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This is the Reading Instruction Show.

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I'm your host, as always, Dr. Andy Johnson.

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The topic of today's podcast is the science of reading, phonics instruction, and the national

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reading panel.

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Now, in this podcast, I'm going to start with a definition of the science of reading or

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reading science that I got from an article written by Tim Shanahan.

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And since the science of reading clown club seems so enamored with phonics, and since

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the national reading panel is the epitome of reading science, we're going to look at

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what the national reading panel report actually had to say about phonics.

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And you might just be a wee bit of surprise.

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So, let's first define the science of reading.

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Now, I have disagreements here and there with Dr. Timothy Shanahan.

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That's okay.

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But in a recent article in Reading Research Quarterly, he offered what I thought was a

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very good understanding and definition of what counts as the science of reading.

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In this article, he also described the two different kinds of educational research, basic

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research and applied research.

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So, let's start here.

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Basic research is research that's done apart from the setting in which it's used.

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It has the goal of improving the understanding of a particular phenomenon or to improve or

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enhance a theory.

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In reading, basic research would include things like brain imaging studies, eye movement

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research, miscue analysis, priming studies.

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These are all important because they add to our understanding of reading and reading

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instruction, they expand our theories and make our theories more robust.

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Applied research is done in the setting in which it will ultimately be used.

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It has the goal of identifying causal relationships.

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In education, applied research is done in the classrooms with students to see how something

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actually functions or works in the real world setting.

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This is the type of research with which most of us are likely familiar.

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You typically have two similar groups.

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You give treatment A to one group and something different or no treatment to the other.

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And at the end, you see if the differences in the two groups are statistically significant.

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If they are, you can say with some degree of confidence that treatment A was the cause

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of the difference.

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Another type of applied research is done to see if the effect of something to a single

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group had any effect or had any significance.

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Meaning that you give a pre-test, then you administer treatment A to the group, then

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you give a post-test.

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If the difference between the pre and post-test are statistically significant, you might be

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able to say that treatment A was effective in making that something happen.

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Now that's a very simple overview of controlled experimental research in education.

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The two groups, one experimental and one control or treatment group and control and then the

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single subject design.

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Now let's take a look at the science of reading to see what if we can understand exactly what

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it is.

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Let's go out that term and just assume everyone has a common understanding.

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Now again, I don't always agree with Dr. Shanahan, but I thought he did a good job in defining

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and describing the science of reading.

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He says the science of reading is that which is based on applied research using controlled

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experimental studies or controlled experimental research.

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In a recent blog, he wrote this and I quote, to me, a science of reading, if we are talking

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about education, requires that our prescriptions for teaching be tempered by rigorous instructional

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evaluations.

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If a claim hasn't been tried out and found effective, then the claims, no matter how

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heartfelt, aren't part of reading science.

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Here are different views and interpretation of reading science, but according to Dr. Shanahan,

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reading science is based on the premise that only findings that come from controlled experimental

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research using applied research should be used to determine what reading instruction

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should look like.

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In other words, only strategies that have been shown to be effective using controlled

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experimental research and conducted in an actual learning environment should be used

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to determine what's effective.

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Only this type of research should be used to design reading programs and to make reading

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policy.

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Now I think this is a very limited view and excludes a lot of important qualitative and

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descriptive research, but I could live with Dr. Shanahan's interpretation of reading science

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or the science of reading if it was used correctly and consistently, but it's not.

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Now let's take the issue of phonics instruction.

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Members of the science of reading clown club have consistently claimed that phonics instruction

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needs to be included in a comprehensive reading program.

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No argument there.

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Everybody believes phonics instruction should be included in beginning reading instruction.

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It's not the what, it's the how and the how much.

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Now the science of reading clown club puts a great deal of stock in the national reading

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panel report.

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And by the way, Tim Shanahan was a big part of this.

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I would encourage everybody to read the national reading panel report.

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Actually, read it.

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Don't just sound out the words.

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Don't just look at the executive summary.

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Don't look for someone else to interpret it for you.

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Read it.

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You can find lots of links to this online.

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Now the national reading panel report reviewed over 100,000 research articles and selected

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only studies that use controlled experimental research conducted in a classroom that applied

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type of research.

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They then issued a report on their findings.

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And in their findings, there was nothing new here.

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The report simply reinforced many of the things that we already knew.

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Many of the things that the International Literacy Association and the National Council of Teachers

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of English have been saying for decades, but there's some good stuff in there.

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So if you need reminding, if you need an official report to tell you things we've known for

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decades, well, go ahead and read it.

