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SpeakUP! International Inc.
Mirror Books and Adolescent Literacy: A Conversation with Dr. Valcine Brown
What happens when adolescents lose their passion for reading, and how do we bring it back? Dr. Valcine Brown, a veteran educator who recently completed her PhD in education, is tackling this challenge head-on with innovative research and classroom practices.
Reading used to be magic. Remember that feeling of getting lost in a book? Too many adolescents don't – they find reading "boring," a sentiment Dr. Brown has found to be universal across different countries. Her research explores how "mirror books" – literature where students see aspects of their identity reflected – might rekindle that lost love of reading. Through careful measurement of reading attitudes across academic and recreational contexts, she's uncovering insights that challenge traditional approaches to literacy education.
Dr. Brown's own educational journey – earning her bachelor's degree over seven years while raising children as a single mother – informs her compassionate, practical approach. Her innovative credit recovery program allows students to demonstrate mastery through performance tasks rather than retaking entire classes, helping dozens of students catch up on missing credits each semester.
What does the future hold for adolescent literacy? Dr. Brown suggests more research, more student choice, and more interventions beyond third grade. The good news? Sometimes the solution is as simple as 15 minutes of daily reading in a student's "zone of proximal development" – starting where they are and growing from there.
Ready to transform how we approach adolescent literacy? Subscribe to hear more conversations with innovative educators challenging the status quo and creating better outcomes for all students.
You can reach Dr. Valcine Brown using the following social media platform:
Website: https://drvalcinebrown.live-website.com/
Welcome to.
Speaker 2:Speak Up International with Rita Burke and Elton Brown. As a matter of fact, vibrant, energetic conversations with individuals that we consider to be community builders, and today is no exception. We have with us Dr Valcine Brown, who is a veteran educator who is passionate about adolescent literacy. Dr Valcine recently completed her PhD in education and instruction and will be presenting her work at a convention very soon. Her passion she is committed to increasing literacy in adolescents, to increasing literacy in adolescents and to our listeners. I want to welcome Dr Valcine Brown to speak of international.
Speaker 3:Thank you so much, both Rita and Elton Brown, for having me on here. I appreciate you both so much.
Speaker 1:It is a pleasure to have an opportunity to talk to you. What inspired you to focus on adolescent literacy?
Speaker 3:and just thinking about my passion for reading growing up that never left me, even in adulthood, and teaching students who just were not passionate about reading at all, and a lot of them saying that they don't like reading, they find it boring, and that actually takes us into what I find the biggest challenge to be is that they don't enjoy reading. One of the things that's important to me is to try to help them kindle or even find or for most of them, it's rekindling that love of reading and helping them find things that they're passionate about reading.
Speaker 2:So I'm wondering you talk about adolescents and their reluctance to read and the fact that they don't enjoy it. Do you think this is universal?
Speaker 3:Yes, I do think it's universal. I don't think it's as much of a problem, say, in the UK as it is here. When I was working on my PhD, one of the things I found is that over in Europe they do an annual survey about reading attitudes and finding out what people are enjoying reading, and they've noticed a little bit of a dip, but it's not been as significant here. But I also want to say that we don't study it as much here as they do over in the UK, so I don't know if there might be a correlation there. Universally, I'm finding in the research that other places are experiencing the same. One of the research articles I found from New Zealand was talking about students saying that they found reading to be boring. So I think it's universal.
Speaker 1:Yes, and I agree. I think it is universal. It's not just in one section of the world or down the street, it's everywhere. So how does literacy impact a student's long-term academic and economic success?
Speaker 3:I think that it has a negative impact on it If we get aside from what we talk about attitude towards reading but we just focus on what we know as our Lexile level scores. We do find that there is a correlation to lower socioeconomic static with those who have lower reading levels with those who have lower reading levels.
Speaker 2:So I'm hearing, then correct me if I'm wrong the connection between socioeconomic levels and interest and attitude towards reading.
Speaker 3:Not attitude. Lexile levels. Those are two. Yes, my apologies for not being clear. We can look at lexile level as in literacy Can a person read versus attitude towards reading, which is something different. There is a correlation between Lexile level, ability to read and economic status.
Speaker 1:So what are some of the key findings from your PhD research on adolescent literacy and how do they challenge existing perceptions?
