Welcome to another enjoyable episode of the Reading Instruction Show.
I am your genial host, Dr. Andy Johnson.
Topic of today's podcast is Whole Language and Reading Workshop.
Now the Reading League, Emily Hanford and Science of Reading Advocates claim that Whole
Language and Reading Workshop and balanced literacy are the cause of the reading crisis.
And by the way, there is no reading crisis.
It's a reading crisis that isn't.
National NAP reading test scores have been rising steadily since 1971.
Today they're about the same as they were 10 years ago.
So this claim is kind of funny that there's a reading crisis coming from people who claim
to be the science of something.
It's funny because science does not use perceptions or I thinkisms and predetermined beliefs
to come to conclusions about things.
Real science uses valid reliable data.
It uses methods of science.
And a method of science is a predetermined established systematic observation.
So that's kind of funny.
The Reading League, Emily Hanford and the Science of Reading Advocates also believe
that they've isolated the variables causing the reading crisis that isn't.
This too is kind of funny because this process of coming to know something is the furthest
thing you could imagine from real science.
They use perceptions to isolate the variables.
Now, perceptions are good if you're painting a picture or writing a poem, but not so good
if you're trying to identify causal factors.
The Reading League, Emily Hanford and Science of Reading Advocates also believe that they
have found the solution for the reading crisis that isn't.
And that solution is more phonics, which again is hilarious because in real science, one
usually uses some type of comparative research to determine if something is effective or
to determine if one thing is better than the other.
But they haven't done this.
So let's take a look at whole language.
According to Science of Reading Advocates, whole language is supposed to be the factor
that led to the great downfall in reading scores.
But of course, if you ask them to define or describe whole language, they wouldn't know
what to say.
They don't know what it is.
They just know it's bad and they're supposed to be against it.
They'll even tell you that there's a reading war between phonics and whole language, a
reading war.
And saying that sentence shows that the war is not between phonics and whole language,
rather between ignorance and information.
Because whole language includes very direct and very explicit teaching of phonics.
It includes synthetic phonics, analytic phonics, large unit phonics, and an embedded phonics.
Those things are all included in whole language.
Now whole language approaches to reading instruction look a bit different in every classroom.
That's because it's not a method or a program.
There's no recipes to follow or directions that must be adhered to with fidelity.
Rather, it's an understanding that literacy teaching and learning are most effective when
languages kept whole and meaningful instead of breaking it down into teeny tiny little
reading sub-skills.
We learn best from whole to part.
We learn to read best within the context of reading good books.
And we learn reading sub-skills best when they're found within the context of authentic
reading and writing activities.
But they say, how do they read if they haven't been taught to read?
They say, that's the question that is most often wind by the clowns who have been sent
into question whole language and reading workshop.
And therein lies one of the great un-understandings upon which the science of reading foundation
is built.
Reading is not sounding out words.
It's creating meaning with print.
All children can read on their first day of kindergarten.
Yes, they can.
They may rely more on picture clues than letter clues, but they're able to use that book
to create meaning they can retell you the story.
And we teach them letter sounds and letter patterns within the context of these good
books and real writing activities.
And this makes the skills they learn, the reading sub-skills, the teeny tiny reading
sub-skills less abstract, more concrete, more meaningful, and the whole thing is a lot more
enjoyable.
So we can see within this context, a reader, a reading teacher's number one job is to help
children fall in love with books.
After that, 98.97% of all reading instruction is taken care of.
Now I am going to describe to you one whole language approach called reading workshop.
And this is something that Emily and the Reading League seem to equate with the work
of Satan.
So let me describe exactly what it is.
Now reading workshop is an approach, as I said, that falls within the parameters of
whole language.
And when you first hear about it, it may seem more complicated because you don't have the
background information or knowledge, but once you understand the process and see the structure
of reading workshop, it's a lot easier and more effective to implement than a basal approach
or a standard traditional approach to reading instruction.
It is more effective, it's multi-level, and it can be individualized to meet the specific
needs and interests of your students.
And reading workshop is not a method with step-by-step procedures that must be followed
like a recipe.
It's an approach to reading instruction based on research and research-based theory related
to how humans learn literacy.
Now again, it's not a standardized approach or method in reading workshop.
What you would see, the behaviors you would see would be based on the teacher, the students,
the age, their level, their interests.
What works with one class doesn't always work with another.
One size of reading instruction does not fit all.
Thus, in each teacher's classroom, you might see different things.
Reading workshop is structured, it's planned, and there's very, very direct and very, very
explicit instruction based on students' individual needs.
