Students in This Colorado District Make Significant Literacy Gains When Educators Are Trained in LETRS Professional Learning

Colorado’s Littleton Public Schools (LPS) is a high-achieving school district that implemented a Structured Literacy curriculum during the 2017–2018 school year for nearly 14,000 students grades K–2. It made supporting teachers easy through the transition and was beyond paramount to student success.

LPS leaders adopted LETRS training when the balanced literacy approach to teaching early literacy was not adequately helping students achieve phonemic awareness. Administrators recognized teachers needed to understand and be trained in the science of reading pedagogy, and Lexia® LETRS® (Language Essentials for Teachers of Reading and Spelling) was the best literacy training solution to build teacher capacity.

District leaders adopted the LETRS literacy professional learning solution for K–5 educators, and implemented LETRS for the 2018–2019 school year with an initial cohort of 44 educators that included K–2 classroom teachers, special education teachers, literacy specialists, instructional coaches, and administrators.

A 20-year veteran teacher, Jan Kempf explained, “The LETRS course empowered me with more knowledge. Now, I know what to look for and am better able to help my students grow needed skills. In building their confidence as readers, we are laying a strong foundation for future growth, enabling their success in all aspects of learning.”

Discover how LPS students of LETRS-trained teachers became the most likely to have strong phonological and phonemic awareness—something that didn’t exist before LETRS training.