It seems like a lot happens around the dinner table, coffee tables, and gatherings of folks.
The summer after third grade, I sat at the formica and chrome table to watch my mom teach my brother David how to read. The harvest gold refrigerator hummed nearby. The same one under which I used to hide my HILCOA vitamins.
By fifth grade, I was assigned a first grader to help learn to read. At the antique dining room table we bought from an estate sale from down the street, Mom helped me create manipulatives, handwriting paper, and flash cards from a book called Recipe for Reading. I still have the book...tattered and faded.
During college, I heard a sermon on Romans 1 after the Lord's Supper Table. Reprobate minds and stuff. I remember thinking about what this meant for reading and reasoning. As I pondered, all the ideas were the same ones we saw in Figure 19 many years later and all the things in the Comprehension Strand beginning in 2019. Comprehension became a lifetime obsession.
Doneice Ray allowed me to teach a first grade class as a long term sub when I graduated in '91. Wow. What an experience. Did I really know how to teach a person how to read? Did I even know about the Guided Reading table? Nope. The next semester, I was honored to teach for her in fifth grade. I stayed long enough to have those former first graders in my fifth grade class. By that time, I was figuring out a few things.
Thirty three years later sitting at the granite bartop next to stainless steel appliances that don't last 10 years, I'm still figuring things out and the search continues for supporting comprehension in all readers and thinkers.
Since retirement...I've been struggling. There's this scene at the end of Saving Private Ryan that summarizes my thoughts. Have I been and done what I've been gifted and charged to be? Have I earned it?
And then this summer... Tremaine Brown, Jacob Breeden, and I put our heads together on a project over a piece of brown butcher paper in the dining room at Shi Lee's Soul Food. You see, Tremaine tries to make The Heights a better place for his daughter and all those around him. He's fed people so their tables and tummies are full. He's made sure they have clothes. He makes sure they have school supplies. He makes sure they have fun at holidays. But how could he help them with literacy? And we all know that success in school is complicated. Lots of reasons kids and teachers struggle. With the Vessel and Unity Learning Communities, we want to tackle all the barriers to literacy.
In January, we'll begin with 12 kids. 5th and 6th graders that struggle with reading and writing. A counselor will lead a group of four teachers - three kids per adult. And a "grandma" figure will be the mentor for all of them. The community at the Warford will partner with us.
As students of AISD, they've had all the literacy interventions. Powerful initial instruction and remediation. But yet, there are those that still struggle and aren't qualified for services like special education or emerging bilingual support. And there are those that have struggles related to society and living life in this century. We'll dig into those issues together, solving and supporting the struggles together.
Honestly, it's a giant experiment. The Amarillo Area Foundation has funded a portion of what we need to begin...and we are honored by their investment in our children's future. This month and the next, we are meeting with teachers and counselors to collaborate on a set of challenges, processes, and key vocabulary and theoretical underpinnings for our approach. In January, we'll begin meeting with kids...thought partners and co-creators with them to cause their own success and growth.
Along the way, we'll all be writing and documenting the process and outcomes...telling the story of what happens around these new tables. Won't you join us? Learn more, connect, and join us here: https://www.beblessedbythevessel.org/home
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