WEBVTT 00:00:00.240 --> 00:00:03.259 This is The Reading Instruction Show. I am your 00:00:03.259 --> 00:00:07.679 host, as always, the colorful one, Dr. Andy Johnson. 00:00:08.179 --> 00:00:11.279 Topic of today's podcast is called Selective 00:00:11.279 --> 00:00:15.500 Umbridge, full colon. Emily Hanford is an Alexa 00:00:15.500 --> 00:00:20.620 app. Now, in my podcasts, YouTubes, and online 00:00:20.620 --> 00:00:23.839 articles, I often use colorful metaphors for 00:00:23.839 --> 00:00:27.980 things or people. For example, penguins or phonics 00:00:27.980 --> 00:00:31.579 penguins. These are people who are obsessed with 00:00:31.579 --> 00:00:35.679 phonics instruction, who think that phonics is 00:00:35.679 --> 00:00:40.439 the solution for everything. Clowns are people 00:00:40.439 --> 00:00:43.960 who think they know a lot about reading instruction 00:00:43.960 --> 00:00:48.740 when in actuality they know very little. Number 00:00:48.740 --> 00:00:52.119 monkeys are people who think that all learning 00:00:52.119 --> 00:00:57.039 can be quantified. and that testing is the solution 00:00:57.039 --> 00:01:01.520 to an imaginary literacy crisis. We can test 00:01:01.520 --> 00:01:05.939 our way out of this imaginary crisis. Toadies 00:01:05.939 --> 00:01:10.599 are educational consultants whose knowledge is 00:01:10.599 --> 00:01:14.939 for sale, whose recommendations seem to align 00:01:14.939 --> 00:01:20.549 with those who are paying them. And zealots The 00:01:20.549 --> 00:01:23.349 word zealot is used to denote a person who is 00:01:23.349 --> 00:01:26.629 fanatical and uncompromising in their pursuit 00:01:26.629 --> 00:01:31.469 of religious, political, or other ideas. And 00:01:31.469 --> 00:01:34.689 the term zealot can be used to describe a person 00:01:34.689 --> 00:01:39.450 who is unwilling to make concessions or to change 00:01:39.450 --> 00:01:44.150 one's way of thinking, even when faced with overwhelming 00:01:44.150 --> 00:01:48.900 evidence. And zealotry is the best way to describe 00:01:48.900 --> 00:01:52.120 the impetus behind the current science of reading 00:01:52.120 --> 00:01:56.180 movement. Under the guise of good instruction, 00:01:56.659 --> 00:02:02.319 they've fabricated a reading crisis. And they 00:02:02.319 --> 00:02:07.159 used this fabrication to create laws that disempower 00:02:07.159 --> 00:02:13.080 classroom teachers. Teachers are forced to use 00:02:13.080 --> 00:02:16.319 scripted one -size -fits -all commercial reading 00:02:16.319 --> 00:02:21.919 programs that have no basis in research, but 00:02:21.919 --> 00:02:27.479 are instead firmly enmeshed in i -think -a -sons. 00:02:28.599 --> 00:02:32.199 Schools are forced to purchase for -profit teacher 00:02:32.199 --> 00:02:35.060 professional development programs that have no 00:02:35.060 --> 00:02:41.099 basis in legitimate research. Instead of investing 00:02:41.099 --> 00:02:44.020 in things that could actually impact learning, 00:02:45.599 --> 00:02:49.520 hundreds of millions of dollars in states are 00:02:49.520 --> 00:02:53.259 being wasted to pay for expensive commercial 00:02:53.259 --> 00:02:57.740 products and services. And of course I realize 00:02:57.740 --> 00:03:01.819 that not every single person who aligns with 00:03:01.819 --> 00:03:05.800 the current science of reading movement disregards 00:03:05.800 --> 00:03:11.419 scientific principles. not literally, not every 00:03:11.419 --> 00:03:15.219 single one of them. It's a bit of hyperbole, 00:03:15.240 --> 00:03:20.740 you see. From my experience, it seems a great 00:03:20.740 --> 00:03:25.639 many of them seem to do so. And not all science 00:03:25.639 --> 00:03:29.780 of reading enthusiasts are zealots, but a great 00:03:29.780 --> 00:03:34.960 many certainly display zealous behaviors. And 00:03:34.960 --> 00:03:39.020 if it walks like a zealot and quacks like a zealot, 00:03:39.080 --> 00:03:46.479 well. So, polite words, it brings me no joy to 00:03:46.479 --> 00:03:49.599 have to use colorful metaphors. Okay, it brings 00:03:49.599 --> 00:03:53.699 me a little joy. But for years, many of us have 00:03:53.699 --> 00:03:58.080 tried to use research and reason to make our 00:03:58.080 --> 00:04:03.300 case. But along comes Emily Hanford, a journalist. 