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We’ve heard a lot about last year’s test results in North Carolina and Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools in the last few weeks, so please forgive me for writing about them again.
But I keep thinking about reading challenges, particularly in light of the Nation’s Report Card that came out last week, showing that 12th grade reading and math was down this year – and down 10 points in reading since the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) exam was first administered in 1992. That mirrors what we saw earlier this year with nationwide declines in 4th and 8th-grade reading.
The state test results showed growth across North Carolina – there were increases in 12 of the 15 tests that North Carolina public school students take.
But what were the three that saw declines? Grade 3 reading, English II (grades 9-12) and Math I (grades 9-12). Certainly, those declines, taken with the recent NAEP scores, show at least some signs of improvement.
As I’ve been reporting on test results, I’ve heard a lot of talk about third grade reading. For context, remember that North Carolina invested $114 million into LETRS, a professional development program for all K-5 teachers that’s based on the science of reading, in hopes of improving scores.
I’ve heard from administrators in our area that they believe the LETRS training played a role in growth. Union County Superintendent Andrew Houlihan told me last week, “There is clearly a direct correlation between the way we’re teaching reading now and the impact in fourth and fifth (grades).” And the state has touted strong performance on the early literacy exam known as DIBELS for students in grades K-2.
But even Union County, which led the state in overall proficiency, saw a decline in its third grade reading scores.
“We still have work to do in third grade,” Houlihan told me last week, adding that he was still pleased with the third grade scores, but just saw it as the district’s most notable gap. “That transition between second and third grade, in districts across America, continues to be a challenge. You’re moving from different assessment systems in K-2 to a brand new one in third grade.”
We heard a little bit more about third grade reading at last week’s Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools Board meeting. As I wrote about in last week’s newsletter, 33% of CMS students grades 3-8 scored at the career- and college-ready level on state tests last year, a 3 percentage point increase over the 2023-24 school year.
As Superintendent Crystal Hill noted at last week’s board meeting, an increase of that size would typically be “a really big deal,” but it fell short of the district’s target for this year of 37%.
One of this year’s challenges? Third grade reading.
“If we would have seen the same amount of growth in 3rd grade that we saw in 4th and 5th, we would have well surpassed the target,” Hill told the board.
State leaders said recently that they’re expecting to see the full effects of LETRS and the science of reading in the test results from this current school year.
“There’s been much effort in recent years around the science of reading and we’re all very anxious to see the outcomes,” said Tammy Howard of the Department of Public Instruction at a press conference on the statewide test results. “So we’d like to note that cohorts one and two, with the way they’re progressing through the system, their year of looking at those results is actually the current school year, 2025-26. So we’re anticipating next year this time to have results related to that work and that effort.”
Still, educators have also brought up something that’s been a big topic of conversation around the science of reading in recent years – and that’s the importance of reading comprehension. There’s been some debate in recent years about whether educators have focused too much on reading skills – things like phonics, word recognition, understanding how to decode letters and sound out words – and not enough on comprehension.
The state EOGs have a deeper focus on comprehension, and so for third graders coming out of a streak of instruction in K-2 focused heavily on decoding and language skills, the next step is helping them understand what they’re learning.
“We also always want to emphasize the importance of reading comprehension,” Howard added at that press conference. “That relates back to our K-3 learners who are learning how to read. It goes beyond the skill of reading, it goes also to reading comprehension.”
Hill made a similar point at last week’s school board meeting, highlighting the importance of “listening comprehension.” Helping those younger K-2 learners understand the spoken word to create building blocks for later comprehension – say, in the third grade. It’s a skill you build by listening to adults read aloud, for instance. She noted how Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools was one of the first adopters of the LETRS training, but that through that training, there hasn’t been much focus on listening comprehension – something the district hopes to change.
“Sometimes when kids are in K-2, they get so stuck on decoding, then they pick up their fluency, but they’re losing their comprehension because a side of their brain is working so hard to decode the words, and we really have to focus on doing both at the same time,” Hill said.
