Garland trustees considered a mostly digital summer reading program that could improve the number of books students have access too.

The preliminary 2023 summer reading program for Garland ISD was presented as an information item during the Tuesday, March 28, meeting. The district first began a summer reading program in 2013, and it has grown to include an online component and partnerships with local libraries.

Executive Director of Teaching and Learning Development Melissa Hill said the initial iteration involved five student-selected books that were sent home along with discussion materials to help parents and students talk about what was read and early literacy skills. A 2019 study conducted by the district revealed that 84% of families completed all five books over the course of the summer.

“Our ultimate goal is getting students exposed to books in the summer to help mitigate that ‘summer slide,’” Hill said. “It is especially important in our pre-K through second grade students who are just getting exposure to how to read.”

In addition to English, books were available in Spanish and Vietnamese, the other two official languages of Dallas County. Since, the district has looked for ways to expand the program online to help boost accountability and accessibility of reading materials, notably students with learning or intellectual disabilities.

“We felt like as a district it gave us accountability on usage and how students were reading and what students were reading,” Hill said. “It’s an accessible platform which means it is designed for students that might have visual or auditory disabilities.”

In 2022, Garland ISD adopted a board game theme for its summer reading program by sending home paper boards and reading logs. It also used its myON platform to help log how much time students spent reading and how many books they explored. Prizes were distributed to campuses with the most participation and top readers by grade band. Schools also developed their own incentive programs, Hill said, adding that at least 500 minutes, a little over eight hours, of reading had to be completed to win.

Last year, district data demonstrated that 576,000 minutes were read over the summer with the myON platform with 57,400 books started and 24,900 completed.

For the full story, see the April 6 issue of The Sachse News.