00:04:04.009 --> 00:04:08.169 with a ready -made platform who just says stuff. 00:04:09.150 --> 00:04:11.930 And because of the emotional tug of what she 00:04:11.930 --> 00:04:16.610 says, people believe her. After all, listening 00:04:16.610 --> 00:04:20.610 to a radio documentary that provides simple answers 00:04:20.610 --> 00:04:24.970 is much easier than reading and assimilating 00:04:24.970 --> 00:04:28.029 a bunch of scholarly work with complexity and 00:04:28.029 --> 00:04:33.649 nuance. So when research and reason no longer 00:04:33.649 --> 00:04:38.569 work, you must try other things. So yes, occasionally 00:04:38.569 --> 00:04:42.050 I step out from behind my timid third -person 00:04:42.050 --> 00:04:46.829 objective voice. I use metaphors and analogy 00:04:46.829 --> 00:04:51.689 to create memorable images that seem to get through 00:04:51.689 --> 00:04:55.670 some of the haze of all that politely worded 00:04:55.670 --> 00:05:01.329 blabber. But the baseless accusations coming 00:05:01.329 --> 00:05:06.110 out of the politely worded blabber are much more 00:05:06.110 --> 00:05:10.069 offensive than a couple of my two -bit metaphors. 00:05:11.430 --> 00:05:15.009 Making teachers and professors public pinatas 00:05:15.009 --> 00:05:18.670 to whack about simply because they can't whack 00:05:18.670 --> 00:05:23.129 back is much more offensive than a couple of 00:05:23.129 --> 00:05:28.490 my poorly worded analogies. And tearing away 00:05:28.490 --> 00:05:32.350 at the fabric of public education and teacher 00:05:32.350 --> 00:05:36.889 autonomy is much more offensive than the names 00:05:36.889 --> 00:05:41.750 I have given to the fabric terrors. What about 00:05:41.750 --> 00:05:46.089 the children? They say in their soft pleading 00:05:46.089 --> 00:05:50.449 voices. What about the children? We must protect 00:05:50.449 --> 00:05:56.930 the children. Are my images, my words, are they 00:05:56.930 --> 00:06:01.610 offensive? Yes, we must protect the children, 00:06:01.990 --> 00:06:05.550 which is exactly why some of us fight so hard 00:06:05.550 --> 00:06:09.550 to get research -based reading instruction along 00:06:09.550 --> 00:06:13.490 with legitimate professional development and 00:06:13.490 --> 00:06:17.329 teacher autonomy back into our classrooms. Why 00:06:17.329 --> 00:06:21.250 we work so hard to get better working conditions 00:06:21.250 --> 00:06:27.769 and pay for teachers. Now, Louisa Moats regularly 00:06:27.769 --> 00:06:31.310 says that teachers are not knowledgeable. They 00:06:31.310 --> 00:06:33.610 don't know the right things. They're unprepared. 00:06:33.769 --> 00:06:37.529 They don't know how to teach reading, and professors 00:06:37.529 --> 00:06:41.149 aren't teaching the right things. Might this 00:06:41.149 --> 00:06:46.230 be a little offensive? And compare what I say 00:06:46.230 --> 00:06:49.149 to the subtle and often not -so -subtle statements 00:06:49.149 --> 00:06:53.240 made in inferences. Teachers are ignorant. Teachers 00:06:53.240 --> 00:06:56.620 aren't very smart. Teachers are lazy. Teachers 00:06:56.620 --> 00:06:59.819 don't know how to teach reading. Teachers need 00:06:59.819 --> 00:07:03.519 to be told how to teach reading. We can't trust 00:07:03.519 --> 00:07:06.180 teachers. We need to hold them accountable. We 00:07:06.180 --> 00:07:09.410 need to disempower them. Literacy professors 00:07:09.410 --> 00:07:12.649 are ignorant and teach the wrong things. Teachers 00:07:12.649 --> 00:07:15.310 have an agenda other than helping each child 00:07:15.310 --> 00:07:18.449 develop his or her full potential. Professors 00:07:18.449 --> 00:07:21.889 have an agenda other than educating students. 