Article Review - “Poetry and Writing: Improving Fluency and Motivation For Students With Developmental Dyslexic Traits” by Dr. Benita Bruster

 The article I chose  was “Poetry and Writing:  Improving Fluency and Motivation For Students With Developmental Dyslexic Traits” by Dr. Benita Bruster,  Professor of Education and Interim Chair of the Department of Teaching and Learning at Austin Peay University in  Clarksville, Tennessee.  The article was based on Dr. Bruster’s work in a fourth grade ELA classroom with a small group of students who had been selected by their classroom teachers because they were struggling readers (Bruster, 2015).  In her article, Dr. Bruster explains that she was a volunteer who was “interested in literacy” (Bruster, 2015, p.93) and was approached by the classroom teacher to work with five boys during “their regular small group reading time”  (Bruster, 2015, p.93) for a period of nine weeks).  She goes on to explain that the boys selected for the intervention were identified as demonstrating characteristics of “developmental dyslexia”  (Bruster, 2015, p.94) based on “work samples supplied by the classroom teacher” (Bruster, 2015, p.94). The goal of her work with these students was to “improve the fluency and motivation”  (Bruster, 2015, p.93) of the boys through the use of poetry (Bruster, 2015).

    In the article, Dr. Bruster defines  Developmental Dyslexia as “a reading and spelling disability with possible heredity implications” (Bruster, 2015, p.94) that affects between 3 and 10% of children of school age (Bruster, 2015).  In addition, according to the article, children with Developmental Dyslexia can have a variety of symptoms that are the result of the “absence of a deficit in phonological awareness including phonological memory and  naming” (Bruster, 2015, p.94).    Such a deficit has been found to negatively affect the ability to read fluently, as the article states by reference to a 2011 study by Duff and Clarke (Bruster, 2015).  Dr. Bruster states that all of the boys in her intervention “were free from any diagnosed reading disability” but they all “demonstrated characteristics of developmental dyslexia”  (Bruster, 2015, p.94).  At the beginning of the nine weeks, the boys were tested on their reading fluency, words read correctly per minute, phonological awareness and phonics knowledge (Bruster, 2015).  She established a baseline score for the boys and kept running records to monitor their weekly progress (Bruster, 2015).

     Dr. Bruster outlines the steps she took during the intervention. She surveyed the boys about their reading interests, and kept the results in mind for later on in the process when the boys would be able to choose their own poems (Bruster, 2015).  She also noticed from their inventories that the boys lacked motivation to read (Bruster, 2015).  To counter the lack of movitivation, she looked for high interest poetry for boys.  She began by choosing the poems and reciting them to the boys to model “what good fluency looks and sounds like”(Bruster, 2015, p.95).  To give the boys practice, the intervention included choral readings of poems, singing poems, and using overly exaggerated expressions when reading poems (Bruster, 2015). Next, Dr. Bruster presented a large selection of poetry to the students and encouraged them to choose a poem that they wanted to recite to the group (Bruster, 2015).  In addition, at the end of each poetry activity,  the students reflected on their experience on the group’s Kidblog. (Bruster, 2015).  

    

    About four weeks into the program, Dr. Bruster introduced the idea of each boy writing his own poem towards the end of the intervention.  All but one boy responded enthusiastically  (Bruster, 2015).  The professor wrote a poem about the boys in the group to model how to compose a poem and she did not push the reluctant boy to write his own poem (Bruster, 2015).  The final activity involved “a partner reading of the poem The Grump”  (Bruster, 2015, p.97).  The boys were encouraged to practice reading different parts of the poem aloud and to vary their emotions and inflection (Bruster, 2015).

     Dr. Bruster found the results of the intervention to be significant.  She states that the boys had developed “a sense of ownership over the entire reading process” (Bruster, 2015, p.97) due in large part to being able to choose their own poems to read (Bruster, 2015).  She also found that their engagement and interaction with texts had increased, as had the fluency with which they read.  Their motivation also improved (Bruster, 2015).  Three of the five boys in the group scored Proficient on assessments that they had scored Basic on at the start of the intervention,  while the other two boys showed significant improvement (Bruster, 2015).  In addition, the boys had gained an appreciation, if not a love for poetry during the intervention (Bruster, 2015).

    While based on a small number of participants, and primarily anecdotal,  the case study conducted by Dr. Bruster is encouraging.  At the beginning of the intervention, she discusses how the boys claimed to be non-readers, who thought that poetry was “dumb” or “for girls”  (Bruster, 2015, p.94).  Over the course of the intervention Dr.  Bruster observed the boys “actively engag[ing] in the act of reading poetry for pure enjoyment” (Bruster, 2015, p.94).  Through her use of engaging poems that reflected the interest of the boys in the group and student-centered strategies, Dr. Bruster changed the boys’ negative attitudes towards poetry, increased their motivation, and helped them to improve their reading fluency and comprehension (Bruster, 2015). She modeled how reading poetry is similar to singing songs, by adapting how she recited different poems to reflect mood, emotion, action, and character, etc.  The boys were able to connect their background knowledge with songs that they like to poetry (Bruster, 2015).   They learned that reading can be approached in a variety of ways, and that it is an acquired skill.  I enjoyed reading her article, and appreciate that she volunteered in this particular fourth grade classroom to help struggling readers.

 

References

BRUSTER, D. B. (2015). POETRY AND WRITING: IMPROVING FLUENCY AND MOTIVATION FOR STUDENTS

             WITH DEVELOPMENTAL DYSLEXIC TRAITS. Reading Improvement, 52(3), 93-99.