Project Merit

The Dade-Monroe Teacher Education Center (TEC) was awarded a grant from the Florida Department of Education to create videotapes and a website based upon superior instructional models. The TEC chose the teaching and learning strategy, Reciprocal Teaching, as the prototype for this grant initiative.

In Dade County Public Schools, the District Director of Language Arts/Reading, Ms. Norma Bossard, piloted Reciprocal Teaching in selected Chapter I fourth grade classes. She referred to this overall reading comprehension program as Project MERIT (Making Excellent Readers Intelligent Thinkers).

Chapter I teachers in Project MERIT were trained in the Reciprocal Teaching strategy. These teachers, with their students, practiced one reading passage per day for 20 consecutive days before the standardized test. Teachers read the passages aloud each day with their students, clarified the words the students didn't know, required the students to ask `“teacher-like”-like', comprehension questions, and then write summaries of the passages. For homework, students took the passages home, read them aloud and came back the next day to answer the multiple choice questions.

When the standardized test scores arrived at one of the schools, Mr. Bossard jumped up and danced on the table: the scores rose 13 points in the fourth grade. This increase in scores was even more impressive in light of scores that actually decreased in other grade levels. Clearly, the strategy of Reciprocal Teaching made a difference.

Encouraged by the test results and the positive attitudes toward Reciprocal Teaching exhibited by students and teachers, Ms. Bossard applied for and was awarded a Title VI grant. She worked with two Educational Specialists who, in turn, presented model demonstration lessons for students at eight middle school sites.

During the initial trial-runs, students were asked to complete the K in the KWL sheet to tell the Educational Specialist what good readers do when they read. The less proficient readers wrote that good readers read fast, they like books and they know how to pronounce lots of words. The more proficient readers wrote some of those things, but almost all of them included something to the effect of "good readers have a video going on in their heads when they read."

In analyzing students' responses, it was clear that a piece was missing from the original Reciprocal Teaching technique. Thus, visualization was added as a reading strategy. Instead of four strategies, Project MERIT taught students to use five. Icons were developed to represent the five strategies. A bookmark with those icons, question stems, and hints for using the strategies was developed for students to use as they read. Task cards for each of the five strategies were also developed. Scripts were added as guides for students to become reading leaders during group work. Teachers were trained in the use of the five strategies, and demonstration lessons were modeled in classrooms.

An on-site school administrator helped the Educational Specialists monitor Project MERIT throughout the year.

Pre and posttests were administered to students in the eight schools and were analyzed by reading subskill. In a comparison of the pre and posttests, students in five of the eight schools improved in reading comprehension. Students were taught to use the five strategies and also used practice passages and multiple choice questions for the twenty days before standardized tests were administered in March, 1997. The most dramatic results were the improved attitudes of students and teachers who practiced the five comprehension strategies of Project MERIT, based on Reciprocal Teaching.