00:07:22.370 --> 00:07:25.230 Literacy professors aren't doing their job. We 00:07:25.230 --> 00:07:27.910 need to mandate certain things and outlaw other 00:07:27.910 --> 00:07:35.370 things. Yes, I know that it's unbecoming of a 00:07:35.370 --> 00:07:39.290 literacy professor. to make broad generalizations 00:07:39.290 --> 00:07:42.990 like I have. And I know that I should be better 00:07:42.990 --> 00:07:46.670 than that, better than calling people names. 00:07:46.949 --> 00:07:50.730 But I'm not. I'm not better than that at all. 00:07:51.029 --> 00:07:55.769 In fact, I'm most likely worse than that. Now 00:07:55.769 --> 00:07:58.769 let's take a look at the metaphor. In a recent 00:07:58.769 --> 00:08:02.269 show, I referred to Emily Hanford as the Alexa 00:08:02.269 --> 00:08:07.189 app of reading instruction. And this was a metaphor, 00:08:07.810 --> 00:08:12.589 a common literary device in which one makes a 00:08:12.589 --> 00:08:17.089 comparison without using the words like or as. 00:08:18.009 --> 00:08:22.189 It creates an image. For example, when we say 00:08:22.189 --> 00:08:25.430 America is a melting pot, we don't literally 00:08:25.430 --> 00:08:30.230 mean there's a big pot bubbling someplace. Metaphors 00:08:30.230 --> 00:08:33.870 create images and communicate things that an 00:08:33.870 --> 00:08:38.750 accumulation of words simply can't. And I compared 00:08:38.750 --> 00:08:44.629 Emily Hanford to an Alexa app. Is it an apt comparison? 00:08:45.649 --> 00:08:51.070 Yes. She says things without recourse. You can't 00:08:51.070 --> 00:08:55.779 trust her as a valid source of information. She 00:08:55.779 --> 00:08:59.399 presents things without context, very much like 00:08:59.399 --> 00:09:04.039 my Alexa app. For example, my Alexa app said 00:09:04.039 --> 00:09:08.399 that her net worth was $15 million. Interesting, 00:09:08.580 --> 00:09:13.559 yes? Do I trust this information? Do I think 00:09:13.559 --> 00:09:19.240 it's accurate? Maybe my Alexa app is Emily Hanford 00:09:19.240 --> 00:09:23.620 of Internet Information. Now recently somebody 00:09:23.620 --> 00:09:29.559 took great umbrage of my use of metaphor. I was 00:09:29.559 --> 00:09:33.159 said to have called her an Alexa app. Oh, the 00:09:33.159 --> 00:09:37.000 horror! But I didn't call her an Alexa app. I 00:09:37.000 --> 00:09:41.620 didn't say Emily Hanford is an Alexa app. If 00:09:41.620 --> 00:09:46.159 I wanted to call her a name, I could do far better 00:09:46.159 --> 00:09:50.990 than calling her an Alexa app. However, a person 00:09:50.990 --> 00:09:56.350 took great umbrage, but it seems to be selective 00:09:56.350 --> 00:10:01.389 umbrage. It seems to be something else disguised 00:10:01.389 --> 00:10:05.769 as umbrage. It seems to be false umbrage or pseudo 00:10:05.769 --> 00:10:10.029 umbrage. I mean, how could you possibly get all 00:10:10.029 --> 00:10:13.950 umbraided by someone using a metaphor to compare 00:10:13.950 --> 00:10:19.139 somebody to an Alexa app? And here's where the 00:10:19.139 --> 00:10:23.039 selective umbrage kicks in. Again, consider how 00:10:23.039 --> 00:10:27.120 teachers have been demeaned and impugned by Emily 00:10:27.120 --> 00:10:30.019 Hanford, Louisa Moats, and the Science of Reading 00:10:30.019 --> 00:10:34.759 movement. Their pretty words may not have contained 00:10:34.759 --> 00:10:38.679 metaphors, but think for a minute what's been 00:10:38.679 --> 00:10:42.559 said about classroom teachers and public education. 