Literacy Now

The Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium (Smarter Balanced) recently convened two advisory committees to address the needs of English language learners (ELL) and students with disabilities. Comprised of national experts in student assessment, accommodations strategies, language acquisition, and learning disabilities, these panels provide feedback to Smarter Balanced staff, work groups, and contractors to ensure that the assessments provide valid, reliable, and fair measures of student achievement and growth toward college and career readiness.

Richard Durán


Bridget Dalton


Barbara Ehren

International Reading Association (IRA) member Richard Durán, PhD from the University of California at Santa Barbara was selected for the English Language Learners Advisory Committee.

IRA members Bridget Dalton, EdD from the University of Colorado at Boulder; Barbara Ehren, EdD from the University of Central Florida; and Martha L. Thurlow from the University of Minnesota sit on the Students with Disabilities Advisory Committee. Ehren contributed to an article in Reading Today and on Reading Today Online entitled "Marinak and Ehren Discuss Shared Responsibility for Literacy Aquisition."

A full list of committee members is available on the Smarter Balanced website.

The committees met for day-long sessions in Denver and Chicago to discuss the Consortium’s approach to item development, accommodations and accessibility review, validity, and translation. The advisory committees will continue to collaborate with Smarter Balanced through the end of 2012 supported by grant funding provided by the Carnegie Corporation of New York. Smarter Balanced is also coordinating with the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC) on issues involving English language learners.

In addition to the advisory committees, a state-led Accessibility and Accommodations Work Group focuses on ensuring the assessments are designed to meet the needs of special student populations. As part of the development of accessibility and accommodations policies, Smarter Balanced commissioned two literature reviews of existing research on assessing English language learners and students with disabilities. These documents are available on a new webpage devoted to under-represented students.

by Elizabeth Bleacher

The deadline for the International Reading Association (IRA) Regie Routman Teacher Recognition Grant is November 15. The award, a US$2,500 grant, is given to an outstanding mainstream, elementary classroom teacher dedicated to developing reading and writing skills within students.

Potential nominees need to be IRA members and teach at schools where at least 60% of students are eligible for free or reduced lunch. Teachers must also be able to demonstrate that they are devoted to improving the teaching and learning of reading and writing across the curriculum in grades K-6.

Teachers will be expected to provide a proposal outlining their plans for the grant. Only educators with original, creative proposals will be considered. The grant may not be used to purchase pre-existing commercial programs. A budget outline, personal statement, and three letters of recommendation are also required.

The award is supported by literacy coach, teacher, and author Regie Routman who has been a member of the IRA for 35 years. Routman’s informative Literacy and Learning Lessons from a Longtime Teacher is an excellent guidebook for K- 12 educators, new and old. The book contains 100 literacy learning lessons that serve as inspirational frameworks to raise achievement and enjoyment in the classroom.

This past September Routman joined a group of her colleagues in hosting an IRA Literacy and Leadership Institute for educators committed to making lasting changes in literacy education. The institute offered a uniquely intimate chance to interact with professionals in improving literacy in schools. Routman will be conducting another institute from January 28 to 29 in Charlotte, North Carolina. Registration for the event is currently open and the form can be found at the IRA Literacy and Leadership Institute website.

Dawn Beach, a fifth-grade teacher at John I. Meister Elementary School in Hobart, Indiana, was the 2012 recipient of the IRA Regie Routman Teacher Recognition Grant. As an educator, Beach encourages her students to grow academically, socially, and emotionally by focusing on goal setting and developing life skills. In order to promote creative learning, Beach used the grant money to establish a professional puppet residency.

For more information on the IRA Regie Routman Teacher Recognition Grant, visit the International Reading Association’s website. Those interested can also visit Regie Routman’s personal website.

Elizabeth Bleacher is the strategic communications intern at the International Reading Association.

Research has found that teachers are the most important contributors to students’ academic success. Since there is evidence that teachers play a critical role in the accomplishments of their students, government programs should be reworked to facilitate teacher growth. The International Reading Association’s newly developed Universal Principles: The Essential Role of the Teacher in Classrooms, School, and Society is meant to enable that process. These principles were developed by a group of teachers working at all levels of education.

