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This is the Reading Instruction Show. I'm your host as always. Dr. Andy Johnson.

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The topic of today's podcast is called Special Ed World and the Science of

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Reading Comedy Club. And today we are going to focus on quote evidence-based

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instruction and quote scientifically based research on quote or

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scientifically based reading research. So one thing I'll say about evidence-based

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is this. Can it really be evidence-based if only a certain type of evidence is

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used? Can it really be scientifically based if only certain methods are allowed

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to ask certain types of questions and collect certain types of data? And that's

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the whole problem with the liturgical chance of evidence and evidence-based

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and scientifically based and the science of reading made by the Science of

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Reading Comedy Club to support a litany of practices taken from their

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Direct Instruction Holy Book. That's the whole problem in Special Ed World with

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their declaration of faith stating that only practices used to manipulate and

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control behavior are evidence-based. These represent the simplistic understanding

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of research in the social sciences. Within Special Ed World and the Science of

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Reading Comedy Club and even the US Department of Education, controlled

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experimental studies are thought to be the only way of establishing causal

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relationships that one thing causes another thing to happen. They have

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determined that only a single type of research methodology can be used to ask

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and answer questions in the field of education. This is ironically labeled as

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scientifically based research. However, in true scientific inquiry, the question

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determines the method. The method does not determine the question, but if

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controlled experimental research is the only acceptable research method, the

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questions that get asked become rather narrow. Instead of asking how do young

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children acquire literacy, the question becomes is method X more effective than

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method Y in helping young children acquire literacy? One question seeks to

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understand. The other question seeks to control and manipulate variables. Again,

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how can anything be said to be truly scientific if it ignores or invalidates

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an abundance of data? Now, there's nothing wrong with controlled

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experimental studies. They are one important part of education and one

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important part of educational research. In examining recently scientifically

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based reading research and evidence-based practices in education,

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it's not the type of research methodology that's the problem. It's the

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exclusive use of one type of research methodology to the exclusion of all

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others. This has created a methodological people that has resulted in a very

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narrow and unrealistic view of the very educational reality it seeks to examine.

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The result is that the term research and research-based and evidence-based are

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often used inappropriately to justify a variety of bad decisions. Evidence

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outside of context is falderol. Now, the science of reading comedy club and the

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pompous potentates of special ed world and the non-educational scholars in the

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US Department of Education mandate that the same research methods used to

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study bacteria in a Petri dish must be used to study children in a classroom.

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They simply must. But human beings are not standardized products and there are far

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too many variables in the real world of education to control or isolate. As well,

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the results of large controlled experimental research do not always

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generalize to smaller smaller populations. But the question you must

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always ask when someone says a strategy or a practice is evidence-based is this.

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Have you actually looked at the evidence of the evidence-based or you're just

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using the term because you heard somebody else use it? When somebody squeaks

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joyfully that they're using evidence-based practices, one must always ask what kind of

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evidence? How was the evidence collected? For whom? For what purpose? How much? How

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often?