Speaker 3:My dissertation was on attitude towards reading, not so much lexile level, and what I did find is that exposure towards mirror books does improve attitude towards reading. Now I'm going to back up a little bit to go forward. Whenever I say the term mirror books, a lot of people say what is that?
Speaker 3:Mirror books are books through which someone can see themselves reflected, either racially, culturally, religious-wise, sexual orientation whatever all of the facets through which we view ourselves, there's something within that book that they're able to see reflected within themselves. And so the survey that I use, the SARA Survey of Adolescent Reading Attitude, breaks down attitude towards reading in four different components. There's academic print, academic digital, there's recreational print and recreational digital, and I did my study by having my core group as well as my testing group. Now my treatment group is the group that I gave the mirror books to. So both of the groups took the SARA Survey of Adolescent Reading Attitude. That gave us a holistic score and then the sub scores for those different sections, their attitude towards reading. We did six weeks of sustained silent reading in which the treatment group was given mirror books and the non-treatment group was just given books of high interest books, but not books that I quantified as mirror books based on the demographics of the school where I did the study. At the end of the six weeks, I again gave both the groups the sera and what I found is that within the treatment group those who were exposed to mirror books there was an improvement in attitude towards recreational print and there was a small dip in attitude towards recreational digital, which is your social media.
Speaker 3:Now, those changes were not considered, or did not measure, statistically significant, but there was a shift in the numerical value. So while I left and said maybe there's something here because the change was not considered statistically significant, I have to go back to the drawing board and ask myself some additional questions and possibly do another study in the future. Some of those questions might be what if I chose books that I thought the students might see as mirror books, but they didn't see themselves reflected? So, in that regard, could I then ask students to give me a list of books they might like to read that they do see as mirror books, and then see if that changes their attitude towards reading? Or another thing is maybe six weeks wasn't long enough. Maybe if it was six or seven months, there might've been a statistically different shift. So while I left with an idea that maybe there's something to this because the measurement wasn't statistically significant, I can't actually say Quite a deep and wide study.
Speaker 3:Yes, yeah. So when I say I'm passionate about it, you certainly sound passionate about it.
Speaker 2:Now you somehow became an educator, and I want you to talk to us about what was behind that decision to become an educator.
Speaker 3:I was a late in life person who came to teaching, and so I like to say I came through it through a circuitous route. I really didn't wasn't sure what I wanted to do when I originally left high school. I went to college and tried a couple of different measures, but it wasn't anything that really struck me and drew my love and my passion. And it wasn't until my adulthood, where I was a stay-at-home mom with three children. I was running a home daycare and I was making my own curriculum, for my two oldest were going to school at the time.
Speaker 3:So I was at home with my youngest and two other children who were in my daycare and I started putting together curriculum based on phonics and grouping together projects and things like that. And I discovered, I said, I'm really good at this. I am very good at putting things together thematically, the kids are loving what I'm doing and that was what cued me in that I would be a good teacher. But I knew that my passion for literature would drive me more towards just teaching English language arts, and at the high school level, because I love the deep, rich conversations I can have with my students about literature. So that's how I came to be an educator and I'm 12 years in and I have to say I still love it.
Speaker 1:So how do you see the future of adolescent literacy evolving and what changes would you like to see as it evolves?
Speaker 3:That is a very tough question and it's hard because most of the research that is done on literacy really just focuses two different areas that don't impact adolescent literacy. A lot of the intervention strategies that are studied to improve students' reading ability are for third grade and below, and then there are some studies that are focusing on attitude towards reading, but they're very few and far between at the adolescent level. So I would start by saying we need more research that focuses in this area of adolescent literacy, but it needs to be divided into lexile level the skill of being able to read and looking at students' attitude towards reading and see if we can find a convergence between those two different aspects of adolescent literacy. So I would say any changes that I'd like to see would be to see more research in that area, research in that area and then, of course, depending on what the findings of the research reveal to us, I'd like that those findings to shape the direction we're going in with education.
Speaker 2:So you told us that you have been in education for 12 years. Am I correct? Yes, so what happened before then?
