MAC LIT

What is MAC LIT?

Mack Avenue Community Literacy, MAC LIT, is a community-based literacy clinic which offers one-on-one tutoring to eligible students and literacy education to the community.

1. Tutoring

Students will be assessed using a basic reading inventory in order to diagnose his or her individual reading difficulties. A plan-of-action will be developed to address the student’s needs.

Students will work one-on-one with trained volunteers, two times per week. The tutoring sessions will focus on developing oral language skills, reading and hearing a wide variety of texts, responding to texts by talking, writing and drawing, and teaching phonics, word structure, visual analysis, spelling patterns, and word-solving actions.

Tutoring sessions will be modeled after the Howard Street Tutoring Manual and HOSTS Language Arts.

Student Eligibility and Intake

Students in Grades K-6, residing in the 48214 zip code, will be eligible for tutoring through MAC Lit during the 2011-2012 school year.  MAC Lit will recruit low reading students at Howe Elementary School, Nichols Elementary School, and Garvey Academy.

Parents interested in enrolling their child in tutoring will complete an application and a literacy survey. The results of the survey will inform the content of the Community Family Night sessions.

Tutoring Days

Tuesday and Thursday, September 20-April 26
(Tutoring will not be held during School Breaks)

Sample Tutoring Schedule

4:30 Arrival
1. Sign-In
2. Snack
3. Constructive Activity

5:00 Tutoring Session
1. Contextual reading at the child’s instructional level and response (18 minutes)
2. Word study (10 minutes)
3. Easy reading (10 minutes)
4. Reading to the child (7 minutes)

5:45 Students are dismissed

Cost

In order to promote dignity, families will be required to pay for the tutoring their child receives. The payment options are: $25 per semester (12-weeks).

Tracking Results

Students will be pre-tested and post-tested in order to document their reading level growth. Students may also be assessed a third time at mid-year.

In order to analyze the growth of students receiving tutoring through MAC Lit compared to students not receiving tutoring, we may pursue an opportunity to test a number of students, in the appropriate grades, in the Detroit Public Schools in our community.

As grade levels are added, standardized test scores of individual students may be used to compare growth.

Plans for Expansion

Although research indicates that it is crucial for intervention to take place early in the child’s school career, before “failure takes its emotional toll and the gap is too great to bridge,” (Fountas and Pinnell, 2009) we desire to serve the literacy needs of every child and adult in our community. We plan to:

• Gradually increase the grade level range of the students eligible for tutoring
• Offer Parent and Child (Ages 0-4) literacy experiences
• Offer adult literacy intervention
• Offer “drop-in” time slots for families to read, write, talk, and engage in literacy building activities
• Offer more hours of tutoring per week
• Offer intense literacy intervention during the summer (5 days per week)
• Generate volunteer tutors from within our community
• Solicit funding from local foundations and grants
• Partner with a University

2. Community Family Night

Once a month, families from the MACC body and the surrounding neighborhood will come together to learn how different lifestyle habits affect literacy, the ability to learn, and health. Families will learn together and have the opportunity to apply what they have learned. It will be an opportunity for members of the community to interact with the body of Christ.

Additionally, the Community Family Night will serve as an opportunity to address the norms exhibited in cultural poverty and how these norms affect literacy. Volunteers will be on hand to work with kids from families that have multiple children. Habits that will be addressed include: sleep, exercise, nutrition, reading to and with children, media (video games, television, and movies), talking to and with children, organization, and stress.

Parents will read with their kids and participate in other activities that promote literacy and overall health and well-being. Participation will be required for families enrolled in tutoring.

Dates

October 4 | November 1 | December 6 | February 7 | March 6 | April 3
May 2 - End of Year Celebration

Sample Community Family Night Agenda

5:45 Families arrive and enjoy a healthy snack while interacting with other families from the community

6:00 MACC Representative shares why we are doing what we are doing

6:30 Share a Potluck meal together

5:15 Lesson on the benefits of reading early and often - kids go to activity with volunteers

5:30 Community Family Night Ends