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The Current Controversy About Teaching Reading: Comments for Those Left With Questions After Reading the New York Times Article.

2/17/2020

 
Over the weekend the New York Times published an article on the front page about the teaching of reading. A friend posted in on Facebook saying "I won't know what to think about this until Dan comments on it." I thought some background for people like my friend might be useful.

How is the teaching of reading still controversial? Surely they’ve sorted it out by now.

The relationship between a teacher’s actions and a child’s success is murky.

Psychologists love to point out that “complex behavior is multiply determined.” Reading is complex, therefore many factors contribute to success or failure. Phonics instruction supports children learning to decode, but some kids figure out decoding with less support. The degree to which kids need more or less phonics instruction depends on their oral language skills (vocabulary, the complexity of syntax they can unravel), their knowledge of letters and print, and their ability to hear individual speech sounds, at the least. In addition, a teacher may be fully on board with phonics instruction, but either not be great at it (lack of knowledge or skill due to poor training) OR may be hobbled by the school or district having adopted a mediocre reading program.

And once you get past measuring decoding (i.e., you're measuring comprehension) things get still murkier because other factors contribute to comprehension. 

So with all those factors, how much does all this really matter? If every teacher taught decoding via phonics instruction tomorrow, how much would reading improve?

It’s hard to say precisely, but you can predict the general pattern.

First, as I noted, some kids need less phonics instruction, so they get by with the bits and pieces they are getting now, although they’d learn to decode faster and more easily with more systematic instruction. It’s the kids with weak oral language skills, and those who have a hard time hearing individual speech sounds, those are the kids that will benefit most. There’s absolutely some percentage of kids floating into mid- and upper-elementary grades with really poor decoding skills who could be doing better.

Second, “decoding” is not synonymous with “reading.” It’s necessary but not sufficient. Once a child is a fairly fluent decoder, her comprehension is heavily influenced by her vocabulary, as well as the breadth and richness of background information in memory.

So it’s not that phonics instruction would make every child a great reader. It’s that without it, some kids won’t learn to read at all. 

Isn’t phonics instruction boring for the kids who don’t need it?

There’s limited data on the matter, but nationally representative sample from 1995 showed that reading attitudes weren’t affected by decoding instruction. Although phonics instruction may seem boring it may be that (1) decoding itself is rewarding; (2) phonics is boring, but there are still read-alouds and other stuff that support positive reading attitudes (3) other types of instruction aren’t as interesting as we might have thought.

Perhaps most important, in most classrooms, teachers accept that there are some things children must learn or experience that aren’t fun, but are too important to skip. You make it as fun as you can, you make a show of enthusiasm, and hope the kids are swept along.

What happened that prompted the New York Times to put a story about this on the front page?

The article made it sound like new data from eye-tracking and brain imaging “now show” that phonics is crucial (and that exposure to appealing books isn’t enough). I don’t think that’s true. The behavioral data were plenty convincing twenty years ago, although our understanding of how the mind reads is, of course, always advancing. (Also, brain-imaging and eye tracking data aren’t that new.)

This issue—how much phonics instruction is really necessary?—has been visited and revisited since the 1920s. It quieted down in the early aughts with what was supposed to be a compromise position called “balanced literacy.” This position said “look, both sides are right. You need phonics, and you need great childrens literature and read-alouds.” This position is correct, of course, but people have been worried that phonics is getting short shrift, that teachers (and those who teach them) who don’t think phonics matters much just kept doing what they’d been doing, but now called it “balanced literacy.”

I’ve never met a US reading teacher who said “Kids don’t need any phonics instruction.” The concern is that teachers are underestimating how much kids need  (edit: and, as Twitter user @MiriamFein pointed out to me, the quality of instruction--issue is not necessarily more, but better). Exactly because reading is multiply determined, it’s easy to think of reasons the child might not seem to get it very quickly…and to think that maybe he’ll get it in a few months.

Meanwhile, the instructional supports teachers get often encourage this sort of thinking. A recent review of one of the most-used reading programs in early grades concluded that support for phonics instruction was weak. In 2015 I noted in one of my books that the K-2 literacy guide for New York City Schools listed 16 activities, only one of which was phonics instruction. Yet I don’t think I was concerned enough.

The impetus behind the new controversy has been the work of Emily Hanford, a reporter who has done a thorough job of describing what’s known about how children learn to read, and she called schools of education to task for not teaching future teachers the best way to teach kids to read. Who knows, maybe the time was just right, but certainly the depth of her reporting made the moment possible.

