Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Hi, I'm Maggie.
[00:00:01] Speaker B: And I'm Nicole. Welcome to the DAC Dyslexia and Coffee Podcast. We're so happy you could join us. We're both moms and dyslexia interventionists who want to talk about our students and children.
What dyslexia is, how it affects our kids, strategies to help and topics related to other learning disabilities will also be covered in this podcast.
Parents are not alone, and we want to give voice to the concerns and struggles we are all having.
This is a safe place to learn more about how to help our children grow and succeed in school and the world. Grab a cup of coffee and enjoy the conversation.
[00:00:36] Speaker A: Hi, everybody.
So welcome to episode 70 of Dyslexia and Coffee podcast. Yes, 70. A seven and a zero.
[00:00:46] Speaker B: Wow.
[00:00:47] Speaker A: Yeah, that's a lot.
So exciting for us.
We're going to start today's episode like we have every single other time with the concept of the week. So the concept of the week is our opportunity as practitioners to kind of pull back the curtain a little bit and let everyone into an interventive session. So we like to talk about things that either we would teach directly to our students or their parents and families.
So today's concept of the week is something really pretty important, and it is the 25th percentile.
I should back up a little bit and define percentile.
[00:01:35] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:01:36] Speaker A: Not everyone is going to know that term, and that's okay.
So a percentile is a way of measuring a large group of people kind of against.
Right. So a percentile is way is not the same thing as a percentage. Correct. A percentile.
Think back to your, you know, 10th grade stats class.
Right. And think back to that. That bell curve, Right. Where you have the up, around, and down. Right. And that part of the bell curve is what's considered the normal range.
So the 25th percentile is.
It's also known as the first quartile. It represents the value at which.
[00:02:31] Speaker B: Below.
[00:02:33] Speaker A: Right. So 25% of people would have scored below that, and then 75 would have scored above that.
Okay. The 25th percentile is generally considered the cutoff for the quote unquote, normal range. The normal range, in percentile speak is typically between the 25th percentile and the 75th percentile, which is a big range. Which is a big range.
Basically, if there were a hundred people tested on the same scene, if you're at the 25th percentile, 25 of them would have done as good as or worse than you, 75 would have scored as good as or better than you would have done it is often the cutoff, like I said, for what is considered the normal range, quote, unquote.
So in IEP meetings, anytime we're taking a look at diagnostic data, we're going to look at that 25th percentile as kind of okay. If you are below that.
Now, we are considering that below average.
But even the picture in your head, right. That 25th to 75th percentile, that is a huge range.
And it is because in that normal curve.
[00:04:13] Speaker B: Right.
[00:04:13] Speaker A: That is what we would consider that average. Right. Like average would be straight at that 50th and then one standard deviation over on either side.
It could be a bit confusing.
[00:04:27] Speaker B: I think so.
[00:04:27] Speaker A: Yeah.
And hard to take too.
[00:04:32] Speaker B: Exactly.
So the reason we're talking about this is because in episode 70, which is this one we're going to be talking about, so the Department of Public Instruction sent out our Act 20, which is our new law in Wisconsin literacy report. So they started screening students in every.
[00:04:57] Speaker A: School.
[00:05:00] Speaker B: Literacy this past year.
[00:05:02] Speaker A: Yes. So this is one year's worth of data.
[00:05:06] Speaker B: Right.
[00:05:07] Speaker A: So we're going to just preface this whole episode by saying this is for the 2024, 2025 school year.
[00:05:15] Speaker B: And this was.
This came out November 30th of 2025. So it's very new data.
[00:05:22] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:05:22] Speaker B: And very concerning data for me, I think.
[00:05:27] Speaker A: Yeah, absolutely.
Very concerning.
Not surprising. Right.
The reason this law was enacted is because we were not doing so hot.
[00:05:40] Speaker B: Right.
[00:05:40] Speaker A: Okay.
And this data is not really based on any really good interventions being applied.
[00:05:47] Speaker B: Correct.
[00:05:48] Speaker A: So this is more or less baseline data. Correct.
