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Author puts Turie T. Small Elementary in spotlight

EDITOR´S NOTE: Gene Maeroff, author of more than a dozen books on education, visited schools around the country to write his new book on the importance of early education (prekindergarten through third grade). The result is "Building Blocks, Making Children Successful in Early Years of School" (Palgrave Macmillan). The founding director of Hechinger Institute on Education and the Media at Teachers College, Columbia University, where he is now a senior fellow, spent a day at Turie T. Small Elementary School in Daytona Beach in 2004.

His observations about the school are included in two of his chapters, one on behavioral issues and another on teacher training:

GOOD BEHAVIOR

In a chapter titled "Instilling Habits and Dispositions," Maeroff writes about practices that some schools use to encourage good behavior. An early childhood center in Lincoln, Del., for instance, has a "behavior coach," who wears gym-type clothes and, along with other school leaders, greets children as they enter school. For difficult situations, the coach has a time-out room, unfurnished, where she can safely deal with children having tantrums. A Harrisburg, Pa., elementary school uses a program offering children an alternative to acting out in anger. They are taught to deal with conflict by "doing turtle," pulling their heads back into their shells to think things over and let strong emotions pass.

Maeroff also highlights Turie T. Small´s Behavioral Academy:

"Taking another approach, springing from different needs, Turie T. Small Elementary School in Daytona Beach formed a Behavioral Academy as a response to the problem of children roaming the open-style campus and misbehaving in the morning, after the free breakfast and before classes began. Based on an analysis by a consultant, the school confined students to the school´s multipurpose room and teachers monitored the room, handing out reading materials to youngsters who weren´t in the cafeteria eating breakfast. The school also established a weekly behavioral class, but the intervention did not end there.

An ongoing feature of Turie T. Small´s effort at behavior modification was the distribution of Bulldog Bucks, named in honor of the school´s mascot. The school emphasized group behavior by awarding Bulldog Bucks to entire classes. A class might win awards for not acting up when a substitute teacher filled in or by keeping in line when walking from one activity to another. An entire class could redeem Bulldog Bucks for rewards -- $35 for popcorn and a movie for the class, $25 for a special Friday recess, $10 for a book reading by the principal or some other school dignitary, for example. The pupils most readily motivated toward good conduct by the program were those in the primary grades; Bulldog Bucks did not so easily persuade those in the upper elementary grades that they should behave."

TEACHER TRAINING

While researching his chapter on teacher training, Maeroff became interested in a program called "Literacy First," a process used for improving reading instruction. It not only promoted reading but also provided professional development and promoted interaction among principals and teachers. One of the reasons he visited Turie T. Small school was because it had used that program. A segment called "Literacy First in Daytona Beach" follows:

"Educators at Turie T. Small Elementary School in Daytona Beach, Florida, feel . . . lifted by Literacy First. With almost nine out of 10 of its students on federally subsidized meals, Turie T., as it is known, has the characteristics of the worst of inner-city schools. Pupil behavior was abysmal and reading scores were so low that Florida gave the school a "D" on its annual state report card (1999). The school was a revolving door for teachers, many of whom did not remain long enough for children to get them. They simply gave up and shifted to jobs elsewhere in the system, replaced sometimes by teachers other schools didn´t want.

Principal Betty J. Powers worked into the night to no avail; reading scores remained mired in waters seemingly as deep as the nearby ocean. The area superintendent finally told Powers that he intended to close Turie T., a warning that paradoxically provided her with an opening to pursue improvement. She asked faculty who wanted to remain to write letters explaining what they would do to make the school better. Enough of the almost 40 teachers were reassigned to enable Powers to hire 17 replacements -- and, for the most part, she chose to fill the positions with novices who did not bear the stain of past failure. In 1999, Powers turned to Literacy First. "With so much pressure from the FCAT (Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test)," she said, "we had to give teachers support to show we were still there." The result was that teachers found a way to focus their work and felt empowered by the knowledge and skills they gained for teaching reading.

"Literacy First made me a better reading teacher," says Jennifer Joseph, who taught second grade at Turie T. and later shifted to fifth grade. "I came out of college with courses in reading, but I wasn´t ready for the different levels in the same classroom. Literacy First gave me a toolbox of strategies. I became more organized and able to understand the process of how kids learn to read. It changes the conversation among teachers because we have now all had the same experiences and can discuss the same strategies."

Teachers think they learned a great deal through a process in which Peggy Rivers, the Literacy First consultant, and the school´s administrators observed them providing reading instruction in their classrooms. Then, while a substitute kept the class going, the teacher would leave the room and undergo an instant critique, point by point, aimed at honing her craft. "The teachers were brave and agreeable," says Nancy Gossett, the administrator who became Turie T.´s academic coach. She and others stress that the critique was "nonthreatening."

The story almost has a Hollywood ending -- but not quite. FCAT scores soared and Turie T. ultimately gained an "A" on the state report card. There was a sense of mission on the campus, which comprises several separate one-story buildings without indoor corridors. The doors of classrooms open to covered walkways and grassy courtyards. A Wall of Fame in a multipurpose room has the portraits of "A" students and classmates who have distinguished themselves by improving.

But Powers and her staff look over their shoulders to keep Turie T.´s troubled past from catching up with them. They face the challenge of a persistent pupil mobility rate of 49 percent, churned by a steady stream of families on public assistance checking in and out of the dilapidated motels lining Route 1, the historic Maine-to-Florida highway just blocks away. Family reinforcement for the school remains tenuous as evidenced by low participation in a family education program. The school used (federal) Title 1 funds to assemble baskets containing books and a cassette player, goods worth a total of about $50, to reward those who attended all six evenings in a series. Only 15 families qualified for baskets. Even Mother Nature reminds Turie T. of its fragility. Three of the four hurricanes that pounded Florida´s east coast in the fall of 2004 tore through the neighborhood, ripping holes in the school roof and leaving Turie T. with a half-million-dollars worth of damage.

Powers and many of the teachers think that perhaps the school should bring back Literary First to maintain their momentum. Some teachers joined the faculty while the professional development program was under way and didn´t receive the benefit of the entire program, and newer teachers missed it altogether. A school, after all, is a dynamic place, always in flux. Furthermore, Powers and a number of the teachers who participated believe they could use a refresher course. School communities that rally to free themselves from the grip of adversity generally worry about retaining their gains and not slipping back, not unlike many families that make their way up out of poverty.

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