above the din of chairs sliding on hardwood floors.
The desks, once spread apart to fight COVID-19, are back together. But the pandemic maintains an unmistakable presence.
Look no further than the blue horseshoe-shaped table in the back of the room where Evans calls a handful of students back for extra help in reading — a pivotal subject for third grade — at the end of each day.
That is where time lost to pandemic shutdowns and quarantines shows itself: in the students who are repeating that grade. In the little fingers slowly sliding beneath words sounded out one syllable at a time and in the teacher’s patient coaching through concepts usually mastered in first grade.
It is there, too, where Evans jots pluses and minuses and numbers on charts he’s made to track each child’s comprehension and fluency, and notes words that trip up a student a second or third time.
In a year that is a highstakes experiment on making up for missed learning, that strategy — assessing individual students’ knowledge and tailoring instruction to them — is among the most widely adopted in American elementary schools. In his classroom of 24 students, each affected differently by the pandemic, Evans faces the urgent challenge of having them all read well enough to succeed in the grades ahead.
Here is how he has tackled it.
GOING FROM PANDEMIC TO ‘NORMAL’ IS HARD
It is a Thursday in October, early in the school year. Six students surround Evans at the blue table, each staring down at a first-grade-level book about baseball great Willie Mays.
“What sound does ‘-er’ make?’” Evans asks 9-yearold Ke’Arrah Jessie, who focuses through glasses on the page. She puts “hit” and “ter” together to make “hitter.”
Most of those students were sent home as kindergartners in March 2020. Many spent all of first grade learning remotely from home full- or part-time.
Challenges didn’t end when schools reopened full time for second grade. The young children were by then unaccustomed to — and unhappy about — full weeks of school rules.
“All year long,” Evans said, “I had kids ask me, ‘Why do I have to be in school for five days?’”
MOVING FROM ‘LEARNING TO READ’ TO ‘READING TO LEARN’
At the start of this school year, assessments showed 15 of Evans’ initial 23 students were reading below grade level. Of those, nine were considered severely behind.
There was no time to waste. Studies show those who don’t read fluently by the end of third grade are more likely to drop out or finish high school late.
Ke’Arrah spent more than a year learning remotely early in the pandemic. Her mother, Ashley Martin, wanted to keep her young family safe but could see the toll on her daughter’s drive to learn. So when Ke’Arrah was assigned to a new elementary school for this year, her mother reenrolled her in third grade.
Midway through her second stint in third grade, the decision is paying off — in measurable progress and Ke’Arrah’s interest in reading books from the Junie B. Jones series with her mother at bedtime.
DOUBLING UP ON KIDS WHO NEED IT MOST
While many students are behind, Evans also referred more candidates than ever — five — for the school’s honors program because of their advanced scores on early assessments. Those students sometimes work independently or with each other to give Evans extra time with the others.
The range highlights the varied experiences during the pandemic.
Districts like Atlanta have sought to address learning losses by adding time to the school day. Others, like Washington, D.C., have pursued “highimpact” tutoring. Niagara Falls has put reading specialists in each elementary school while emphasizing differentiated learning to move students forward, Superintendent Mark Laurrie said.
Using assessments to identify students’ individual needs is the top post-pandemic strategy, followed closely by remedial instruction, according to a federal survey.