[00:05:56] Speaker B: So for our baseline, they said around 36 to 43% of kindergarten through third graders, that's the group that were tested, were identified as at risk. So they were scoring below that 25th percentile in reading.
That's a lot of students.
[00:06:18] Speaker A: That's a lot of students.
[00:06:20] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:06:21] Speaker A: Yeah. Approximately 36.8% of students in grades 4K through 3 fell below the 25th percentile on universal reading screeners. So in the state of Wisconsin, that is the AIMSweb data.
Every parent who has a child in public school, the state of Wisconsin is required to be screened using GameSwap.
And the schools are also required to share all of that data with parents.
[00:06:56] Speaker B: Yes.
So this translates to over 93,000 students requiring a personal reading plan.
So if you are under the 25th percentile, the law said you had to have a personalized reading plan. What that is is kind of a little bit more.
[00:07:15] Speaker A: A little more not specific. Wishy. Of course.
[00:07:20] Speaker B: And that's a lot of Students.
[00:07:21] Speaker A: That's a lot of students.
[00:07:23] Speaker B: And I.
So they said nearly half of all first graders needed a reading plan.
That's concerning.
[00:07:34] Speaker A: Absolutely.
DBI highlighted strong school participation and commitment to the requirements.
Viewing the data as, you know, a baseline, just like we said, for improving instruction.
This tells me we only have up to go, I hope. Right, right.
You know, nearly half of all first graders needing these personalized reading plans.
That means we're not doing what we can in early intervention.
So this is. Okay, now what? Right. This is now what Data in the.
[00:08:18] Speaker B: Long term effect for this is that lower literacy that creates significant challenges for future education and workforce readiness.
[00:08:28] Speaker A: Right.
[00:08:28] Speaker B: Because you need that for work.
They break it down into a lot of like 4 year old kindergarten was at.
I think it was like, wasn't that low. Because they're still learning.
[00:08:53] Speaker A: They're still learning.
And it's not required yet. Right. So also think about 4k enrollment is.
[00:09:02] Speaker B: Not required in Wisconsin.
[00:09:03] Speaker A: It's not required in Wisconsin. And not all, not all public schools offer 4K. Correct.
[00:09:08] Speaker B: So that makes sense why that was lower.
[00:09:10] Speaker A: That data is not. It's. It's not the same. Right.
Five year old kindergarten, also technically not required by law in Wisconsin. It is not required to send your kid to.
Yeah. Technically, first grade is like the first required mandatory grade. But most public schools offer five year old kindergarten.
[00:09:35] Speaker B: Right.
[00:09:36] Speaker A: So it is. It's a bit more representative of the general population, but still not technically mandatory education.
[00:09:43] Speaker B: And yet 41.7% of them were below.
[00:09:46] Speaker A: 20, were below the 25th percentile. Again, this is where kindergarten is a tricky beast. It is.
[00:09:56] Speaker B: Because everybody's at a different level. Right.
[00:09:57] Speaker A: Because that bell curve.
Yeah.
[00:10:00] Speaker B: 5K is still learning how to be in school. You're still learning how to sit still, how to follow direction. You're learning.
[00:10:10] Speaker A: Right. As far as true reading skills go, you're learning letter sound relationships.
You're doing CVC words, you're doing some sight words.
You're really learning the basics. Some kids come into 5k already reading.
[00:10:28] Speaker B: Reading, and some have never opened a book.
[00:10:31] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:10:31] Speaker B: So, I mean, you got to think about that.
[00:10:33] Speaker A: That's a tricky piece. If there's a reason kindergarten. Kindergarten is a completely separate licensure than any other teaching license. It's the only teaching license I don't own. Actually, I'm not certified.
I am certified in early ed. I'm certified 1 through 12, but I am not certified in kindergarten because it's different.
[00:10:57] Speaker B: But where it starts getting concerning is in first grade, right?
[00:11:00] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:11:01] Speaker B: 46% second grade is 40%. And third grade is 41st, 41%, which they're kind of staying. They're not really moving.
[00:11:11] Speaker A: They're not really moving.
[00:11:13] Speaker B: And that's not really something that you want to see.
