Wisconsin Act 20 requires “science-based early reading instruction” in grades K-3. WRPS plans to implement changes through fifth grade for the 2024-25 school year.

WISCONSIN RAPIDS − Last summer, the Wisconsin State Legislature and Gov. Tony Evers reached a compromise on sweeping literacy reform for Wisconsin students.

The reform, known as The Right to Read Act or 2023 Wisconsin Act 20, requires “science-based early reading instruction in both universal and intervention settings” and specifically prohibits reading instruction using “three-cueing instruction,” according to the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction website.

Wisconsin has ranked at or below average among other states in student reading performance measures since the 2000s, a large shift from its top 10 status in the 1990s.

Wisconsin is one of over three dozen states to enact similar reading reform bills in recent years. Here’s what readers need to know about the changes and how the Wisconsin Rapids Public School District is working to implement a new reading curriculum.

What is ‘science-based’ reading instruction?

DPI defines science-based reading instruction as “systematic and explicit and consists of all the following: phonological awareness, phonemic awareness, phonics, building background knowledge, oral language development, vocabulary building, instruction in writing, instruction in comprehension, and reading fluency.”

“In a science of reading framework, teachers start by teaching beginning readers the foundations of language in a structured progression − like how individual letters represent sounds, and how those sounds combine to make words,” Sarah Schwartz of EdWeek wrote in 2022. “At the same time, teachers are helping students build their vocabulary and their knowledge about the world through read-alouds and conversations. Eventually, teachers help students weave these skills together like strands in a rope, allowing them to read more and more complex texts.”

What is ‘three-cueing instruction’ and why is it prohibited?

DPI defines three-cueing as “any model, including the model referred to as meaning, structure, and visual cues, or MSV, of teaching a pupil to read based on meaning, structure and syntax, and visual cues or memory.”

This model of instruction rose to popularity, despite scientific pushback, over the last several decades for a range of political, economic and social reasons. American Public Media reporter Emily Hanford explores this history in detail on the Edward R. Murrow award-winning podcast, Sold a Story.

The DPI website clarifies that the “prohibition applies when the instructional goal is for the learner to solve unknown words.”

Reform creates Office of Literacy and adds literacy coaches

Besides adopting new curriculum standards and prohibiting a misguided method for early reading instruction, the legislation also creates an Office of Literacy within DPI, mandates new teacher and administration training, provides grants to districts that need to choose a new curriculum, creates new reading assessments for students and establishes 64 full-time literacy coaches to help carry out the reforms across the state.

The Office of Literacy and the literacy coaches are set to expire on July 1, 2028.

How is Wisconsin Rapids Public Schools impacted?

Director of Curriculum and Instruction Roxanne Filtz said Wisconsin Rapids Public Schools has been trying early reading curriculum resources in the district since December in anticipation of the new state standards. WRPS is eight years into a regular 10-year cycle for evaluating its reading curriculum resources and piloting resources is a regular part of that process. The district’s current reading-related pilots are for both classroom materials and for teacher and staff training materials.

The new state law bumped the district’s process forward about a year but due diligence is still being performed by district staff in order to make an informed choice, Filtz said.

A team of district staff have been meeting monthly to discuss the pilot programs. They began late last year with a list of five science-based curriculum materials they put together based on materials nearby states use but have since eliminated three of those and shifted to solely evaluating materials approved by the Wisconsin legislature’s Joint Finance Committee in March. Materials on the legislature’s approved list are eligible for partial reimbursement from the state.

The curriculum department intends to have a recommendation ready to present to the School Board in June and to be ready to implement the new program with the 2024-25 school year.

Filtz said the district will rework its literacy program all the way to fifth grade even though Act 20 only requires changes for kindergarten to third grade. She said the district is being proactive and has had a positive process so far.

WRPS previously was using curriculum resources designed by Lucy Calkins, who is primarily featured and interviewed in the Sold a Story podcast and is known for promoting a “balanced reading” approach to literacy education. “Balanced reading” often includes “three-cueing” strategies.

How have WRPS students fared on reading assessments?

In 2022, the National Assessment of Education Progress test found about a third of Wisconsin’s fourth and eighth graders are proficient in reading. Wisconsin’s two other main measures of student literacy are the annual Forward exams, given in grades 3-8, and the ACT exam, typically taken by students in 11th grade. Forward exam data only goes back to 2018-19.

• In the 2022-23 school year, 39.2% of Wisconsin students and 33.2% of Wisconsin Rapids students in grades 3-8 scored proficient or advanced on the Wisconsin Forward Exam for English Language Arts. In the 2018-19 school year, these numbers were 40.9% and 39.2%, respectively.
• In 2018-19, 43.3% of fourth-graders statewide scored proficient or advanced compared to 44.8% in 2022-23. In Wisconsin Rapids these numbers were 36.1% and 38.3%, respectively.
• In 2018-19, 36.5% of eighth-graders statewide scored proficient or advanced compared to 36.2% in 2022-23. In Wisconsin Rapids these numbers were 34.2% and 23.1%, respectively.
• In 2022-23, 37.7% of Wisconsin students in grade 11 scored proficient or advanced, while 25.9% scored below basic on the ACT exam for English Language Arts. In Wisconsin Rapids those numbers are 35.8% and 29.5%, respectively.
• In 2018-19, 36.8% of Wisconsin students scored proficient or advanced in English Language Arts on the ACT while 35.8% of Wisconsin Rapids students scored at the same level.

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Erik Pfantz covers local government and education in central Wisconsin for USA-TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin and values his background as a rural Wisconsinite. Reach him at epfantz@gannett.com or connect with him on X (formerly Twitter) @ErikPfantz.