DoDEA Reads:

SSG Chris Mitchell: From the AFRTS News Center in Washington, this is the two-minute report. Reading is the focus of the Department of Defense Education Activity for the upcoming school year. Officials say they'll be looking at individual schools and their curriculums to ensure they support the reading theme.

Dr. Elizabeth Middlemiss: You may ask, "Don't they read well?" Our students read very well and they write well too, as is shown in many of the tests that they take. But we're looking at reading from the perspective of reading across our curriculum, reading for a variety of purposes, and helping the students to understand that the classroom truly applies to their daily lives.

Mitchell: A new DoDEA initiative this school year will help support its theme. High school students can enroll in new reading support classes as elective courses to give them additional instruction in reading skills.

Dr. Middlemiss: This is the first year that that will be offered and we encourage parents and students to talk to counselors about that opportunity.

Mitchell: Dr. Middlemiss says DoDEA will also support the basic principles of the Department of Education's No Child Left Behind reform.

Dr. Middlemiss: DoDEA isn't required by law to follow the No Child Left Behind legislation, but we certainly embrace the spirit of that far-reaching legislation. Many of the components of that program - strong reading program, technology, assessment - are already in place within the DoDEA schools. We've looked at the various initiatives; we feel like we're right on target.

Mitchell: Dr. Middlemiss emphasizes that parents are still central to the learning process. She says they're generally the first teachers their children have and she encourages them to stay involved in their child's education. That's the two-minute report. From Washington, I'm Army Sergeant Chris Mitchell.

Support Classes:

Jim Langdon: From the AFRTS News Center in Washington, this is the two-minute report. Students in Defense Department high schools can get extra help in reading and algebra courses through a series of new support classes being offered this fall. The classes will be elective courses for students who feel they need additional instruction in those two subject areas.

Dr. Elizabeth Middlemiss: Most of our youngsters read quite well, but still in high school we have youngsters that need that additional time. Not only looking at how to read specifically, but how to look at textbooks, how to get the clues they need, and apply this throughout their coursework.

Langdon: The Department of Defense Education Activity will also offer additional college credit advanced placement courses for high school juniors and seniors.

Dr. Middlemiss: They are an advanced, more specific and rigorous course than the other courses, which are still rigorous, but provided in the high school setting and high school background.

Langdon: A new multimedia social studies program also starts this year for students in kindergarten through 12th grade.

Dr. Middlemiss: They’re not only lovely materials, attractive materials, but very relevant materials, different perhaps than some of the old social studies books that we remember because they link to technology in so many ways.

Langdon: Dr. Middlemiss says the multimedia social studies program will also support DoDEA’s commitment to enhancing computer literacy for its students.

Dr. Middlemiss: Because we no longer consider just reading, writing and arithmetic, the vital issue, that technology issue, is going to carry youngsters, both within the classroom and outside the classroom, to new levels of research and understanding of what’s
available to them in the learning process.

Langdon: The new classes and programs are part of curriculum enhancements taking place in Department of Defense Dependents Schools over the next five years. That’s the two-minute report. From Washington, I’m Jim Langdon.