Alpha II Learning Systems

Failure Is Not An Option

Keys to Student Success

Instruction time is maximized

Appropriate/Realistic student placement

Provide students with opportunity to succeed immediatelyStudent ownership

Achievement is managed and documented promptly

Experiencing Success

‘Using Metacognitive Strategies to Facilitate Expository Text Mastery.’ Education Research Quarterly, 1997.

“Before resistant readers can be introduced to reading strategies, they must experience success in reading. A series of short, easy, but interesting reading assignments is necessary to focus the students upon the mental tasks that comprise reading.”

Characteristics of a Good Reader

• Gain an insight of the text before reading

• Make predictions

• Aware of why they are reading a text

• Decipher unfamiliar vocabulary based on context clues

• Interpret the text while evaluating its quality

• Aware of when they are confused and when they need to exert more effort

Pressley, Michael. “Comprehension Instruction: What Makes Sense Now, What Might Make Sense Soon,” 2000.

How to Make Students Better Readers

• Teach decoding skills

• Teach vocabulary

• Encourage students to build world knowledge through reading and to relate what they know to what they read

• Teach students to use a variety of comprehension strategies such as prediction, question asking, and summarizing

• Encourage students to monitor their comprehension

Pressley, Michael. “Comprehension Instruction: What Makes Sense Now, What Might Make Sense Soon,” 2000.

How Alpha 2 Has Helped

• Places students in materials at appropriate levels, which alleviates frustration and lower discipline problems

• Focuses on individual as well as group deficiencies to increase school’s overall performance

• Provides frequent criterion/benchmark testing, which helps to ensure that students are mastering skills and objectives from the daily classroom work

• Provides student management database, which generates a variety of reports for both individuals and groups.

• The issue is not that we cannot teach some children nor that some children cannot learn.

• All children learn; the issue is whether or not we can teach children what we want them to know.

Teacher as Motivator

Frieder, Brian. “Motivator: Least Developed of Teacher Roles.” February, 1970.

Teacher as Motivator

“If you can’t tell where you’re going, you may end up where you started. Or, you may get there and not know it!

• The teacher’s role as a motivator would be greatly enhanced if he/she know precisely what it was she was motivating children to learn.

• Teachers often find they have motivated students to learn things they did not intend them to learn.

Step 1 - Diagnostics/Placement

• Students are given two types of tests to determine appropriate placement

• It’s important for teachers to know where their students are in relation to where they want them to go

Step 2- Prescription Plan

• Students are given a strategy to succeed

• Assignments are clearly laid out for each student

• Begins with skills that students have demonstrated mastery in (provides opportunity for immediate success)

Step 3- Instruction

• All instruction is broken down into small, objective based sequences

• Active responding is required by student

• Immediate feedback and reinforcement is provided by teacher

• Presentation may be from a book, tape recorder, an activity, or teacher led activity

• Any media from which a student can learn the objective may be used

Step 4- Management

• Students will find some assignments easy and others difficult. Teachers need to know about these problems, but how…………?

Solutions to management and organizational problems include:

* Student Prescription Records (Flowcharts)

* Daily Task Logs

* Progress Checks

* Criterion Mastery Tests

* Student Profile Reports

* Grouping Reports

Step 5- Evaluation

• Ongoing activity as well as critical component

• Used for assessment of student progress on a daily basis as well as long term basis that measures retention

Evaluation tools:

- ensure objective mastery

- focus on specific ‘trouble’ skills

- pinpoints individual attention when needed

Promotion

Upon successful completion of assignments and mastery test, the student is placed at next level.

Alleviates ‘Regular classroom with one text’ scenario.

Student’s progress is not limited by the pace of other students.

Strand/Student Resource

Grade Gain

Grade Level

Resource Level (e.g. book, kit, etc.)

Student’s current placement “P”

Module mastery “M”

Module waived by teacher “W”