Literacy is a basic human right, it is something that empowers a person and it liberates a person. That power, of being able to learn and grow and connect, I just don't think there's anything like it.

My name is Tisha Hayes, and I'm an associate professor in the School of Education and Human Development.

I'm pretty lucky because I get to work with pre-service teachers, in-service teachers, training to be reading specialists.

Dr. Hayes laid out the roadmap for systematic reading instruction. I attended the Postgraduate Master's of Teaching Program at UVA's School of Education, and now I teach second grade at Johnson Elementary. What Dr. Hayes taught me. I apply every single day. A lot of times we think of learning to read like learning language. 

We learn our language very naturally our brains are set up to do that. Reading is, it's a different beast, because we're connecting a symbol to our sounds, which is really an abstraction, and it really is a big leap for a kid to make .

Some kids make that leap easily, and some kids need more support and help along the way. And it's our job as a teacher to show them the magic of this system.

In second grade they really make this connection between all of the letter sound spellings and basically their fluency in reading. You see the transition between learning to read and reading to learn. They can start reading the instructions on their work in math. And so their understanding of other concepts and other content areas becomes much more secure, so they gain confidence as a learner. And there comes this moment, where I have this big bank of words that I know and I do have this, this flow of what I'm reading. Then my mental resources move from the words on the page, to the meaning on the page. And that is a beautiful, beautiful moment. When you see their excitement and curiosity paired with their literacy, it breaks open a whole new learner and a whole new kid.

Their world just expands immediately. We know from our statewide data, kids in kindergarten through third grade are feeling the impact of the pandemic. And so, we are at this place of reflection as a field in how we can best meet the needs of all kids. All of our choices, the teacher, the schools, school board and teacher preparation programs come together and have a great impact on a child's learning and their potential opportunities in life. So we all have to work together, because we all want to get it right.