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For Immediate Release
Voyager Expanded Learning Announces
Third VoyagerU Professional Development Course
Dallas, December 19, 2006− Voyager Expanded Learning® announced today the release of a new VoyagerU® professional development course, called Getting Reading Results: A Continuous Improvement Process. The latest course helps kindergarten through eighth-grade teachers better understand how to use assessments to identify students who struggle to read and target instruction to fit student needs.
The third course in the VoyagerU professional development series, Getting Reading Results complements and builds upon the foundational learning teachers receive through the first two courses of the program, The Reading Academy and Reading for Understanding. The new course focuses on assessment tools and instructional strategies to help teachers develop the skills necessary to identify student needs and deliver effective data-driven instruction tailored to each student's current reading level.
Getting Reading Results uses student outcome data to guide professional development by examining instructional practices, curriculum materials and assessment results to meet the instructional needs of students and to plan and execute effective classroom-based instructional decisions. The organizing principle of the course is that teachers must create an instructional program that responds to the skill development of each learner to meet the needs of all students in a class.
During the course, participants complete four learning modules: Initial Planning, Implementation Phase I, Implementation Phase II and Small-Group Instruction. These targeted modules teach teachers the skills they need to effectively break down tasks using quantitative assessments and ultimately develop productive and successful small-group instruction.
"Getting Reading Results was developed with a learning path that integrates into teachers' workflow over time. Teachers build mastery through a learn-by-doing approach and receive measuring and teaching activities throughout the program," says Warren Anderson, vice president of eTraining Solutions for Voyager.
The course combines the use of online instruction, classroom application and coach support to further increase the professional development of the teacher. Participants learn a variety of instructional components while differentiating their own learning path.
Supporting course learning activities is a Content Reference System (CRS), an interactive online resource that gives learners access to research-based foundational content covering the "Five Big Ideas of Reading and Student Motivation." Through CRS, participants can access video, reading, activities and sample lesson material to add to their knowledge base.
More than 1200 teachers and reading coaches in approximately 100 schools across Oklahoma, North Carolina and Tennessee are already participating in the new course.
About Voyager Expanded Learning
Voyager Expanded Learning provides core, intervention and supplemental reading programs, as well as math intervention and ongoing professional development programs for school districts throughout the United States. Founded in 1994, Voyager has delivered extended-time reading and basic skills intervention programs as well as large-scale reading programs to more than 900 school districts in cities such as Dallas, Phoenix, New York, Philadelphia and Los Angeles, resulting in dramatically improved student performance. Voyager Expanded Learning, Inc. is part of ProQuest Education, a business segment of ProQuest Company, based in Ann Arbor, Michigan. For more information, please visit www.voyagerlearning.com or call 1-888-399-1995.
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