LOUISVILLE, Ky. — Zerina Kicic marched in place and her first grade students followed her lead. Sound-by-sound, piece-by-piece, she taught her students how to sound out 'fish.'
Fish is four letters. It contains three phonemes and three graphemes. Phonemes are the sounds used to make words; graphemes are their letter representations. Because 'S' and 'H' make the "shhh" sound, the single phoneme is represented by the grapheme 'SH.'
"We're taking those sounds, putting them together, finding them in words, stretching them out on our hand, listening for those sounds; learning how some letters have one sound and other letters come together to make two sounds," Kicic said. "And there's so much more, I could just sit here and go on and on about all the letters and sounds."
This is how reading is taught in Wilder Elementary — and how it will be taught in every Jefferson County Public school.
Yes, even the marching. Ronda Cosby, the assistant superintendent of Elementary Academics with JCPS, said it's meant to engage every type of learner.
"If students can't read, that's on us," she said, "Putting a focus back on foundational skills is [our] number one priority."
Kentucky Department of Education data from the 2021-2022 school year evaluating JCPS's English learning performance showed just 23.3% (which exceeded the state's goal of 18.7%) of elementary students in the district were at least proficient.
Cosby laid the blame for reading learning gaps on the lack of in-person instruction during the COVID-19 pandemic.
"Whether they decide to move on to college or whether they're taking any career path, there's gonna be some type of reading or writing involved," Mrs. Kicic said.
It's why foundational learning, especially in reading and math, is so important — it affects a student for life.
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