Continuously serving Kosciusko County since 1854
LARWILL - Whitko Community Schools Board heard Monday about updated i-Ready test scores along with a good-bye from their curriculum director, Dr. Jaime Carroll.
“A couple things I want you to remember about what we’ve done with the curriculum since July,” said Carroll. “For kindergarten through eighth, English language arts, we have reworked all curriculum maps. The middle school is still working on solidifying theirs, but we have aligned all of them to the checkpoints for grades three through eight.”
Kindergarten through fifth grade for the entire district was able to show reading scores through i-Ready, while middle school still was under a different contract, but will use i-Ready next year.
The K-5 student reading scores showed at the beginning of the year that 25% were at or above grade level, and the middle of the year showed 50% of students at or above their grade level.
"When we see these red bars shrink from the beginning of the year to the end, that’s exactly what we want to see,” Carroll said.
Students who were a year below grade level started the year at 26% of students that were below grade level, and at the middle of the year, showed it was at 14%, “which is really exciting.”
Math showed 14% at or above grade level districtwide, and the middle showed an improvement of 28%.
“They are also implementing a brand-new math curriculum,” said Carroll. “They are working really hard with all the new changes. Both math teachers at the middle school have been working diligently, to make sure that everything they are teaching is aligning with that checkpoint.”
The scores for kindergarten through fifth grade were as follows:
Kindergarteners' reading scores started at 25% of students being at or above grade level and are now at 74% for the middle of the year. Math started at 7% of students being at or above grade level and is now at 42%.
First-grade reading scores started at 7% of students being at or above grade level and are now at 40%. Math started at 2% of students being at or above grade level and is now at 11%.
Second-grade reading scores started at 18% of students being at or above grade level and are now at 42%. There are no students within second grade who are below a two years or more grade level with their reading skills. Math started at 7% of students being at or above grade level and now is at 21%.
Third-grade reading scores were at 51% of students being at or above grade level and are now at 68%. Third-graders who were three or more grade levels behind started with 7%, to 3% by the middle of the year. Math scores started at 10% of students being at or above grade level, and to 28%, with no students three or more grade levels behind.
Fourth-grade reading scores started at 23% of students being at or above grade level and are now at 38%. Math scores started at 19% of students being at or above grade level and is now at 29%.
Fifth-grade reading scores started at 23% of students being at or above grade level, to 38%, and students that were two or more years behind grade level went from 50% to 28%. Math scores started at 18% of students being at or above grade level and went up to 43%.
For middle school, Carroll was only able to give the math scores, as that’s all they could test with on the i-Ready, which are as follows:
Sixth-grade math showed 13% of students being at or above grade level at the beginning of the year and is now at 24%.
Seventh-grade math started at 20% of students being at or above grade level and stayed the same during the middle of the year.
Eighth-grade math started at 22% of students being at or above grade level and has increased to 35%. Students that were three years or more below grade level went from 35%, to 22% by the middle of the year.
“So, we’ll do testing in the spring, and it looks like it will trend positive, but will all of these students still trend positive next year?” asked Board President Scott Werstler.
“Yes, but there is always a summer slide, so it’s hard to make that assumption,” said Carroll.
Carroll also gave her farewell to the board, and to WCS as she will become the superintendent for Westview schools. She stated that she was extremely grateful for the opportunities that were given to her at Whitko.
