A pile of orange letters of the alphabet sat between Katie Rooney and a 4-year-old boy. The Marquette graduate student coached the preschooler, praising him each time he fished out the correct letter.

They later progressed to joining syllables to form full words in Spanish. "Dame cinco!" she says when the native Spanish speaker successfully pronounces a word, and they exchange a high five.

"He's getting it," said Rooney, a first year graduate student in the College of Health Sciences.

Rooney is one of 30 Marquette students involved in the Wisconsin Reading Acquisition Program, a partnership between Marquette and Day Care Services for Children, a Head Start agency in Milwaukee. Rooney helps instruct preschool students at the Virginia Center, 647 W. Virginia St., a part of DCSC.

The project received a $4 million Early Reading First grant from the U.S. Department of Education last September. It is the largest three-year grant in Marquette's history.

The program serves nearly 300 preschoolers from low-income families in 16 DCSC classrooms throughout Milwaukee, said Maura Moyle, an assistant professor of speech pathology and audiology. More than 90 percent of the 3- and 4-year-old children are minorities, and about half are bilingual, she said.

Moyle heads the program along with Brenda Gorman, an assistant professor of speech pathology and audiology, and Sue Berman, a clinical instructor of speech pathology and audiology.

The project focuses on language and literacy skills, Moyle said. Of the 31 ERF grants awarded by the Department of Education in 2008, the Wisconsin program is the only project headed by speech-language pathologists.

Research shows that language is the basis of later literacy success, Gorman said. WRAP emphasizes vocabulary and phonological awareness to form language skills that will facilitate literacy.

"We want to give (students) those foundational skills so they have the ability to succeed once formal instruction in literacy begins," Gorman said.

The children receive daily instruction in a variety of contexts, including traditional teaching, story time, snack time and recreational periods, Moyle said.

In addition to classroom teaching, some students receive small group and individual instruction, Gorman said.

The grant is being utilized to implement a research-based curriculum, to train teachers and to help parents develop children's skills at home. Besides paying the salaries of WRAP staff members and some Head Start employees, the grant is funding purchases of materials like books, computers and printers, Berman said.

Studies show huge discrepancies between the numbers of words children living in poverty are exposed to versus those in higher income households, Moyle said. This leads to smaller vocabularies that handicap students once they enter school.

"If (kids) start out behind, they don't catch up," Moyle said. "If we're not capitalizing on brain development, it's almost too late when they reach school."

While the first year of WRAP focused on teacher training and buying materials, Berman would like to see increased parent involvement next year.

"It's got to start with the home," Berman said.

Still, Moyle believes the budding program has made strides.

"We already feel like we're making a difference," Moyle said.

Dierdre Degroot, a senior in the College of Health Sciences, said she has seen notable improvements in the children's skills since WRAP instruction began in January. Degroot earned a teacher's aide certificate to become an hourly worker for the program at the Virginia Center.

She said many children at the center did not know any of the letters of the alphabet when they took pretests. Now, she said, they know all of them.

"Just recognizing letters — that was huge," Degroot said. "I've seen the good (WRAP) has done."