Electronic Library 250

Contact

Carron Practicals
Condover
Nr Shrewsbury
SY5 7AY

Tel:  01743 872120

e-mail: eddiecarron@btconnect.com 

Website: http://www.carronpracticals.co.uk/ 

Program evaluation

I say:-

Many users of the Electronic Library are very enthusiastic about its use, and the website provides a list of schools where the programme is in use so that its effectiveness can be verified.

Essentially, the programme is, as the name suggests, an electronic library from which students can select books to read.

The books, or chapters from the books, are presented on screen. The student "prepares" a single chapter at the computer on their own. If they encounter unfamiliar words they can press a key for the computer to provide an "auditory clue" to the word by voicing it.

A second read through follows with the computer prompting the student to spell the unfamiliar word/s.

When ready, the student prints out the chapter and then reads it to the teacher or other helper.

This is not a bells and whistles approach, but the strength is in the programme's insistence that as far as possible the student prepares the text on their own but with help available when needed. In a busy teacher's day this is welcome.

Eddie Carron insists that the programme is most effective when used in a professional way by teachers "with good class management and organisational skills." There is emphasis throughout on this. For greatest results Eddie lays down a very precise set of "rules".

It is good to see this - but hard to comply with some of the programme's needs. However, the programme's requirements do provide useful ammunition when you are trying to secure more time to work on students' reading - especially in secondary schools.

In use at secondary level we have found it most popular with students with reading ages of up to 9.0 years.

There are no comprehension questions at the end of each chapter. Eddie states that,

"the aim is to encourage children to read books, not to put them off reading books for the rest of their lives."

and

"It is important that teachers should allow children . . . to enjoy reading and to enjoy reading to others."

Yes.

For a very comprehensive review have a look at this one by Ruth Newbury on the Reading Reform Foundation website.

Program Details

Research into the effectiveness of Eddie Carron's Electronic library reported:-

The prior average rate of progress in reading for participant children was about 0.7 years per chronological year in school. Their average rate of progress during the project year virtually doubled to 1.3 years which means that on average, targeted pupils are on track to recover all of their reading deficits. In spite of the fact that only Year 6 children with the greatest reading deficits in these schools were involved in the project, a child in one school made a staggering reading-age gain of 5 years 5 months and :-

in 10% of schools one or more poorest readers made reading-age gains of 4 or more years.
in 34% of schools one or more poorest readers made reading-age gains of 3 or more years.
in 47% of schools one or more poorest readers made a reading-age gain of 2 or more years
in 98% of schools one or more poorest readers made a reading-age gain in excess of 1 year

Eddie notes:-since there are no magical reading programmes, it follows that these children did not have an innate reading problem. A gain in excess of one year indicates a rate of progress which must lead to the complete recovery of any reading deficit. The best results were achieved by those schools which followed the instructions for the library most closely (professionally) and the poorest results were obtained by those who ignored these instructions and adopted their own interpretation of how best to use it. (unprofessionally).

Prices from: eddiecarron@btconnect.com