The Universal Principles are meant to serve as a comprehensive framework for teacher education and support. A complete version of Universal Principles: The Essential Role of the Teacher in Classrooms, School, and Society can be found at the IRA website. Additionally, IRA is seeking reader suggestions regarding the Universal Principles until November 1. All comments and recommendations can be e-mailed to the IRA.

Capable and dedicated teachers ensure that their students experience academic success at the classroom level, but they also ensure that their students will become literate, well-adjusted members of society. The Universal Principles are broken into three separate sections that effectively outline the role of teachers and the support they need. The three sections are: teachers are dedicated professionals, teachers need adequate support and access to sufficient resources, and teachers are intensely committed to student success.

IRA endorses these proposed principles as essential for every teacher worldwide. In order to create schools where students can thrive, government programs need to consider teachers and their role in students’ lives. Highly qualified and effective teachers are critical to classroom success and the academic development of students.

Elizabeth Bleacher is the strategic communications intern at the International Reading Association.

by Elizabeth Bleacher

The International Reading Association (IRA) Paul A. Witty Short Story Award is given to the author of an original story for children. The story should function as a literary standard for works being published in children’s periodicals. The award, a US$1,000 stipend, is meant to encourage authors to write engaging stories for children that will help promote interest in creative writing. Applications for the award are due by November 15.

Since the award seeks to encourage creative writing in periodicals, the story being nominated must have been published within a children’s magazine. Additionally, a story is only eligible for nomination in the year in which it was first published. In other words, any story published in a young reader periodical in 2012 can be nominated for this award cycle.

Stories submitted for consideration may be nonfiction or fiction, but all work must be original. Retellings of myths or legends will not be considered. Ideal stories create believable worlds, present information truthfully, and engage young readers. They should also offer a standard by which readers can measure the quality of other writing.

Subcommittee members, IRA members, authors, and publishers may all enter stories for consideration, but publishers are limited to three stories per publication. Copies of the publication containing the nominated story should be sent to each committee member for review. Shipment information will be distributed after an application form has been submitted.

Brenda Moore received the award in 2012 for her story “Beyond the Call of Duty” published by Cricket Magazine. Moore prefers to write nonfiction accounts of people and important events in history. Her favorite aspect of writing nonfiction is the extensive research that her topics require. She also likes the challenge of making history interesting for children.

More information about the application process can be found on the International Reading Association’s website.

Elizabeth Bleacher is the strategic communications intern at the International Reading Association.

How does a book become an IRA Children’s and Young Adults’ Book Award winning title? Authors and publishers may nominate books for consideration, and IRA particularly invites publishers to submit eligible titles for consideration.

To be eligible, a book must be the first or second children’s book from the author and first published in English during the past year. Each book submitted is checked for eligibility and classified for consideration in one of the six categories. An average of about 200 eligible books are submitted in award cycles. 

In 2011-12, 14 IRA members served on the awards committee. For initial review, every committee member reads and rates each Primary fiction and nonfiction title, but the committee splits into two panels for the other books, with one focused on Intermediate titles and the other focused on Young Adult.

Committee members carefully review each book to find nominees that can serve as “a reading and literary standard by which a reader can measure other books,” (IRA, 2013). Books are rated on a four-point scale in the initial reviews, and committee members provide comments with their scores. Committee members may also join in electronic discussions of particular books as they read and assess.

At the end of the initial reviewing, scores are aggregated across all readers to determine the top ten to twelve finalist books in each category. The finalists are then read and reviewed by all committee members who rank the titles in order. Committee members examine the groups’ overall rankings and engage in extended discussion about the results, and the particular nature of the award to recognize new promising authors, before finally recommending award winners in each category. These recommendations are submitted to the IRA Board of Directors for final approval. The winners are announced at the IRA Annual Convention and appear in Reading Today.

This article is an addendum to an article from the October/November 2012 issue of Reading Today. IRA members can read the interactive digital version of the magazine here. Nonmembers: join today!

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