Speaker 3:I was a stay-at-home mom for about 12 years and then I went back to school to finish, and that took me about six or seven years because I was working as well as raising children and I was divorced at the time, so I was a single parent on top of that, and so I worked a plethora of different part-time jobs, full-time jobs, putting myself through school until I became an educator.
Speaker 1:And just like that, she became the educator. You make it sound so easy. I'm sure that it was not that easy. There's a saying that says whatever you really want. It takes a lot of pain and determination, and so, to see this huge smile on your face as you're telling us your accomplishments, I'm thinking, no, it's got to be a little difficult than that.
Speaker 3:I wouldn't say there was any pain, but there were certainly challenges. And for me like I like to emphasize that it took me seven years just to get a bachelor's. So that to me was one of the struggles, in that I couldn't just go for four years and be done Working part time jobs, raising children. I had to go part time. So seven years just to get my bachelor's degree and then I did do my credentialing program in one year. So that was a blessing. So I would say for me it wasn't really a pain.
Speaker 3:I didn't experience any pain, but there was the struggle and the juggling of the multiple facets of my life while staying focused and passionate about what I wanted to do. And the interesting thing about that is while I was in working on my bachelor's degree, at the time there was the teacher shortage in layoff 2006, seven and eight. And I remember a well-meaning friend saying are you sure you want to go back to school to teach? Look at all these layoffs. You're not going to have a job. But my faith was such that I was like other people not going to have a job, but I'm going to have a job. I don't know about them and it was. I just knew that I was going to be, this was my passion, this was my calling, and I knew it was for me. So I think that's a part of my driving focus, as well as my focus for the light at the end of the tunnel. I just there was no doubt in my mind that I was meant to teach.
Speaker 2:Two very important points for me that you made. One is that it took you seven years to get your bachelor's, and the next is that someone was trying to discourage you from pursuing what your dream was. I know somebody that it took them 10 years to get their undergraduate degree and every so often they have to encourage her and to say to her it's okay, because sometimes she sees that as a burden.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and that's sad that sometimes people may be well meaning, but as well meaning as they may be, there are consequences to the words that they share of doubt I was having some problems there yeah and then the next thing is that you tend to allow people to discourage you.
Speaker 2:And I know someone who was an older person as well Older he might have been, about his late 20s, early 30s and he was going to segue into education and the Sunday before his class started, a friend whose husband was a teacher was saying I wouldn't go into education either because jobs. And he said his luck is not my luck, I'm going after it, and absolutely no regrets. He pursued education and became quite an excellent educator for high school students. So we've got to be so mindful of the people who mean, don't they? They mean really well, they think they're encouraging and supporting, but they don't have your dream. But this is what I want to talk to us about what did you enjoy most about that process? The PhD process?
Speaker 3:Oh, I think what I enjoyed most about the process was falling in love with research. I never anticipated being filled with such driving questions that fueled hours and hours of pouring over various peer-reviewed journal articles, annotating, taking notes and letting these ideas just juxtapose and settle in my mind. Very early in my PhD program I can't remember what course it was, but we were supposed to pull together some research that we thought might be beneficial towards whatever we were going to research. They were checking that we knew how to pull peer review journal articles, we knew how to juxtapose texts within a short paper. And my professor replied back this was very thorough, very concise. You will make an excellent researcher someday.
Speaker 3:And I read that and thought I don't want to be no researcher. I just I want to answer to this question. That's it, just this question. And, as I mentioned, this was early on and as I continued the journey of finding more peer review journal articles and getting more questions, I was like, oh, I'm turning it to a researcher. Now here I am done with my dissertation, finished my PhD, and I have more studies that I'm planning. So that teacher knew better than me.
Speaker 1:It could have been worse, like maybe having to go into the bowels of Egypt and dig up dead bones I mean dead bodies and things I don't know.
Speaker 3:Definitely that's not for me. Me in a library, and I will be very happy.
Speaker 1:If I have a choice, then I'll go with you. I would much rather go that route. So how do you feel technology has influenced adolescence literacy, and tell me or give me a positive and a negative.
Speaker 3:Okay, positive and negative. Okay, one of the negatives has to be the use of AI and students plagiarizing using AI. That is definitely a negative and unfortunately I've caught a few students who were doing that and I have to give them a zero because I have a no plagiarism policy in my classroom. I tell students don't do it. You think I'm not going to catch you? I am going to catch you. I've been reading your writing all year long. You don't think that I can recognize your voice and your tone, your point of view. Come on now and I tell them I said if you plagiarize, I'm giving you a zero. No, you can't redo it and I'm going to call your parent. So that would be the bad part.
