Summer Success in Small Classes
by Howard Libit
originally published July 22, 2001
The Baltimore Sun
Focus: Baltimore and Prince George's counties have reduced the number of pupils per teacher to help boost reading performance.
Karan Bevers has spent five years teaching summer school in Baltimore County. With only five pupils in her elementary reading class, she says this summer at Dogwood Elementary School is easily the best of her career."We're able to be so focused on every one of our kids," says Bevers, who taught fifth-grade this past year at Woodbridge Elementary School. "This summer is a teacher's dream." She will become a mentor teacher—helping new teachers succeed—in the fall.
The small classes are part of a state-supported effort this year in Baltimore and Prince George's counties to see how much more pupils can learn when they're given summer reading help in smaller groups. Although summer programs often rely on small groups, this year's extra dollars have allowed class sizes to be reduced even more.
The two suburban school systems are sharing about $1 million in federal and state funding this year for the Maryland Educational Opportunity Summer Pilot Program. It's double the amount that they shared in 2000, the first summer the state funded the program.
"We're able to keep the classes to six students or less, and that small class size and individual attention makes all the difference," says Elizabeth A. Young, coordinator of Baltimore County's Office of Alternative Programs. "We're already seeing the results."
Almost 6,000 Baltimore County elementary, middle and high school students are enrolled in summer classes this year, according to Young. About 900 elementary and 300 middle school pupils are participating in the Soar to Success reading program, published by Houghton Mifflin Co. The county's program is scattered across 10 elementary schools and five middle schools.
"The parents are coming in and saying how excited they are about the program, about how their children are coming home and they can see the improvements," says Laverne Goins, principal of the summer program at Catonsville's Westchester Elementary School. "They love the small classes and what their kids are learning from them."
The state legislators who pushed through funding for the summer program hope to see it expand in coming years, particularly if test results at the end of the summer show gains in reading achievement.
"We'd like to see this eventually become a statewide initiative," says Del. Robert A. Zirkin, a Baltimore County Democrat who sponsored the summer pilot-program legislation. "Summer can make a big difference for kids who need help, and the state needs to help pay for it."
All the Baltimore County elementaries are using the Soar to Success program; Prince George's schools are using different materials.
Soar to Success takes struggling readers through a series of lessons aimed at building their skills.
"It's such a structured program that there are no behavior problems," Bevers says. "The books are interesting, and there's no time for the kids to get distracted."
Reading takes place even during the mid-morning snack break. Bevers pulls aside 10-year-old Sherelle Horton for a quick "independent reading inventory"—a check of Sherelle's reading skills to see which sounds or words are tripping her up.
"This morning, my mom told me no one should have six cats," Sherelle reads aloud without a bit of hesitation.
Sherelle - who will be a fourth-grader at Featherbed Lane Elementary—continues with the story for another few minutes. She then gets a chance to eat the cookies she brought from home for her snack, and Bevers turns to another pupil for some one-on-one reading.
In a downstairs classroom, Erica Smith and her five pupils, all of whom will enter third grade in the fall, read the story "My Friend Edward Cole" aloud.
In this small group, Smith can easily identify pupils who have trouble pronouncing words or who don't keep up with the reading.
"What does the 'a-r' say in Edward?" Smith asks.
"Or," replies 7-year-old Trina Cheatham, who attends Johnnycake Elementary.
With such small classes, every classroom at Dogwood is filled with two or three sets of teachers and pupils, working steadily for the three hours of daily classes. Summer classes began July 2 and will end Aug. 3.
"This whole building is filled," says Barbara J. B. Otakie, Dogwood's summer school principal. "We've taken every space we could find."
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