So schools of education are to blame?

There are thousands of teacher preparation programs in this country so it’s hard to generalize. But the weekly education newspaper, Education Week, did a survey of professors regarding how they prepare future teachers to teach reading, and yeah, the results indicated that a lot of teachers are not getting very good instruction in teaching reading.

The most common misalignment I hear is this: when people think about reading, they think about it the way an already-skilled reader does it. For example, they say that readers use meaning-based cues to help figure out a word. That’s true, and there are two ways it happens. One is an unconscious process that is only in place if you are a fluent decoder who understands the rest of the text to that point; this process only nudges you towards the right interpretation, it doesn’t magically make you read it. The second is a conscious process, puzzling out what an unfamiliar word means, and ample data show readers are willing to do a little of that work, but not much. It’s frustrating and effortful. So the idea that we should teach beginning readers to use meaning-based cues has a certain logic to it—it’s what really good readers do—but it’s not a good strategy for beginners.

So what happens next?

Ideally, current and future teachers will get better instruction in how people read (I actually wrote The Reading Mind as auxiliary textbook for schools of education with this purpose in mind) and then too in how to teach reading. There’s much more to reading than phonics instruction and we’re actually know much less about how to teach those elements—fluency, for example, or how to raise reading motivation. Decoding is the most thoroughly researched aspect of reading, and it’s the one we know the most about teaching. We really ought to take advantage of that work. 
allen
2/17/2020 09:19:52 am

You're far too kind.

Whole language has been a reliable way to ensure all kids find reading tedious and largely unworthy of the effort while leaving a substantial fraction of kids illiterate.

What's also missing from this piece is any explanation of why professionals would use a methodology that's inherently flawed and only succeeds, where it doesn't fail utterly, without a great deal of remedial instruction over a methodology that always works.

Abbey
2/22/2020 01:06:49 pm

Allen, I'm wondering if the professors who were in charge of determining how teachers were taught had deep attachments to whole language and balanced literacy because they themselves were likely good readers who needed very little phonics instruction to become fluent readers.

allen
2/22/2020 01:29:33 pm

The genesis of whole language lies in the utter disregard public education has for teaching skill.

When skill's not the metric for advancement ambition doesn't just go away among the very ambitious. They find other means to garner attention/fame.

One such way is to align yourself with the cutting edge displaying, if not skill, than modernity. None of the old, fuddy-duddy phonics for the brave explorers of the pedagogy of tomorrow!

And from where do these cutting edge developments emerge? The hallowed halls of academe where great minds toil to uncover the secrets to tomorrows pedagogy.

Or something like that.

You surround the exciting, new development with a thicket of meaningless jargon with the inevitable confusion being the opportunity to engage in the condescension of the ignorant.

Since no one wants to be condescended too objections tend to be steam-rolled.

The ed school profs are beneficiaries of this situation since whole language, along with the vast array of other, similar ideas makes those ed school profs seem more important and valuable than they are.

Unsurprisingly, self-interest means they cling to the complex and opaque over the simple and obvious with the indifference of the public education establishment to teaching skill, and thus learning, insulating them from their lack of value.

Debbie Hepplewhite link
2/17/2020 09:50:43 am

There is only phonics that a reader can apply to a new printed word - new to spoken language and not just new in print - that can result in pronunciation and therefore enable the reader to expand their spoken language.

In other words, 'meaning' can be deduced from context, but not pronunciation. There could be quite a large number of 'readers' (in our schools for example) who can get by in working out the gist of the print, but who cannot expand on their spoken language well enough without bothering to work out a pronunciation for new words in print - or without the capacity (phonics knowledge and skill) to come up with a pronunciation unaided.

Goodman Peter link
2/17/2020 01:37:52 pm

Currently the Principal, Teachers Union and Athens Chancellor are collaborating on collecting ELA and Math “programs” in each school .. so far, most schools use whole language, usually Columbia TC Lucy Calkins ..next steps coordinated PD ..

Harriett Janetos
2/17/2020 07:26:20 pm

I have been following this debate closely, and you've provided an excellent summary. I've also been rereading The Reading Mind and have appreciated all over again your excellent Summary and Implications sections at the end of each chapter. I wish I had had this book in my reading specialist credential program.

