GUYTON — The reports on Reading Recovery in Effingham County are real page turners.

A one-on-one program designed for first graders who are struggling in reading and writing, Reading Recovery provides 30 minutes of one-on-one instruction per school day with a teacher for 12-20 weeks.

“Last year, more than seventy percent of those struggling readers reached the average of their peers,” said Jenny Wilkins, the Reading Recovery teacher leader. “If you compare it to other interventions, (Reading Recovery) has a tremendous success rate.”

Wilkins, a Marlow Elementary School teacher, doesn’t have yet have complete data for 2019 Reading Recovery students. The program’s track record of more than 20 years is undeniably positive, however.

“We continue to support the other kids in other ways — the ones who are still struggling — but nearly three-fourths of them (in Reading Recovery) reached where they were reading at the same level as their peers were reading by the end of the school year,” Wilkins said. “That happens in no more than twenty weeks and some of them get there faster than that. Some of them get there is twelve or fifteen weeks.”

About 130 Effingham County Reading Recovery students celebrated their success May 13 at Marlow Elementary School. They were treated to a show by Jim Fox and his high-flying canines. The dogs entertained the children, including Marlow students and those from other county schools, by performing tricks, including catching Frisbees.

Mallory Turner, set to succeed Wilkins as teacher leader, said Reading Recovery students learn differently than other students.

“They sat in a kindergarten class and weren’t able to learn from typical classroom instruction,” Turner, a 10-year teaching veteran, said. “With Reading Recovery, we can work one on one with each student and design a plan just for them. One-on-one instruction makes the biggest difference.

“We start where they are, with what they already know how to do, and build on that rather than expecting them to learn with whatever program we have to work from. We go to them. We meet them were they are.”

Wilkins said the What Works Clearinghouse ranks Reading Recovery as the top reading intervention program. The What Works Clearinghouse provides educators, policy makers, researchers and the public with a central source of scientific evidence on what works in education to improve student outcomes. Its goal is to help decision-makers contend with differing messages from research studies and product offerings.

Effingham County’s Reading Recovery program currently targets readers in the bottom 20 percent and the total will expand soon.

“We are about to add ten more teachers to the program,” Wilkins said. “It will probably bring about eighty more children into the program.”

Reading is the foundation for student success, Wilkins added.

“In our county, we just believe that reading is paramount,” she said. “Our board of education does, too. The people on the board and the people in the board office are tremendously supportive of this program.

“And it’s not only helping our graduation rates, it’s helping the community when those kids can get a job and not struggle. We know that kids who can’t read often drop out of school.

“If we wait to try to catch them up in the third grade, the gap just gets bigger and bigger, and that’s why we do it now.”