[00:11:15] Speaker A: That is concerning again. It is very concerning.
And when you factor in things like confidence interval. Right.
So in statistics, the confidence interval means, like, how confident are we that this data is true? And usually it's like 5 percentage points on either side.
So like 46%. Right. That could go all the way up to like 51.
[00:11:48] Speaker B: Right.
[00:11:49] Speaker A: Or all the way down to 41.
So when you look at these numbers, they are.
They are very consistent. These are all within what is typical for that confidence interval. Meaning pretty static data.
[00:12:06] Speaker B: Right. Yeah.
And like we said, they're not comparable to other years because they're using different measures.
And if you can't. So this is kind of our first round of data that we're actually looking at.
[00:12:23] Speaker A: Yes. What's good about this?
This is definitely something we have to search for.
[00:12:29] Speaker B: Good. Right?
[00:12:30] Speaker A: Right.
[00:12:31] Speaker B: We are.
[00:12:32] Speaker A: What is good about this is while I have issues with the way our 20 has been implemented, I'm happy to see that most districts in the state were compliant with Act 20.
[00:12:51] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:12:52] Speaker A: Meaning they were taking this data as was required of them.
Similar measures in other states have not.
[00:13:02] Speaker B: Been as successful in terms of the.
[00:13:04] Speaker A: School districts actually participating.
So what is good here is this is data that should represent the state pretty well. Meaning with proper instruction, we should be able to see this data improve.
[00:13:27] Speaker B: Right.
[00:13:30] Speaker A: So in that way, again, I'm not happy about the state of things. I'm not okay with where we're at, but I'm hoping this at least is a little concerning enough, that we've got more momentum behind us.
[00:13:46] Speaker B: Correct.
So just to compare, on average, in 2024, it said that 79% of U.S. adults were literate. They don't really give us how literate.
[00:14:01] Speaker A: How literate and based on exactly what measures.
[00:14:05] Speaker B: Exactly. So that's really hard for us to compare.
[00:14:08] Speaker A: Again, totally that.
[00:14:09] Speaker B: And then 21% were illiterate. What do they call illiterate is beyond me.
But what's interesting is 54% of adults have a literacy below sixth grade level, and 20% are below a fifth grade level.
[00:14:28] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:14:28] Speaker B: So that's. That's actually quite a few adults that definitely.
That's pretty low.
[00:14:36] Speaker A: It's.
It's very low.
[00:14:38] Speaker B: I mean.
[00:14:42] Speaker A: You know, low levels of literacy is estimated to cost the United states up to $2.2 trillion per year.
[00:14:54] Speaker B: Right.
[00:14:58] Speaker A: 34% of adults lacking literacy proficiency were born outside of the US.
[00:15:07] Speaker B: I thought it was interesting. The states with the highest literacy rate was actually Massachusetts and the lowest was New Mexico.
[00:15:21] Speaker A: Yeah.
New Hampshire. So interesting that in, you know, Massachusetts, highest rate of child literacy, but New Hampshire was the state of the highest percentage of adults considered literate.
[00:15:35] Speaker B: Which is very interesting.
[00:15:36] Speaker A: Interesting. I mean, still east coast states. Right.
[00:15:40] Speaker B: And then New Mexico was the lowest child literacy rate, but California was the lowest adult literacy rate.
[00:15:47] Speaker A: I think, you know, if we consider region. Right, if we consider region, this data can make a little bit more sense.
You know, definitely.
It's. It is, it is interesting.
You know, the US Likes to talk a real big game in terms of being the leader of the free world and yada, yada, yada.
We rank 36th in literacy, and that's.
[00:16:17] Speaker B: From one national literacy report, but that's still not really great.
[00:16:25] Speaker A: Yeah. You know, this is where I was listening to a different podcast that I really like and they were interviewing a data scientist.
Some phrases at this data scientist. Right. Which is different than a statistician. Right? A statistician. Their job is to literally crunch the numbers. Right. Their job is to take a study or a test or some kind of body of data and literally just organize it by the statistics.
A data scientist is different than that.
Generally they are the person who is looking at the data and then trying to interpret what it actually means.
