This is the Reading Instruction Show. I'm your host as always. Dr. Andy Johnson.
The topic of today's podcast is called Special Ed World and the Science of
Reading Comedy Club. And today we are going to focus on quote evidence-based
instruction and quote scientifically based research on quote or
scientifically based reading research. So one thing I'll say about evidence-based
is this. Can it really be evidence-based if only a certain type of evidence is
used? Can it really be scientifically based if only certain methods are allowed
to ask certain types of questions and collect certain types of data? And that's
the whole problem with the liturgical chance of evidence and evidence-based
and scientifically based and the science of reading made by the Science of
Reading Comedy Club to support a litany of practices taken from their
Direct Instruction Holy Book. That's the whole problem in Special Ed World with
their declaration of faith stating that only practices used to manipulate and
control behavior are evidence-based. These represent the simplistic understanding
of research in the social sciences. Within Special Ed World and the Science of
Reading Comedy Club and even the US Department of Education, controlled
experimental studies are thought to be the only way of establishing causal
relationships that one thing causes another thing to happen. They have
determined that only a single type of research methodology can be used to ask
and answer questions in the field of education. This is ironically labeled as
scientifically based research. However, in true scientific inquiry, the question
determines the method. The method does not determine the question, but if
controlled experimental research is the only acceptable research method, the
questions that get asked become rather narrow. Instead of asking how do young
children acquire literacy, the question becomes is method X more effective than
method Y in helping young children acquire literacy? One question seeks to
understand. The other question seeks to control and manipulate variables. Again,
how can anything be said to be truly scientific if it ignores or invalidates
an abundance of data? Now, there's nothing wrong with controlled
experimental studies. They are one important part of education and one
important part of educational research. In examining recently scientifically
based reading research and evidence-based practices in education,
it's not the type of research methodology that's the problem. It's the
exclusive use of one type of research methodology to the exclusion of all
others. This has created a methodological people that has resulted in a very
narrow and unrealistic view of the very educational reality it seeks to examine.
The result is that the term research and research-based and evidence-based are
often used inappropriately to justify a variety of bad decisions. Evidence
outside of context is falderol. Now, the science of reading comedy club and the
pompous potentates of special ed world and the non-educational scholars in the
US Department of Education mandate that the same research methods used to
study bacteria in a Petri dish must be used to study children in a classroom.
They simply must. But human beings are not standardized products and there are far
too many variables in the real world of education to control or isolate. As well,
the results of large controlled experimental research do not always
generalize to smaller smaller populations. But the question you must
always ask when someone says a strategy or a practice is evidence-based is this.
Have you actually looked at the evidence of the evidence-based or you're just
using the term because you heard somebody else use it? When somebody squeaks
joyfully that they're using evidence-based practices, one must always ask what kind of
evidence? How was the evidence collected? For whom? For what purpose? How much? How
often?