And it's strongly research-based using real science, not that fake stuff, based on how
real human beings learn.
So during a 40 to 90 minute session, you might see some or all of these things.
First, there would be independent reading.
Absolutely.
Yes, students, select and read books of their choice.
This is at the heart of reading workshop and it's only one part.
But if you want to get better at something, you need to practice.
That means that classrooms need lots of books in them, lots of good, good books, and ideally,
these books are at students' independent level or below.
Reading practice.
If you want to get good at something, you have to practice.
Just like wrestling practice or football practice or choir practice, you have to practice doing
the things.
There would be number two, a literacy log.
There's usually a literacy log of some sort and this is simply a notebook where students
are able to respond to aspects of what they've read.
Oftentimes, the teacher will put a prompt on the board before reading so that students
can think about the prompt and read with meaningful intent.
This could be something like describe an interesting character, describe where the story took place,
identify two interesting or important events, record an interesting or important word, tell
you what you think it means, find and record words with a long A sound.
You're limited only by your imagination, but students are reading and they're writing
and the reading and writing connection has been firmly established.
One impacts the other.
The reading log is used to respond.
It's not used as a book report to see if they're reading to catch them.
We trust students to read and if we have good books, of course they're going to read.
That's why it's important for them to have good books.
We don't have to test them to make sure they read or test them to make sure they comprehend
everything they read.
There are places to assess comprehension and other things, but it should be like taking
soil samples, bits and pieces here and there.
We don't assess everything students do for goodness sakes.
All right.
Independent reading, number two, literacy log.
Number three, whole class mini lessons.
Yes, there are whole class mini lessons.
Mini, by the way, means small.
Mini lessons using very direct and very explicit instruction to teach phonics or letter sounds
among other things and as recommended by the national reading panel, a variety of phonics
instruction would be included.
Synthetic embedded large unit phonics by spelling.
And mini lessons would also be used to teach comprehension skills and word identification
skills and vocabulary or grammar or spelling.
Mini, that means anywhere from two to 10 minutes or longer.
And these skills could be based on a suggested scope and sequence, but students are your best
scope and sequence chart.
So the skills you use for mini lessons could also be based on what you are seeing, what
the teacher sees, what the students need.
That's a very direct instruction because what you're teaching is directly related to what
students are doing.
Not to some abstract scope and sequence chart put together by some greasy guy in New York
who doesn't know your students.
That's indirect instruction.
We like direct instruction.
All right, we've got independent reading, literacy log, whole class mini lesson.
Number four, targeted mini lessons.
These are small, flexible, small group or individual mini lessons.
Students who are struggling with this skill might need to be called up front to the table
to work on one targeted skill related to a letter sound or pattern vocabulary, fluency
comprehension.
Our advanced students might be called up for more advanced reading skills.
These are flexible groups.
As you see and observe your students needing something, you teach what they need.
All right, conferences and there are several types of reading conferences.
This is where the teacher talks to the reader about what they're reading, listens to them
read, sets goals for the types of books to read and listens to how they respond.
And the teacher takes notes as he or she is listening.
You can also have small group conferences, drive by conferences.
All the while the teacher is taking notes, anecdotal notes, noting down, recording what
they see.
Students talking structured conversations.
You can also see this.
Reading is important for language development, it is related to vocabulary, reading fluency
and comprehension.
Structured conversations around books would take place in a whole class setting in small
groups and in pairs.
But students would be talking and authentic assessment.
And there are a variety of problems with standardized tests.
Of course, they don't reflect real reading.
They're a single snapshot in time, they're culturally biased and they're designed to
measure only that which can be measured.
They are inathetic and indirect measures.
Reading workshop uses some form of portfolio assessment to show growth over time, authentic.
And a variety of types of assessment are included here, a miscue analysis, running record story,
telling charts, clothes, words per minute rates, book talks, student self-assessment,
more authentic types of assessment.
So to sum it up, if you think reading is just sounding out words and reading class should
just be a bunch of sounding out word instruction, you're not going to understand what's going
on in reading workshop.
But just because you don't understand the thing does not mean the thing is not effective.
If you focus on sounding out word instruction like the science of reading advocates want
us to do, yes, you're going to get small blips on sounding out word tests, but do these results
transfer to real reading situations?
They do not.
We're not preparing our students to exist in a school world.
We're not preparing them to sound out words.
Our goal is to help students, each one develop their full literacy potential and to be able
to use literacy for real world endeavors in a real world.
To this end, we want students to be able to create meaning with print and use print to
create meaning.
This has been the Reading Instruction Show.
I am your host, Dr. Andy Johnson.