Speaker 3:One of the good parts is having the ability to use technology to shift on a dime, and what I mean by that is there are some times where you come up with some ideas of a thematic lesson you're putting together for your students and it does not go over. It is not as well received as you might think. You are excited putting it together and when you start implementing it, your students' eyes just glaze over and they're looking at you. You're like okay, let me rethink this, and especially within my AP classes that I teach. One of my students said some of these things, they're just so old I don't find them useful.
Speaker 3:Today I said okay, what topic would you like to study? They gave me some suggestions. I said, okay, we have to finish this unit because I need time to plan, but let's finish this unit and our next unit will be based upon that and I will incorporate some newer text. So being able to do a deep dive across the Internet, find essays from reliable sources that I can group together around the topic that they want to discover, and then be able to apply the AP literature or the AP Lang standards to question them and help them discover the nuances of what we're looking through I cannot imagine teaching prior to having access to the internet, having that ability to make that shift. Now the students are happy because they're reading about something they're interested in. I'm happy because we're still going over the standards. We're still doing the things that we need to do academically to prepare you and get the skills that you need. So it was a win-win for Go ahead.
Speaker 2:No, go ahead, Rita. Does that reading something they're happy with? Is that what your mirror books speak to?
Speaker 3:Partially, yes, but for these particular students, what they were asking, teresa and I wish I could remember this was my AP Lang students, so we were predominantly reading nonfiction texts. So it's your essays that talk about either climate change or something or that nature. And there was a particular topic and my apologies, I can't remember that they wanted to research. So for them it wasn't so much a mirror book, but it was just a topic of interest. Mirror books would tend to be some aspect of a student's life that does impact their life and that could be anything from race to gender to religion, and that could be both fiction and nonfiction. But this particular conversation with my students, it wasn't necessarily a mere topic but something they wanted to learn about, learn more about.
Speaker 1:So what advice would you give educators who want to be more intentional about fostering literacy in their classrooms?
Speaker 3:I would give two pieces of advice one to the teachers and one to the administrators and the district. I am very fortunate to work in a district where we have a lot of choice in what text we use in our ELA classrooms. They are unwavering on making sure that we are focused on standards and all of the English teachers are totally fine with that. So the first piece of advice to districts would be to give more freedom and license to the professionals that you have hired. Trust them to be able to do their job. Do not have an unrealistic expectation of them to be synchronized across the classrooms.
Speaker 3:Everybody's reading the same thing at the same time. Classrooms everybody's reading the same thing at the same time. This group of students may not want to read that. And now you've initiated a tug of war, a push and a pull between the students and the teacher. That did not need to happen. That's the first piece.
Speaker 3:The second teachers just because something was exciting to you when you were reading it in high school doesn't mean it's going to be exciting to your students. It's OK to say and I've done it and I just shared an example of it I put together something like oh my God, this is going to be amazing and my students are like no, it's OK to self-reflect, to say that didn't go over the way I thought it was. Ok, new plan. And there's power in that we don't have to appear to have all the answers. It's okay if we can say uh-oh, I made a mistake, that's okay, let's fix it. Or this didn't turn out the way I thought it would, let's do better. So that would be the two piece of advice. Teachers be flexible, give your students choice. Choice is very important and that's another aspect, that of Research that I came across the power of choice. Students are much more invested when they are given choice.
Speaker 1:Oh, we're doing it again. Go ahead, Rita.
Speaker 2:I like that, that students deserve to be given choice, absolutely. You talked about, maybe, a piece of literature that someone may be excited about, and what have you Talk to us about authors or books that excited you?
Speaker 3:Oh, that's always one of the hardest things for me. I read everything from Greek tragedies to fiction to nonfiction you name it. I love to read it. So it's very hard for me to narrow it down to just a few authors that excite me. I'm going to try genre. I love David Baldacci. I love the fiction drama that he writes, police dramas and FBI dramas. Those are really good when it talking about some of the the fire next time. That's a huge accolade for me. Once I read it, I'm done. I'm moving on to the next scene. But I've read that twice. I also really appreciate what's escaping me now. Who's on that bookshelf over there? I also love juvenile fiction. I read it because I want to be abreast of books that I can bring in as possible things for my students to be interested in. So A Cat Named Dewey that was really cute, yeah. So it's really hard for me to narrow it down. I think I've done the best I can, yeah.