And this data scientist, who is their job to do this, they were saying basically two phrases that they wanted eliminated from vernacular where, like, the data speaks for itself.
Because.
[00:17:31] Speaker B: Does it?
[00:17:33] Speaker A: No, because it depends on who you ask. Exactly. That it can.
There are many things that can be done with data to that. To either purposely mislead an audience or.
[00:17:49] Speaker B: To make it more threat. Correct.
[00:17:53] Speaker A: Exactly.
[00:17:54] Speaker B: And you're never going to be 100%.
[00:17:56] Speaker A: No. Because that is not how a human brain works. It just isn't so part of this is, especially in education and other fields are like this too.
But especially in education, we are taught to read studies with a very side eye suspicious kind of lens, because who's publishing these studies?
Why are they publishing these studies?
What are they trying to sell?
What's going on?
[00:18:35] Speaker B: What's the purpose of this?
[00:18:37] Speaker A: So I try to be really careful, even with data that is highly concerning. Like half of our first graders are not moving to the level that they should.
But also, this does not fully tell us why.
[00:19:00] Speaker B: It doesn't give us the whole picture.
[00:19:01] Speaker A: It doesn't give us the whole picture. Now, what we know from our own backgrounds in structured literacy and science of reading. Right. Which is also becoming a term that is being used to sell bad products, which is very frustrating to me, is that we do know what to do to intervene here.
How we scale. That is a whole other ball of X. Right. How do we actually do this?
We do know from multiple bodies of data that early intervention is key. So how do we get that into the hands of the people who really need it?
And that it does remain to be seen. I've been hearing a lot of feedback from our, you know, 5K through third grade teachers about the reading plans, the personalized reading plans and how they're quite cumbersome.
[00:20:14] Speaker B: And well, think about how many kids need them.
[00:20:17] Speaker A: Exactly.
[00:20:18] Speaker B: How can you really do an individual plan for somebody when you have 30 to 40 students in your class and maybe have a plan and you're one teacher?
[00:20:29] Speaker A: And it is frustrating too because it has led to, and I am fully still on the fence there. There have been changes to the state standards when it comes to literacy and many view these changes as quote unquote, lowering the bar.
I'm. I'm skeptical of that view, to be honest, because for a long time what I was seeing in the field is these completely unrealistic standards for like a first grade kid. Like the first grades. One of the first grade state standards is like synthesizing information to make a multi step story.
And what we know from human development is like their brains are not ready for that.
[00:21:24] Speaker B: No.
[00:21:25] Speaker A: So I am suspicious of the quote, unquote lowering of the bar. Like are we lowering the bar or are we being more realistic and aligning our standards more with what we know about brain development?
You know, in this, especially where we live. I mean, full disclosure, where we live in Waukesha county is like very.
Can be a little uppity.
Can be a little. We want our academic excellence and of course we do.
Of course we want academic excellence for all kids. But also what is realistic? Like what can their brains actually do?
[00:22:11] Speaker B: Right.
[00:22:12] Speaker A: So I think there's a lot of different ways that we can take this data. And while this is alarming and concerning it is.
I don't. I don't think this is like doomsday data.
[00:22:27] Speaker B: Right.
[00:22:30] Speaker A: So I'm actually a little hopeful that we now actually have a system for collecting all this data.
[00:22:37] Speaker B: Yeah.
And we can compare it next year.
[00:22:39] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly.
[00:22:40] Speaker B: We can see what happened. What happened. Obviously that's what you do. Right. Is you collect data and then you kind of make a plan around the data.
[00:22:48] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:22:48] Speaker B: If it goes up, we're doing a good job. I mean, if it goes down.
[00:22:53] Speaker A: Right. If it goes down, not so much.
[00:22:55] Speaker B: Right.
[00:22:55] Speaker A: But it is hard.
I am also hopeful that we have enough patience to give the structured literacy interventions enough time to show growth.
[00:23:10] Speaker B: Great.
[00:23:11] Speaker A: Because what we know from working with students here at the center is when they initially first start working with us, sometimes we actually see a dip in, like, their MAP scores.
