school doing read 180 and I am doing Barton compatable?

From what I am hearing, Read 180 is a computer-based program that has nothing really new in it and not as much phonics as is really needed. There was some discussion about it on LDOnline a while ago.

As soon as I hear “*These* kids can’t do ––” and “*These* kids learn diferently”, my hackles rise. These are classic evasions and excuses and/or prejudice — they don’t have to teach effectively or use proven programs and pedagogy because the kids are some strange beings from Mars, uh, no, doesn’t fly with me.

You have a choice of trying to find something that coordinates with a program that isn’t working and that has no real research proof; or using a proven effective program and doing something that might make a change in the direction of success. Why not go for something new and different from the previous failures?

I don’t think you need to worry about Read 180 and Barton being compatible. I don’t think she will learn much in Read 180. :-} I have tutored kids all year that were getting Whole Language in the classroom. The only down side is that they are getting reinforced in the school for guessing. Then they go to me, and I don’t allow guessing. I’m not sure if Read 180 reinforces guessing or not, but that’s the only problem I would know of. I wouldn’t try to find something “compatible” to Read 180, because you’d be wasting your daughter’s time. Just do Barton and most likely you will have very good results.

BTW, I have been using Barton. If you have any questions ask away. I think it is a very good program though better for older brighter kids, imo.
(Middle school is ideal, imo).

Sadly you won’t get much out of the school, don’t waste your time and energy. I think that would be better spent doing Barton.

—des

I plan on continuing the Barton program at home. I see that it works,but will take time. I am hoping the read 180 program won’t conflict.It sounded like they thought the ideal time for them to pull her for speech would be during the reading time also.My IEP is pretty good and I may not want to call an IEP meeting, as yes, it sounded like she was talking whole language and I don’t want what I worked hard to get to be thrown out the window.

She is right, older students *do* learn differently.

However, the Barton program deals with those differences effectively. THey may learn a bit differently, but they still need to learn the stuff they’ve missed.

I, too, don’t think you’ll have any problems with compatibility — and Reading 180 does have its strong points. One huge problem with non-reading students is that their language development deterioriates instead of advancing, and Reading 180’s immersion into audio literature *does* get the students thinking in language beyond “Gnome saen?” (“Know what I’m saying?”) and the other advanced discourse that happens in the hallways.

Thanks to all of you for the information. And I have to ask how do they learn differently? The other thing I am worried about is that they are saying she probably won’t be taking social studies and will be in reading program then, so that is two 80 minutes classes of reading and writing. Because of reading level of students they say most kids are behavior problems in social studies so they don’t put them in social studies class. I am wondering if I should suggest she does take social studies with accomodations.

I agree with Sue, at least from what I’ve seen of the program (I haven’t actually seen the real thing). The other is perhaps that they can read some of this literature that they don’t read. There are cheaper ways to do this, for example books on tape or the Don Johnston program set of books/CDs “Start to Finish books” or even someone reading to them, if they tolerate such a thing.

I am absolutely certain you aren’t going to have “compatibility problems”.
The program includes some reading materials on the computer, questions on comprehension, etc. And some small amt. of guided instruction. The phonics concepts would only be part of that and are pretty basic. By Barton’s book 4, she could teach it that little class. The two students I have gotten that far, I have been very happy to know something the rest the of the class doesn’t know. I’d say some of the teachers won’t know it either. Even earlier, the spelling, etc will not be taught, not be Read 180 and prob. not at all.

Differences in older students and younger students has to do kind of with the kind of thinking older students do. They are more able to “think about thinking” and more interested in peers over adults. (A few things I can think of.) Barton at least deals with the cognitive differences by offering progressively more challenging activities and using logic, etc to teach. (As I’ve said, I really think that it is a better older kids program, being short, imo, on play activities, etc. though you could add them.)

I think it is reasonable to have her do social studies with accommodations, if her behavior is good. In fact, I would try to find out graduation requirements (maybe not relevant to Middle school), but I think it would good for her to follow the social studies proceedures and know what she is going to do in high school.

—des

Federal law stresses that students on IEPs are to have access to the regular education curriculum. To miss an entire academic subject - social studies - is to miss a lot. With accommodations, she should definitely have access to Social Studies. Unfortunately, for too many kids with LDs, expectations are lowered and they miss a great deal of the curriculum. There are many appropriate accommodations that can allow her to have access to the curriculum that her peers have access to. Don’t expect anything less!

When I had first talked to the middle school they said they had a seperate social studies class for struggling learners, so this last change was suprising. I am trying to get the elementary learning support teacher to set up an IEP,but she E-mailed me saying she thought it was fine the way it is. Well the service date for speech ends at the end of this school year. And there were some of her objectives in reading ,math and writing that were met or close to being met. The IEP was accepted in December and not fully activated until March. So it has only been in effect for a couple months. I am thinking she should test again with the PAL which is a phonological phoneme test or the Lindamood Auditory conceptualization test which gave her the information for the objectives in the first place. -But it is sounding like she is writing me off and wanting the middle school to decide next year what to do. There are many issues that are arising. I have a E-mail in draft form waiting to send. I know I can’t wait too long as IEPs are due on a certain date as I had that problem before with this learning support teacher before, and she told me it was too late to add to the original IEP.