Speaker 1:So it's really hard for me to narrow it down. I think I've done the best I can. Well, one of the authors that we interviewed a while back says that there is no, there's, no, there isn't any good girl book or a boy book. There's only good books. And this sounds like your philosophy blends right into that, which is incredible, I will admit. So what resources or strategies would you recommend to students who are struggling with literacy but they're not getting the support that they need?
Speaker 3:I would say that would be a piece of advice I'd give to both parents and students. Unfortunately, there are times where students try to advocate for themselves and adults don't listen because they just view them as a child. You don't know what's best, I know what's best, and that's an unfortunate circumstance. So I would say parents, be a staunch advocate for your child. If your child comes home and says, hey, I really need help with this and I don't feel like I'm getting the help that I need, they can partner together and work with the educational system in order to help that student get the help that they need. If they can get access to a reading specialist who can help them.
Speaker 3:There may be an underlined issue that hasn't been diagnosed, such as dyslexia or something of that nature, and that would be a start to establish whether or not there is something out of the realm that needs to be dealt with first.
Speaker 3:Or are they just a slow reader and they need to get back to the basics of the skills in order to build upon there. Providing that there aren't any outline issues such as dyslexia or an undiagnosed issue with literacy, then I would say 15 minutes a day, find something within your realm of reading and just grow and stretch beyond that and begin to read more advanced books. Don't start with the hard stuff. Don't do that to yourself. Start with something within your realm. They call it the zone of proximal development. It's the area where a student can read comfortably by themselves and understand, and the more exposure they give themselves within that zone of proximal development, the higher that zone begins to climb. We can't do it overnight by stressing ourselves out and reaching beyond that zone of proximal development. Start where you are and just be consistent about reading. 15-20 minutes a day will do a lot to improve reading skills, providing there aren't any outlying issues.
Speaker 1:You mentioned, I think you said was it outlining issues or issues outside of the situation? Issues, problems, are you talking about?
Speaker 3:Like dyslexia. There, unfortunately, are people who get into middle school or high school and they've never been diagnosed. There may be ADHD right when I was diagnosed as an adult with ADHD. Now my ADHD in women tends to manifest itself differently than it does in boys. So a boy might have trouble sitting down for 15 minutes and reading if the story doesn't grab him right away, whereas with women we often aren't or girls, I should say, often aren't diagnosed with ADHD because our symptoms don't exhibit themselves.
Speaker 3:We're not up running around and having the outward signs of hyperactivity. Instead, our hyperactivity is all in our mind. That just won't shut down. So it's very possible that a young man could have ADHD. It hasn't been diagnosed and maybe he needs some coping mechanisms or that's not my area of expertise, but working with a specialist could help get him on track. We just never know how. There are other things not connected to reading could impact reading. I mean having ADHD myself, but it was never a problem for me to sit down and read. So that's to me is odd, but it also will. After I've read something, I can sit and think about it for hours. So it's very interesting that there could be issues outside of reading that impact. Reading that impact reading.
Speaker 2:We're having this enlightening, inspiring conversation with Dr Valcine Brown and, based on what you're telling us, I'm drawing some conclusions that you're determined, you're ambitious, you're progressive. No question about that from my perspective. Now tell us three things that you admire about Dr Val Seenbrough.
Speaker 3:Oh, what do I admire? I admire that if I make a mistake, I will own up to it and make changes and move forward. Make changes and move forward. Another thing I admire about myself is my ability to learn new things. I, over the last eight years, have taken up homesteading. So I started with a garden. Three years later, which is five years ago, I got chickens and now I have this homestead thing going on. And that was just through watching YouTube videos, getting books and following bloggers who talk about homesteading. And now here I am on my own homesteading journey and I make TikToks about homesteading and people really appreciate my content.