[00:23:26] Speaker B: Great.
[00:23:27] Speaker A: Because we are asking them to slow down, use their tools, which reflects poorly on their fluency score, which still it's the end all. Be all frustrating to me that that's like the only measure we care about. It seems like. Yes, that's frustrating.
I just, I'm not trying to poo poo fluency. I just don't think it deserves the credit. It gets all the time. Right. But it's like we actually sometimes see a dip before we see a rocket ship up to the moon.
[00:24:06] Speaker B: Exactly.
So.
[00:24:11] Speaker A: I'm concerned that if we do see a dip next year, people are going to be up in arms and say, oh, my God, this isn't working.
[00:24:19] Speaker B: When actually it's just the dip we.
[00:24:22] Speaker A: Normally see when we actually.
We need a couple more years.
[00:24:27] Speaker B: Right. Yeah.
So just so you know, you can look up also in our state, by school, the literacy rates, and I think every state has that posted somewhere.
Your department of education probably has that list somewhere.
So, like, if you're thinking about after this episode, what does my school look like?
You can go look it up.
[00:24:51] Speaker A: Yeah, you can.
And every district must have a representative, too, that can speak to that data specifically.
So, yeah, if you're curious, look it up. And, you know, contact your child's school district. They should be able to answer that question.
[00:25:09] Speaker B: Correct.
So, Maggie, what's happening beyond dyslexia?
[00:25:13] Speaker A: Oh, my goodness.
So as we record this, it is the middle of December, which means crazy.
It is the last week of school before Christmas break.
[00:25:26] Speaker B: Yep.
[00:25:27] Speaker A: And for the second year in a row, every single day this week at school has a theme.
I want this trend to stop.
[00:25:38] Speaker B: I know.
[00:25:38] Speaker A: It won't.
[00:25:40] Speaker B: It won't. It won't.
[00:25:42] Speaker A: It won't.
It won't. But I. I know just we're going.
[00:25:47] Speaker B: Through the same thing.
[00:25:48] Speaker A: Don't. I just don't like it. I want off this great.
I want office every day. Every day.
So tears again this morning because my sweet unorganized boy couldn't find his one holiday sock.
Because it's holiday sock and or slippered day.
[00:26:19] Speaker B: Of course it is.
[00:26:20] Speaker A: Of course it is.
[00:26:21] Speaker B: Today was red or green day or both.
[00:26:23] Speaker A: Red candy cane day yesterday.
[00:26:26] Speaker B: We had candy cake today, too.
[00:26:28] Speaker A: Who has that? Who has that on hand? People.
[00:26:31] Speaker B: What?
What?
Candy Game day. At least tomorrow is PGA day.
[00:26:38] Speaker A: Yeah. Friday is PJ day for our guys.
[00:26:40] Speaker B: That's what I mean.
[00:26:41] Speaker A: Fridays. I know. It's unfortunately still Wednesday.
What's going on with you, Nicole?
[00:26:48] Speaker B: Well, we're still in that, too.
And then we had to redo our son's birthday treat today because we didn't send enough last time. Yesterday.
His birthday is actually over the holiday season, so they're doing it early.
And I thought it was.
I thought something was looked up, and it wasn't. And so we had the wrong number of kids yesterday. So guess what? We went out last night, we picked out a new treat, and we sent a nap.
[00:27:27] Speaker A: Well, you know what?
[00:27:28] Speaker B: There we go.
[00:27:29] Speaker A: Ta da.
[00:27:31] Speaker B: And that's what being a human parent means.
[00:27:34] Speaker A: Exactly. Listen, folks, we're real people in real life. We don't have all the answers sometimes.
What's that called in golf? A mulligan. A mulligan. Yeah.
[00:27:45] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:27:46] Speaker A: Well, thank you, everybody. Please follow us on social media and reach out if you have any questions or you would like us to discuss a topic. If you do like our show, be sure to follow and rate our show on your favorite podcast players. This is how we reach more listeners, and that's how we get to know our families. Thank you, everybody.
[00:28:03] Speaker B: Thank you.