00:10:43.820 --> 00:10:48.090 Think of the constant false narrative teachers 00:10:48.090 --> 00:10:52.809 have had to endure for years. That's much worse 00:10:52.809 --> 00:10:59.549 than calling someone an Alexa app, selective 00:10:59.549 --> 00:11:04.649 umbrage. Now let's look at an analogy. An analogy 00:11:04.649 --> 00:11:08.669 is another literary device that uses something 00:11:08.669 --> 00:11:11.889 familiar to help you understand something new. 00:11:12.190 --> 00:11:16.730 For example, dog is to bone as Andy is to the 00:11:16.730 --> 00:11:20.830 euphonium. We know dogs love bones. The image 00:11:20.830 --> 00:11:23.450 of a dog greedily chewing on a bone is created 00:11:23.450 --> 00:11:27.690 in our head. So we can assume that Andy loves 00:11:27.690 --> 00:11:33.669 the euphonium as much as a dog loves bones. You 00:11:33.669 --> 00:11:36.169 shoehorn the new thing inside the known thing 00:11:36.169 --> 00:11:41.169 and understanding is enhanced considerably. Now, 00:11:41.330 --> 00:11:45.769 Emily Hanford is a journalist. Journalists just 00:11:45.769 --> 00:11:49.210 write things. People tell them things and they 00:11:49.210 --> 00:11:52.889 write it down. There's no checks and balances. 00:11:53.269 --> 00:11:56.889 There's no peer review. Things are pulled out 00:11:56.889 --> 00:12:00.850 of context often so that they're technically 00:12:00.850 --> 00:12:06.289 correct but conveniently inaccurate. Journalists 00:12:06.289 --> 00:12:11.490 write stuff. This is what they do. And in this 00:12:11.490 --> 00:12:15.529 context I wrote, you can't ask a skunk not to 00:12:15.529 --> 00:12:19.029 stink, meaning that a journalist is going to 00:12:19.029 --> 00:12:22.690 do what journalists do, just as a skunk does 00:12:22.690 --> 00:12:28.330 what a skunk does. I used an analogy. Now I could 00:12:28.330 --> 00:12:30.909 have said you can't ask a bunny not to hop or 00:12:30.909 --> 00:12:34.870 a snake not to slither, but it just doesn't roll 00:12:34.870 --> 00:12:40.879 off the tongue quite the same. Andy is to writing 00:12:40.879 --> 00:12:45.519 as monkeys are to throwing poop. Chihuahuas are 00:12:45.519 --> 00:12:48.580 small and make a lot of noise barking at things. 00:12:48.779 --> 00:12:51.759 Andy is a small man who makes a lot of noise. 00:12:52.600 --> 00:12:57.740 You can't ask a chihuahua not to bark. Metaphors 00:12:57.740 --> 00:13:01.379 and analogies are effective in conveying certain 00:13:01.379 --> 00:13:05.700 information because of the visual image created. 00:13:07.149 --> 00:13:10.269 If you want to take umbrage at something, and 00:13:10.269 --> 00:13:13.789 there's plenty of umbrage -worthy things, take 00:13:13.789 --> 00:13:17.250 umbrage at the money wasted to pay for commercial 00:13:17.250 --> 00:13:20.549 products and services related to reading instruction. 00:13:21.990 --> 00:13:26.450 Take umbrage at overcrowded classrooms and poor 00:13:26.450 --> 00:13:31.049 teaching conditions. Take umbrage at low teacher 00:13:31.049 --> 00:13:35.649 pay and lack of legitimate professional development 00:13:35.649 --> 00:13:39.980 opportunities. Take umbrage at tax cuts that 00:13:39.980 --> 00:13:45.299 make tuition costs rise. Take umbrage when the 00:13:45.299 --> 00:13:49.120 public cannot afford to go to our public colleges 00:13:49.120 --> 00:13:54.159 and universities. Take umbrage at the lack of 00:13:54.159 --> 00:13:59.779 healthcare, food insecurity, and mass shootings. 00:14:01.519 --> 00:14:06.129 Yes, I'm an offensive, mouthy little man. But 00:14:06.129 --> 00:14:09.049 I try to be offensive and mouthy for a purpose. 00:14:10.370 --> 00:14:13.809 So save your umbrage for things that are truly 00:14:13.809 --> 00:14:18.490 umbrage -worthy. This has been The Reading Instruction 00:14:18.490 --> 00:14:20.649 Show. I'm your host, Dr. Andy Johnson.