Speaker 3:The other thing is I admire myself as a mother. My children are my world. They're grown, they're adults. They'll always be my babies and I can look at our life and our relationship, which my children are 25, 29, and almost 30. 29, and almost 30. And even as adults. I look at them and the relationship we have and I am so proud of the foundation that I laid, that we have built this relationship on together and I love it. My 25-year old, my youngest, my daughter, she'll call and say, oh, I just want to run this, Pai Yu. I was like, oh yeah, I love that. She values my opinion and it can be anything from I helped her pick out a rug for her house the other day, and the other thing is we talked about investing and saving for retirement. So it's the important things, as well as the smaller things that are just our moments, that we have because of the foundation we laid. I laid, so I admire myself as a mother.
Speaker 1:Well, you are certainly blessed to have daughters that are grown and have left the nest, as it were, that are grown and have left the nest, as it were, and they still want to stay connected to their mom and in their lives, and it's a very special thing because many parents don't get to experience that with their children.
Speaker 3:That is true. Yes, my two oldest are my boys and then my youngest is my daughter. I am very blessed and fortunate to have the relationship with them that I do.
Speaker 1:I am so if you were to implement one policy change in secondary education based on your research, whatever that may be, what would it be and why?
Speaker 3:We have to bring intervention into the middle schools and high schools. Most of the reading intervention that I researched actually pretty much all of it was just done at the primary levels, k through third grade. Now we realize that there are a lot of secondary students which is middle school and high school that are not reading at the level that they should be reading. Okay, we see that there's a need, but yet we don't offer intervention. Make that make sense. So that would be the one thing I would say we have to extend reading intervention into well beyond third grade.
Speaker 2:So you would write that as a policy, as something that needed to be implemented to help those individuals, those children, those young people to achieve their goals?
Speaker 3:Absolutely, talk to us, please, about what's the best piece of advice you have ever been given oh, the best piece of advice came from my grandmother and it extended beyond the realm of what she was talking about. My mother, my grandmother, always said never be. She said, teach yourself the principle of saving. I don't care if it's a nickel, I don't care if it's a nickel, I don't care if it's a dime. You start somewhere and you teach yourself the principle and then you'll be able to go from there. Now that advice works definitely financially, but it also extends outside of finances teaching yourself principles and starting where you are and growing and building from there. So I think that it's more about self-discipline, teaching yourself principles and then growing from there. Absolutely, that's the best advice I've ever been given, and I don't necessarily think she intended that advice to extend beyond discussing finances, but it did.
Speaker 1:Absolutely amazing, absolutely amazing. It makes me smile just listening to the warmth between you and your children, which is absolutely wonderful. Can you talk to us a little bit about you preparing to present your research at the ARENA 2025? Can you talk to us? A little bit about that.
Speaker 3:Yes. So once I had completed my dissertation, my dissertation chair said ERA's opening up the opportunity for people to present their research. I really think that your research would be right on point for the areas that they're going to be discussing. I said okay, and we went through the process. Her and I truncated a hundred page dissertation down into just a few pages five or six pages and I submitted it and they selected it.
Speaker 3:I was one of over 11,000 submissions that they received over 11,000 submissions that they received and I think they only selected 120 of us. So I was in a very small percentage, and being accepted meant you were going to be doing an iPoster, which is a digital poster with all your findings on it, where people can come and go and look at it. Once they told me I'd been accepted for that, they extended an additional opportunity to allow about 25 of us, I believe, to also do what they call an e-lightning TED Talk, and this is you presenting your research in about three to four minutes and taking a minute or two of Q&A, and so I submitted for that and they selected me for that too. So not only am I presenting my dissertation in the iPresentation format, but I actually get to speak about my research and it's being at it's at AERA, which stands for American Education Research Association, and so it'll be in Denver, Colorado later this month.
Speaker 3:How does it feel? Oh, it feels surreal, I have to say. Thousands of people are going to this convention and this will be the first time that I've spoken, I think, to an audience that large. I've sang in front of large crowds, a couple of thousand people but this is the first time presenting research, so I'm definitely looking forward to it. I'm excited, a little bit nervous. I'm already thinking about what I'm going to wear.
Speaker 2:Yes, I'm excited for it too. That must be quite, quite a fascinating thing to be involved with, to be one of the presenters. You've got a book, and I'd like for you to share with us what that book is about.