Having a segregated social studies class seems to defeat the spirit fo the law. I’m sure there are kids who can’t handle the regular classes, and for them it *might* make sense. (See later comments.) But if your daughter *could* handle the classes but needs accommodation (ie help with reading and writing and not behavior and so on), it definitely makes no sense to exclude her.

My nephew is dyslexic and has Aspergers. He took a very advanced media literacy classs and was excelled. He was able to put together assignments in Power Point and that sort of thing. He has had an aide who helps him with the mechanics aspects. They have given the use of a laptop with Cowriter, Power Point, etc on them. They stopped putting him the special ed. type social studies classes when they were just to boring and low level for him. He actually behaves better in the gifted level classes. I think the expectation thing is very big here. The low level special ed classes are for the “dumbies and losers” which they call themselves, btw.

Seems to me you could use some help of advocacy groups in your area.

—des

I asked to view classes and the read 180 program, since they told me June would be the time I could go in and view. Now they E-mailed me telling me they don’t have the read 180 program yet and haven’t even purchased it yet, and that since it is the end of the year I wouldn’t get much of viewing classes but I could look at the read 180 brochures and look at their curriculum documents. Looks like I am going to need to sit down and have a long talk with the middle school principal as our E-mails don’t seem to be working things out. 12 days of school left -

You might look at the online materials. Just plug Read180 into google and see. They pretty much describe it. I still see that there is no possible conflict. At best it would be a fluency program and some introduction to literature. At worst it is a major waste of time (and money on the district’s part, it isn’t a cheap program). It would only be confusing if she was trained to guess, since most public school reading programs encourage guessing well that’s that.

Real confusion would be if you introduced to valid reading intervention programs (like I saw listed here once) that really aren’t meant to work together, say Orton based and LiPS. (Not that you couldn’t take from each. I mean here a strictly by the book approach.) The scope and sequence are radically different, the language is different, and so is the approach. YOu could do LiPS first and then Barton, say. That wouldn’t be confusing. Or you could do Barton one year and go to a different Orton based program, like Wilson, that wouldn’t be confusing. Since they aren’t using any valid intervention I think you can breath easy.

OTOH, I would be more concerned about them keeping her out of social studies. It’s against the law anyway, afaik.

—des

Yes, social studies is one of my biggest worries. I have sent a couple of E-mails on it,but no response. I want to settle it now, as I would hate to have her start school and then realize she isn’t in social studies and then she would be behind and then they don’t let her in. The thing is that they will be testing all kids in late August and I think they want to base their decision on that. So far I haven’t gotten a straight answer, I guess they don’t know what they will be doing until that time. I just can’t imagine working all that stuff out at the beginning of the school year,so I am trying to get it ironed out now.

Sometimes a side door is the way in, if you can find out who one of the teachers might be and get the inside scoop. (The teacher that’s going to actually be at the school some over the summer is the one who’s likely to try & help you out, though sometimes I didn’t know my schedule or anything until mid-August. )

I work at a school that’s implementing Read 180 this year. (It’s funny, the principal complained about the budget this year and now I know why!!! It’s because she spent so much on this program!!! ;-o)

The way the school is using it is they are making it a before school and after school program (1 hour per day. For some kids it will be morning and others afternoon). Teaching aides (like myself) will be trained in running it. Perhaps you can ask about the possiblity of something like this so your daughter doesn’t miss out on other material.

Thanks, I just talked with our new principal and they did get the read 180 program. The school has made quite a change in staff, as they have a new vice principal, and the learning support person left as well (this was the one I mainly talked with), so I am basically starting over. They also have a new counselor, so here we go again. The people who left were the ones who didn’t want her to go to social studies so maybe we can change that.

Funny you should mention budget. They spend thousands and thousands on fancy packaged programs, testing, more testing. But teachers have to buy paper, pencils, etc. (the kids are supposed to buy them but this is high school). We have a $125 dollar budget (includes office supplies) a year and 1000 copies ( I know that might sound like a lot, but it isn’t, imo).

—des

1000 copies goes away *fast* if you need to make stuff for your students to do - you get to divide 1000 by the number of students in the class and that’s what they get…

1000 copies goes away *fast* if you need to make stuff for your students to do - you get to divide 1000 by the number of students in the class and that’s what they get…

The big bucks in texts and software… it’s such a racket. Can’t blame some of the whole language folks for thinking that the Reading Panel has an undercurrent of profiteering… ya gotta notice how much Kaplan et al are making from No Child Left Behind with their tutoring magnates!

I’m thinking the 1000 copies MIGHT last half a year? We could all take a bet on it. :-)

As for the pricey materials… seems school districts have the idea if it costs a LOT and has lots of bells and whistles (and you couldn’t describe Read180 better) then it MUST be good. Anyone here up for making a get rich quick scheme. (You gotta think up a name like Really Scholastic. :-)

—des

And you have to have the big suits and the big booths at the big reading conferences. (Try going to a school librarians’ conference. Much wining and dining!)
But hey, we can get rich making the stuff for them to use at the conferences, too, where they use PowerPoint to convince each other how much they’re Helping The WOrld.

My nephew says your IQ goes down 2 points every time you use Power Point. If so, it might explain a great deal. :-)

Ok, how about that dog and pony show. I think we’d make a great team. (We could connect up with Jan and Victoria and do the “Olde School Marms Reading Revolutions or is that revulsions” :-)))

—des