As the year progressed, the teachers used gradual release of responsibility (Pearson & Gallagher, 1983) by modeling the entire process in the beginning, then partnering students to collaborate together by peer-teaching, and finally working independently. The students anticipated and looked forward to the Wonderopolis® response to their comments each day! The culminating activity for the year included student groups creating their own Wonder of the Day®.
Increased Student Learning and Reading Achievement
The 4-Sight Reading Assessment (2008) is administered four times each year with the Baseline Benchmark test given at the beginning of the school year and the Reading Benchmark Number 4 given at the end of the school year. The 4-Sight Reading Assessment is a reliable and valid instrument that measures student reading achievement (SFA, 2008, p. 19). The 4-Sight Reading Assessment assesses student knowledge and application of nonfiction skills: sequence, author’s purpose, roots/affixes, context clues, figurative language, text features, main idea, and cause/effect relationships. The student data results help identify areas of concern and guide teacher instruction to improve student learning and reading achievement.
During the 2011-2012 and 2012-2013 school years, MCR-II fifth-grade students in two of the classrooms showed significant gains in student achievement in nonfiction benchmark skill areas of roots/affixes, context clues, figurative language, text features, main idea, and cause/effect relationships compared to the two classrooms that did not utilize the Wonderopolis® Wonder of the Day®. Based on the quantitative 4-Sight Reading student data shown in the Nonfiction Benchmarks table below (Figure 1), there is a significant correlation between the implementation of Wonderopolis® Wonder of the Day® and the increased student achievement on these nonfiction benchmarks.
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Figure 1