Speaker 3:Yes, it is called Credit Recovery Through Demonstration of Mastery. Now, this started as a program on our campus. It's in our third year of running. Traditionally, when a student doesn't pass a class that they need for graduation, there's only two methods for them to recover those missing credits they sit through the class again, taking it face-to-face, or they take it online through online credit recovery, and those were the methods that my school was predominantly using. But we came into an issue where we learned that some of the students were cheating when taking it through online credit recovery. They were finding the answers online and teachers are about second chances, but we're not about cheating. So I had an extra period.
Speaker 3:One of the classes I had got collapsed because there was a mix-up in the band schedule and a lot of the students who were in that AP class needed to move to the band class that was being in the same period and it was only going to be four students left in the class. You can't have rich academic discussions with just four people. So they collapsed that class and I had this extra period. So I went to my administrator and they didn't need to level out any other classes and give me another either ninth, tenth or eleventh grade class. So I said listen, I have this idea and I pitched it to her about doing credit recovery. It's based on mastery.
Speaker 3:Our 9th, 10th and 11th grade English classes had already been doing work on aligning our skills. What do students need to have mastered by the end of the first semester of ninth grade to be successful, the second semester of ninth grade to be successful, the first semester of 10th? So when we had aligned those skills, a lot of those are performance tasks that a student could show demonstration of mastering and be able to recover credit. When you took a class at ninth grade, you may not have grasped those skills then. It took you a little longer. But through the continual exposure of same skills in 10th grade, 11th grade oh okay, I have it now. I've now mastered 11th grade standards I eventually caught up. Why should I go back and sit through the class again when I can just give you? You can give me the performance task. I can sit and perform them in front of you where you know I'm not cheating, and I can recover those credits. I didn't have the skills then, but I have them now and my admin was very supportive. They said absolutely, if your team is on board with it. Yes, so I went and pitched it to the English language arts department. I said, hey, we've already done this work to align our skills. What if we can put together performance tasks that students can recover credit? We make sure they're not cheating. Here's some rules we're going to set in place. They said, ok, put it together and let us see what it looks like.
Speaker 3:So for about a week and a half, I used that period where I didn't have any students put together all the resources or performance tasks, went back, pitched it to the 11th grade, to the ELA team, and they loved it. They said, yeah, we can sign off on this. So we started doing credit recovery. So within that period where I don't have students assigned to that class, I would call in a handful of students at a time and I would say you need to recover credit for your second semester of ninth grade. In order to recover that credit, I need you to do these five things. I'm going to call you in and each time I call you in, you're going to do one of those five things and when you're done with them, I'm going to grade them, average the score. If you pass, I'm going to send it back to your teacher of record. They're going to review it, ensure that indeed you did master the skills. They'll sign off on it and you're going to recoup those credits.
Speaker 3:And it has been very successful. It has been very successful. We got started with it a little bit late that first semester only, because it was first my AP class. Then it collapsed. And then putting together the resources, getting everyone's approval, we started in October of that year. We had about 45 students recover credit that first year. Then the next year we had about 60, 65 students recover credit in English language arts. Now with it it's third year and it's running like a whale oil machine. We had nearly 60 students recover credit in ELA just the first semester mister.
Speaker 1:Wow, an amazing success story and an uplifting way of bringing our conversation to a close. It has been a joy having this time just to talk to you about your passions passions adolescent literacy and education, research and your insights that you were able to give us, and then the future of literacy. I think we touched on that a bit and I just found the entire conversation to be uplifting, and I think individuals who listen to this will find this to be uplifting. Rita, do you have something you want to add to that?
Speaker 2:As you know, on Speak Up International, we seek to inspire, educate and inform, and there's no question that our guest today, dr Valcine Brown, has helped us to meet those goals, and I need to say thank you, Thank you, thank you.
Speaker 3:Thank you so much, ms Rita Burke, for having me on Elton Brown. I appreciate you both so much for taking the time and creating this platform where educators can come and speak up and uplift and encourage their fellow educators. Thank you so much.
Speaker 1:Thank you. By the way, I'm sure there's a book cooking. As soon as the masses can get to it, please let us know. We would love to have yet another conversation with you on Speak Up International.
Speaker 3:Thank you so much.
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