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Treasure Island Elementary Community School

"The SuccessMaker management system has enabled our teachers to provide feedback on student strengths and needs to the Treasure Island curriculum committee. SuccessMaker is an important piece of our total curriculum strategy at Treasure Island Community School."
     Luther Gray, Principal, Treasure Island Elementary Community School

Highlights

• Treasure Island Elementary Community School has been recognized by the state of Florida as an ‘A’ school for the past two years.
• In the Pearson Digital Learning SuccessMaker Math Concepts and Skills course, students in grades 1 through 5 made gains of almost a year in 17 hours of instruction. Students in grades 1 through 5 taking the Reading Foundations courses made gains of almost a year in 15 hours of SuccessMaker instruction.
• During the 2001-2002 school year, fourth and fifth grade ESOL students took SuccessMaker courses in the months prior to FCAT testing. Averaging 21.5 hours of instruction, by mid-March the students gained almost a full year in Math Concepts and Skills with 100% of them having acceptable performance. In Reading Foundations courses, the students made 1.24 year gains in 21 hours of instruction. 88% of them had acceptable performance.

Profile

Treasure Island Elementary Community School is located in North Bay Village in Dade County, Florida. The school serves students in preK through grade six and enrolls 1,060 students. Treasure Island is part of Miami-Dade County Public Schools.

A constant flow of immigrant students from many countries attend Treasure Island, many of them from low economic backgrounds.

Treasure Island Elementary Community School.

Challenge

Treasure Island Elementary Community School is challenged by a variety of factors, including low-income families and a large and varied immigrant population.

Solution

Treasure Island implemented SuccessMaker in 1993. Today, the school has 165 SuccessMaker workstations.

Students in grades one through five use SuccessMaker in both math and reading in their classrooms on a daily basis. There is also a 15-station lab in the media center. Teachers monitor daily progress and give positive feedback to students, which helps to keep performance high. Reports in the extensive SuccessMaker management system also guide the teacher in providing reinforcement as needed.

During the 2001-2002 school year, two kindergarten sections were introduced to SuccessMaker. Each child was given a thorough individualized orientation to computers, using demonstration numbers until they could successfully navigate with a mouse and keyboard. Gradually, the courseware was introduced and student performance increased.

Teachers at Treasure Island have seen a strong correlation between gains made in SuccessMaker and those demonstrated on the FCAT tests. According to Tarese Josephs, fifth grade teacher at Treasure Island, "I’ve used SuccessMaker in my classroom at Treasure Island for the past eight years. The exercises in Math Concepts and Skills application strands closely correlate to the FCAT strategies I teach. I love the computers!"

Treasure Island students in the SuccessMaker lab.

Results

Teachers at Treasure Island are highly committed to improved student performance. Students working in SuccessMaker courses were monitored closely and motivational strategies were put in place in the classrooms to help increase student achievement.

Fourth-grade reading students at Treasure Island had particularly good gains for the 2001-2002 school year:

In Reader’s Workshop, 102 students averaged over a year’s gain in 19 hours of instruction, and 76 percent of them had acceptable performance.

• In Reading Foundations, fourth graders averaged a .84 year gain by mid-March when FCAT testing occurred.
• Sixty-seven fourth graders taking Reading Adventures averaged 14.5 hours of instruction and completed 13 lessons. Sixty-six percent of them had acceptable performance. Ms. Gonzalez’ students’ performance was especially impressive. 20 of 24 students averaged 11 hours in Reading Adventures, completing over 12 lessons by Mid-March, with 100% demonstrating acceptable performance.
• One fourth-grade ESOL student was the top scorer on the FCAT writing test for Treasure Island.

These statistics back up Ms. Lourdes Gonzalez’ belief that, "SuccessMaker is invaluable because of its everyday exposure to reading strategies, subsequent gains support, and its impact on FCAT testing." As a result of the pre-FCAT test in the fall, Ms. Gonzalez’ fourth grade students came up as a low ability reading group. However, with the strong implementation of SuccessMaker reading courses and the reinforcement of Ms. Gonzalez’ direct teaching, most of her students scored above average in the FCAT reading section, leading the pack in fourth grade results and were recognized by Treasure Island as students with the "biggest gain on FCAT" in reading. "The use of SuccessMaker, along with careful monitoring for high performance, results in higher FCAT scores…an ‘A’ school again," says Gonzalez.

Fourth-grade students worked in Reading Foundations courses five days a week. Once they reached 3.75 in Reader’s Workshop with 70 percent performance, they were enrolled in Reading Adventures. The students then worked in Reader’s Workshop three days a week and Reading Adventures two days a week for a more balanced approach to reading skills. In addition, teachers had access to Reading Adventures and FCAT reports showing specific benchmark skills that needed further support.

Treasure Island and the FCAT

The FCAT test measures achievement in reading and mathematics for Florida students in grades three through ten, by assessing student progress on benchmarks identified in Sunshine State Standards. Treasure Island met the new and stringent requirements of the 2002 FCAT to remain an ‘A’ school. One factor in remaining an ‘A’ school for a second year in a row was Treasure Island’s ability to use the SuccessMaker management system to specifically track lower quartile students (those achieving level one on FCAT). With new goal achievement reports available to teachers, tracking course levels is very easy. Professional development training scheduled for November will focus on helping teachers use new reports and teaching them to adjust scheduling to ensure "no child is left behind." Fourth-grade teacher Mrs. Dorothy Davern attributes much of her students’ FCAT gains to the ability to isolate strands in SuccessMaker. "FCAT reading strategies can be correlated in class with the corresponding strands in SuccessMaker’s reading courses, helping us target instruction right where it’s needed."

Luther Gray, principal at Treasure Island, attributes the strong teacher intervention and the Pearson Digital Learning staff with keeping students on track. "As a new principal, I appreciate the support our Pearson Digital Learning field engineer and curriculum implementation specialist provide. Their knowledge and insight have been invaluable," says Gray.

ESOL Students at Treasure Island

Another SuccessMaker strategy utilized by Treasure Island to keep their ‘A’ status involved ESOL students. Because non-English speakers must master English in four semesters, special attention is paid to the ESOL students whose scores count on the FCAT testing. During the 2001-2002 school year, these fourth and fifth grade students received intensive scheduling and monitoring in SuccessMaker courses in the months leading up to FCAT testing. Mrs. Davern’s fourth- and fifth-graders averaged 21.5 hours by mid-March and made .94 gains in Math Concepts and Skills with 100 percent having acceptable performance. In Reading Foundations courses, in 21 hours of instruction, students gained 1.24 years in the SuccessMaker courses, and 88 percent of them had acceptable performance.

At Treasure Island Elementary Community School, students overall made significant gains in SuccessMaker’s Math Concepts and Skills and Reading Foundations courses.

In the Math Concepts and Skills course, students in K-5 made
average gains of almost a year in 17 hours of instruction with SuccessMaker. The goals was for the students to reach 90%
skills mastery. 94% of the students met this goal.

In the Reading Foundations course, students in K-5 made average gains
of almost a year in 15 hours of instruction with SuccessMaker. 82%
of the students reached the goal of responding with 65% accuracy.

With SuccessMaker as an integral curriculum approach at Treasure Island, effective strategies have been developed by the school to help its unique and changing population achieve higher academic success.

Contact us for additional information on how Pearson Digital Learning can help you achieve results with SuccessMaker Enterprise.