Have you been following the debate ignited by this piece by Jeff Bowers, Reconsidering the evidence that systematic phonics is more effective than alternative methods of reading instruction, https://cpb-eu-w2.wpmucdn.com/blogs.bristol.ac.uk/dist/b/403/files/2019/12/phonics-educational-psychology-review-in-press.pdf, which was recently published in Educational Psychology?

allen
2/17/2020 07:38:36 pm

accidentally unsubscribe darn it

David Deubelbeiss
2/18/2020 08:13:53 am

The problem in "learning to read" (not reading to learn) is that students are not learning to decode using language they own, speak and utter. We need an approach that is organic and is built upon student emergent language not estranged texts written by distant authors. Students can speak and see their own language "read" and as text. See Ashton - Warner for a very early attempt at this approach. PS. Thanks for calling out the brain research. We know so little about brain processing and those using these reports and championing "science" are just plain wrong to do so. Even Nobel Laureate cognitive scientists admit we know so little and its wrong to make assumptions based on incomplete knowledge of even the basics of how the brain works.

Lorraine Yamin
2/18/2020 11:01:59 am

I have supported students in many K-5 classrooms where teachers are using the balanced literacy, TCRWP approach. I see valiant intentions and hardworking teachers trying to differentiate the instruction. However, many of the strategies modeled and taught appear to be metacognitive lessons about what readers and writers do - then the students can't do them because they lack the foundation skills in word and sentence work! Teachers' pupils are dilated, their palms are sweating trying to land the lessons while keeping the classroom community on point. Then literacy coaches come in to observe and everyone tries really hard to get that workshop model up and running (it is amazing how students and teachers can shift when an observer walks in). As soon as the observer-coaches exit and the classroom community relaxes, exasperation fills the air. Wiley Blevins seems to be sorting out a lot of this, especially what is age appropriate. Judith Hochman, founder of The Writing Revolution, is helping people see the nexus of weak language-processing and executive function skills. We CAN get each individual child up the ladder of skills and it is challenging that some move quickly while others need more support. However, this can definitely be figured out!

George Hruby link
2/19/2020 09:22:06 am

Great points, all, Dan! Made several of these myself in the current issue of Phi Delta Kappan (February issue, special issue entitled Language Matters), "Language's vanishing act in early elementary literacy instruction."

Margaret Whitley link
2/19/2020 02:15:02 pm

Thank you so much for offering comment and clarity to this seemingly never ending debate which ultimately results in illiteracy but even worse frustration with learning for students everywhere.

Paul Thomas link
2/20/2020 08:56:43 am

Hanford and MSM have been harmful for this debate, I think. Too many overstatements and misrepresentations.

Several of the clarifications above are appreciated, but often absent from MSM coverage.

My fact checking of Goldstein: https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1229040822022266881.html

A clarification: The Real Reading Debate and How We Fail to Teach Reading https://radicalscholarship.wordpress.com/2020/02/19/the-real-reading-debate-and-how-we-fail-to-teach-reading/

Elaine Thiery
2/22/2020 11:09:40 pm

Does anyone know if an adult nonreader (people who call themselves dyslexic, whether that's an official diagnosis or not) can be helped to learn to read, on the theory that they simply did not get enough or good quality phonics education? I teach GED classes and run into many such students. I am not a special ed teacher and must find ways to help them pass this (fundamentally reading) test. Might I try basic phonics lessons with them?

Mike G
3/2/2020 01:05:12 pm

Great summary/commentary. Thanks for wading your way through all the reporting.

Douglas Hainline
3/14/2020 07:36:55 am

If anyone reading this is a Liberal/Progressive -- or just not a conservative -- could you please please please find ways to champion the idea of phonics among the liberal community?

I believe that effective teaching strategies tend to be identified in the eyes of EdSchool profs as old-fashioned and 'conservative', and are therefore, in practice, deprecated.

And now we have some especially crazy people denouncing effective teaching methods as 'racist'!

But if you're really on the side of the poor and the working class, you will want them to have the best education possible. Think of it as expropriating the Right Wing if that makes it feel better.

This really ought to be an area where Left and Right can find substantial agreement, in contrast to almost every other issue.

So c'mon liberals and Leftists -- seize this effective teaching method from the Rightwingers, who selfishly would like to keep it all their own!

Harriett Janetos
3/14/2020 12:11:31 pm

You'll be pleased to hear that the NAACP got involved in Oakland, CA and the district is now embracing evidence-based methods. It seems like the current national discussion spearheaded by parents and the press is changing the traditional alliances you describe.


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