Education
BY BRITTANY ANDERSON
PfISD K-5 reading fluency is up through AI reading program
Kindergarten through fifth grade students in Pflugerville ISD have logged over 3,000 hours of reading practice on Amira Learning, an artificial intelligence reading program that has led to higher reading comprehension levels since its inception in the district in 2022. About the program According to PfISD Elementary Language Arts Coordinator Jenny Olsen, Amira Learning is a first- of-its-kind artificial intelligence reading program. Amira provides reading passages in English or Span- ish to kindergarten through fifth grade students, listens to them read, and provides in-the-moment intervention if they make a mistake. “[Amira] helps the students fill all the gaps and deficits they have in their foundational skills—basi- cally what everyone calls phonics instruction,” Olsen said. “The pandemic has really amplified all of these gaps and deficits they have. Unfortunately, when we went virtual, a lot of our students in
Reading fluency in Pflugerville ISD During the 2023-24 school year, kindergarten through fifth grade students in PfISD have higher reading levels compared to national averages.
National average
Pflugerville ISD (using Amira Learning)
Kindergarten
1st grade
2nd grade
3rd grade
4th grade
5th grade
SOURCE: PFLUGERVILLE ISD/COMMUNITY IMPACT
through a Dell grant. Another 6,000 licenses were purchased in February with board approval after several campuses expressed interest. What’s next The first 2,000 licenses are set to expire this Octo- ber, so Olsen said she is looking at getting another grant or using the ELA budget to purchase more.
Pflugerville, as well as nationally, were not reading.” Students are recommended to use the program for 10 minutes a day, three times a week. How we got here The program was first implemented during the 2022-23 school year. The first 2,000 licenses—or individual Amira Learning accounts—were acquired
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