SPECIAL REPORT Learning Programs to Improve Behavior, Safety By Michelle Fisher
Later this month, the school day will start earlier for students boarding school buses where learning has already begun. More “mobile classrooms” are hitting the road as students from more than 25 school districts in states such as Arizona, New Mexico, Arkansas and beyond are reading and conducting online re- search during the ride time to and from school. Ray Trejo, transportation director at Deming Public Schools
(N.M.) and a former principal, needed to address a two-fold prob- lem in his disadvantaged, largely English language learner (ELL) student population: poor behavior and achievement. “Elementary classrooms are full of learning. We tried to replicate
that on the school bus with safety in mind,” said Trejo, who present- ed a course on this topic at the 2007 STN EXPO. “When students walked onto the bus, they were trained to get a book. My thinking was that if they were reading, they wouldn’t be misbehaving.” Trejo soon noticed that students were more “excited” to start
their day as school bus drivers turned into “surrogate teachers.” Te next step was to install DVD players and monitors on the buses and develop instructional material.
“Much of the material we were using on the bus was geared
toward these students — their deficits. I wanted to focus on vo- cabulary and math,” he added. “We had a complete paradigm shift in terms of behavior management. Tere was one driver I caught reading books to the kids while they waited for others to board.”
MOBILE LIBRARIES CHANGE BUS ENVIRONMENT School bus driver Rosemary Peterson of Manatee County
Schools (Fla.) was profiled on NBC Nightly News in April because her reading program captured the hearts and minds of students who were once so disruptive she considered quitting. She said she prayed to God for guidance and heard a voice respond. “It said to me, ‘If a person cannot read, they cannot under-
stand. Tey cannot comprehend, so therefore they cannot learn.’ And it was my answer to what I really needed to do in order to reach these kids,” Peterson told NBC. Te next day she told the children to bring books to read on the bus, and Miss Kookyi’s (pronounced “cookie”) Book Club was born. According to Area Coordinator Terri Dingler, this club caused
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7 North Street Staten Island, NY 10302
www.atlanticexpress.com 26 School Transportation News Magazine August 2010
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