LITERACY COLLABORATIVE AT LESLEY UNIVERSITY

Literacy Collaborative is a school reform model targeted specifically to improve school literacy programs from kindergarten through grade eight. It is a long-term professional development program provided as a collaboration between the Lesley University Center for Reading Recovery and elementary schools. The goal of Literacy Collaborative parallels the mission of Lesley University Center for Reading Recovery, which is to assure successful literacy achievement for every child.

Announcing Position Available: Primary (K-2) Literacy Collaborative Trainer

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To achieve its mission, and the goals of Literacy Collaborative, the Center:

The Literacy Collaborative provides a research-based instructional model that is student-centered, language-based, and process-oriented. The model uses research-based methods of instruction while focusing on the complex skills and strategies of reading, writing, and oral language. In addition, Literacy Collaborative assures an efficient, effective safety net for the lowest achieving first graders by requiring Reading Recovery, along with other high quality interventions, as part of the comprehensive approach.

Lesley University enters into a long-term commitment with elementary schools by training a school-based leadership team to oversee the implementation of Literacy Collaborative to meet the needs of the school while maintaining the integrity of the model. This school team, which includes the literacy coordinator and the principal, meets regularly to ensure a high quality implementation of the Literacy Collaborative in the school. In addition, Lesley University provides multi-year training and professional development for the school- or district-based literacy coordinator or the university trainer. Lesley also provides guidance to the literacy coordinator as s/he provides year-long initial professional development training of 40 - 45 hours for the school faculty along with weekly demonstrations and coaching in the classroom. The year following the initial training, continued monthly professional development is provided to teachers.

Finally, Lesley University engages with a network of universities nationwide to bring the most current research and best practices to schools implementing Literacy Collaborative. These universities conduct systematic assessment of model implementation by collecting and analyzing student test results from Literacy Collaborative schools. Their research results continue to shape the instructional framework of the model and revise the training and implementation process.