When Kalihi-uka Elementary second-grade teacher Andrea Whitfield brought parents in for conferences this year, she made a special plea: Please read at home with your child. Thirty minutes a night, every night, even on weekends.

It might seem like a small thing, she told them, but every bit of practice counts.

Whitfield lives by that mantra in her classroom, too.

Her students read fiction and nonfiction works. They use online programs to improve their reading, and have "workshops" to read with peers. Often, Whitfield reads to them. And if students have extra time in class, they take out a book.

Like many schools in the islands, Kalihi-uka is putting greater emphasis on reading in early grade levels to ensure that all students are reading on their own by the third grade, a significant indicator of future academic success.

The push comes as the state struggles to boost its overall reading proficiency scores for third grade. Last year, 65 percent of third-graders tested proficient in reading on the Hawaii State Assessment. That’s down 4 percentage points from the year before, but up from 62 percent in each of the three previous years.

The Kellogg Foundation, along with several local organizations, has invested more than $11.5 million through 2014 to increase the number of kids reading by the third grade in five demonstration sites statewide, including Kalihi.

Kamehameha Schools, meanwhile, has literacy programs in 23 public schools where there are large numbers of Native Hawaiian students. The federally funded Pihana Na Mamo, housed in the DOE, also targets schools with large groups of Native Hawaiians by emphasizing assessments and professional development.

Karen Lee, executive director of the P-20 Partnerships for Education, which administers the Kellogg Foundation grant funds, said getting kids reading by the third grade requires greater emphasis on high-quality preschool programs to ensure that when kids enter kindergarten, they’re "prepared to be ready to read."

Once students are in elementary school, Lee added, they need the right foundations — and sometimes some extra support — to make sure they are reading by the third grade.

"More research is really pointing to that indicator as crucial," she said. "If students can’t hit that hallmark, then they’re way behind."

Educators say reading by the third grade is vital because in that grade students start to use reading to learn in other subjects. Around that time, for example, students begin to learn math concepts by tackling word problems.

Gloria Kishi, a DOE educational specialist and director of the Pihana program, said work to get kids reading on time needs to begin early. She pointed out that more than 100 schools now assess students on reading skills as early as kindergarten.

The 10 schools in the Pihana program assess kindergartners on measures predictive of later reading difficulties. In the 2010-11 school year, the schools found that about one-third of 711 incoming kindergarten students were in need of "intensive supports" and 37.4 percent were in need of "strategic supports."

Meanwhile, of 645 incoming third-graders assessed at the schools on whether they can "read connected text fluently," about 27 percent needed intensive help.

Kishi said the assessment work is designed to catch students who may be struggling, and "provide them the needed instruction to get them back on track."

AT KALIHI-UKA Elementary, teachers give children formative assessments throughout the school year to determine what kind of progress they’re making. Students who need extra help get tutoring during recess, and teachers pore over the data to see what specific concepts particular students aren’t getting.

Teachers also collaborate regularly, said Principal Laura Ahn, to make sure students are on target. And there is more emphasis than ever to ensure students get the instruction they need to be ready for reading in third grade.

All that work has paid off.

Third-graders at Kalihi-uka, where about 60 percent of students come from disadvantaged homes, saw big improvements in reading in the school year that ended in May (as did their peers in other grades). Some 74 percent of Kalihi-uka third-graders tested proficient in reading in 2011, up from 53 percent in 2010.

A staggering 36 percent "exceeded" standards, from just 3 percent. And the percentage of students "well below" proficiency greatly declined, from 22 percent to just 4 percent this year. Twenty-two percent of students were near proficiency.

Ahn said the school has been able to cobble together its resources to stress reading proficiency. To offer its teachers professional development, it partnered with Puuhale Elementary, sharing the costs of offering a training program.

It has also reached out to parents, trying to involve them more in what their children are learning and impressing on them the importance of making sure that learning continues at home. Students at the school are challenged to read 1 million words a year, something the school tracks through reading logs parents sign off on.

"Some don’t make it" to a million words, Ahn said, "but most do."

On a recent day at the school, Whitfield was reading "Charlotte’s Web" to her second-graders, who were seated on the floor in a semicircle, listening attentively and imagining a world where a spider can weave messages.

Nearly a month into the new school year, parents appear to be fulfilling Whitfield’s plea to read to their kids at home. (She followed through on the request by making reading at home part of her students’ homework.)

"It’s a team effort," she said.