Comprehensive literacy training grounded in evidence-based practices provides crucial foundational knowledge to empower school and district leaders to create a culture and vision for literacy instruction. However, this cannot be done in a day. Leaders need opportunities to discover effective instructional practices and high-quality curriculum and assessment tools. They need to learn how to create a literacy plan that will support their district's mission and strategic priorities as well as the plan’s implementation for lasting change and classroom application.
But which leaders need to be trained? With our nation’s NAEP scores so low, all administrators need to become literacy leaders so they have the ability to support their teachers as they transform literacy research into practice within their classrooms. Think about this scenario, if a principal walks into a 6th grade classroom and sees a student writing and struggling with vocabulary words, they should be able to collaborate with the teacher about using evidence-based practices such as morphology or semantic maps to assist the student. Unfortunately, many times this is not the case because school leaders really do not know what they should be looking for in the area of best evidenced-based literacy practices.
A recent report from the Research Partnership for Professional Learning found that coaching and teacher collaboration are key strategies for effective teacher training. Having leaders trained in the same structured literacy materials as teachers helps them develop deep knowledge of the science of reading and create a structured literacy implementation plan in their schools or districts to support teachers.
Overall, developing school leaders’ knowledge of evidence-based literacy instruction so that they recognize their need for systems-level changes that allow teachers to effectively implement their professional learning is essential. AIM’s Pathways to Literacy Leadership is available for administrators to develop knowledge of the science of reading and create a structured literacy implementation plan in their schools or districts.
Mississippi is an example of a state that has recently seen great growth in their reading scores and training in evidence-based literacy practices played a major role in this shift. During the 2022-2023 school year, the Mississippi Department of Education partnered with AIM Institute for Learning & Research to provide Pathways to Literacy Leadership training to leaders in order to better support implementation of structured literacy into classroom practice to benefit students.
“Our leaders are able to help teachers take the research and translate it into practice in the classroom,” said Kristen Wynn, State Literacy Director (K-12) with the Mississippi Department of Education states, describing the benefits of leadership training. “They're able to monitor and really be instructional leaders within their building. In Mississippi, we are really trying to empower our leaders to move into the instructional space. Training was a great way for us to do that...to move our leaders..to lead the charge for literacy within their building.”
Are you ready to LEAD THE CHARGE in your school or district to create and maintain systems in your school that make literacy success a reality for all? Watch this video of Dr. Ernesto Ortiz Jr., a former elementary school principal, discussing his work on creating a culture of literacy in his school with literacy researcher Dr. Julie Washington of the University of California, Irvine.
As Dr. Ortiz states, “I think people have a fixed mindset that it's the classroom teacher's job or responsibility to teach literacy. The gym teacher can do it. The art teacher can do it. The music teacher can do it...anyone can do it...Families can do it...We're all literacy teachers for [our students].”
