Much in the wide world has changed since I began teaching in 1991—landlines have given way to iPhones, the Soviet Union has dissolved, and the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles have been rebooted several times over. Yet much has remained the same. In 2009, when I returned to classroom teaching after spending ten years away as an educational consultant, I came back to a school where I was required to use a core-reading (or basal) program, a program very similar to the one I was required to use almost 20 years earlier.

In 2010, after one year of using this basal program, my frustrations were many. Few phonic patterns were taught to mastery. Spelling was not strongly integrated with writing. There was a dearth of authentic reading and writing activities and too many worksheets. Students had no choice in what they read, and there was little time for them to practice reading on their independent levels. The list goes on and I haven’t even mentioned my struggling readers’ slow rate of achievement or the creativity and professional control the teacher’s manual stripped from me.

After listening to me gripe for months about the basal, my mother, a retired literacy professional, sent me THE DAILY FIVE and encouraged me to pitch it to my building’s administration as a replacement model. However, our district, just like many others, had made a commitment to their very expensive program. I knew they wouldn’t allow me to simply cast it aside.

Simultaneously, while guest lecturing to pre-service teachers at a local university, speaking on the joys of guided reading, browsing bins, and independent writing routines, two students said to me, “Yes, that’s all well and good, but in our school we use a basal program. We’re not allowed to implement any of the cool stuff you’re showing us.”

All of this led me to wonder, “Is there a way to meld the progressive practices I believe in with the traditional core-reading program I am required to use?” Personally, I couldn’t stomach the basal, yet I couldn’t get rid of it. And so I approached my district’s curriculum director and asked for permission to modify and supplement the reading program in one 3rd grade classroom. My goal was twofold: 1) maintain my sanity during upcoming years of teaching, and 2) increase the reading achievement of my struggling readers. Thankfully the reply was “go ahead.”

I based the new program on what I considered to be the four essential elements of any effective reading program:

1. Time for extended reading
2. Time for extended writing
3. Attention to the big ideas in reading and writing
4. Use of effective teaching practices

As my cooperating 3rd grade teacher and I taught with this modified and supplemented basal reading program, and as I watched it unfold over the year, I saw struggling readers experience success more often and reach higher levels of achievement than they had in the previous year. I became excited by the idea that I could write a book about this “bridge” program, bringing a message to other basal using teachers (which, I found out, were the majority of reading teachers in the United State) that said, “If you must use a basal, you can make it better.” What exactly does better mean? It means more interesting and engaging to all readers, more effective for the lowest and highest achieving readers and writers, and more satisfying to masterful teachers.

That 3rd grade program planted the seeds for SUPER CORE! TURBOCHARGING YOUR BASAL READING PROGRAM WITH MORE READING, WRITING, AND WORD WORK. Its most important messages are: 1) a core-reading program should never be and can never be a complete reading program because it simply isn’t flexible enough, powerful enough, or motivating enough to enable all children to reach important reading benchmarks, and 2) by subtracting a few components, adding a few research-based reading strategies and routines, and becoming mindful of a few instructional techniques, teachers and administrators can create a much more effective reading program.

During my years as a consultant, I met reading teachers who knew these messages to be true. But because most were not permitted to make changes to their district’s publisher-created core-reading program, they had to “fly below the radar,” making instructional changes clandestinely, tucking in progressive reading routines whenever possible.

Today, approximately 75% of U.S. elementary schools still use a basal program (a.k.a. core-reading program) to provide reading instruction. Are these programs effective? If no, is it possible for districts to continue to use them, but make them more effective? If so, what are the ways in which these programs can be made more effective? And finally, what instruction and leadership roles for teachers can be created within a basal system that honor their professionalism and expertise and increase their students’ chances of reaching critical reading benchmarks?

My desire to try and answer some of these questions prompted me to write SUPER CORE. Now, with the book written and three years of 3rd grade data in my spreadsheets, I realize there are ways to build bridges between the progressive reading models used by roughly 25% of the country’s teachers and the less-than-effective traditional basal programs used by everybody else. Perhaps discussions on how to meld the old with the new will be of use to districts as they begin to implement the Common Core State Standards. And perhaps SUPER CORE will bring hope to teachers who are required to use their school's core (or basal) reading program...but don't love it.

My personal belief is that school systems that exhibit a willingness to modify and supplement can create primary reading programs (K-3) capable of boosting 85% to 95% of third grade children to independent third grade reading and writing levels. Additionally, I believe that intermediate grade basal programs (4-6) can be made more effective even as these primary programs are built. If districts and administrators avoid pendulum swings, build programs in systematic ways, stick to the common consensus on what works (as identified in the research literature of the last 40 to 50 years), and empower their most expert teachers to organize, create, and lead, then more effective and more satisfying-to-use reading programs can be built on the bones of a basal in three to five years.

Mark Weakland is a mild-mannered Title I reading specialist in Western Pennsylvania; his alter ego, however, is faster than a fluent reader, stronger than a metacognitive strategy, and able to leap outdated vocabulary instruction in a single bound.