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Now if you are a certified member of the science of reading clown club, I would encourage

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you to read the chapter on phonics.

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The report says that phonics instruction was shown to be effective.

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Absolutely no argument there, but effective in what?

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For how long?

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For who?

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However, the science of reading clown club and other clowns like Emily Hanford and Louisa

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Motz have taken that statement to mean that all phonics instruction is effective for all

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students all the time and for all purposes and everyone should have it.

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They adamantly insist that all students need a healthy helping of direct explicit systematic

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synthetic phonics instruction.

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They believe that if you're a struggling reader, it's because you haven't had enough

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direct explicit systematic synthetic phonics instruction.

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And only if everybody had a healthy helping of direct explicit systematic phonics instruction,

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all our reading problems would go away.

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And the reason why teachers aren't handing out healthy helpings of direct explicit systematic

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synthetic phonics instruction is because they haven't been trained in quotation marks

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the right way as pre-service teachers.

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Teacher preparation programs like the one I work at are to blame.

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I'm to blame.

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They would insist the science of reading clown club that professors like me should spend

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weeks and weeks teaching students how to implement science of reading approved programs that

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provide step-by-step instruction for implementing direct explicit systematic synthetic phonics

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instruction.

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Also all our direct explicit systematic synthetic phonics instruction courses should only be

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taught by people certified in direct explicit systematic synthetic phonics instruction.

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And certification would be conferred by the National Direct Explicit Systematic Synthetic

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Phonics Instruction Association.

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Thereafter all schools would be forced to buy science of reading approved direct explicit

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systematic synthetic phonics instruction programs.

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And classroom teachers should be forced to use these direct explicit systematic synthetic

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phonics instruction programs and follow the directions exactly as they are written.

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Only then will all reading scores across America and beyond be above average.

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Okay, phonics instruction important.

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But let's look at what the National Reading Panel Report actually says about phonics

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instruction.

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This report is often referenced again by the Science of Reading Clown Club.

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It implements all the reading science described as being important and essential by the Science

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of Reading Clown Club.

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And on the cover of this report, it literally says this and I quote, an evidence-based

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assessment of the scientific research literature on reading and its implications for reading

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instruction.

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That should give the Clown Club lots of confidence in this report.

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So here are some things that seem to be overlooked by the Science of Reading Clown Club.

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And the first one is the limited impact of phonics.

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This is what this report says.

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And if you think I'm making this up, go look at it yourself.

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It said, phonics instruction failed to produce a significant impact on the reading performance

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of low achieving readers in grades two through six.

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Failed to produce significant impact.

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And what do we do with struggling readers?

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We give them more phonics so they cannot read even more.

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It said the impact of phonics on comprehension is limited.

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The majority of studies focused on first grade students asking them to read a single sentence.

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Now there's a very high correlation between word recognition and comprehension.

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So in other words, the impact of decoding single words is very strong when reading single

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sentences.

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So phonics instruction contributed only weekly, if at all, in helping poor readers apply these

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skills to read actual text.

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You get a blip in phonics scores, but does that blip transfer to authentic text where

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you're trying to create meaning, trying to comprehend?

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And the report says, no.

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There were insufficient data to draw any conclusion about the effects of phonics instruction with

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normally developing readers above first grade.

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Yet, what does the clown club insist that we all teach?

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Phonics, phonics in more phonics.

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Also, the effect size on reading single words out of context was greater than the effect

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on comprehension.

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Single words out of context.

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Now if you instruct students how to decode single words out of context, they're going

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to do better on measures of decoding single words out of context.

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But when in your real life have you encountered a single word out of context floating in space?

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Words are always found in the context of a sentence, a label, a sign, or some sort of

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environment.

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And the last thing about phonics, the majority of effect sizes involved reading single words

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out of context.

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Only 24% involved text reading.

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And this text reading usually since the majority of students were in kindergarten or first

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grade involved reading a single sentence.

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So we don't know much about the impact of phonics on comprehension.

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Now let's see what the national reading panel said about balanced literacy instruction.

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And I know that's going to make the heads explode of the science of reading clown club

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because they insist that that's a bad thing even though they tend not to know what balanced

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literacy instruction is.

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They just know it's bad and they should be against it.

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When I asked them to define what it is, well, you know, they once they start explaining

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what they think it is, you realize that they don't know anything about literacy or balanced

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literacy instruction.

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Never have so many knowing so little about so much.

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So let's hear what it says.

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First, programs that focus too much on the teaching of letter sound relations and not

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enough on putting them to use are unlikely to be effective.

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Too much on letter sound relations.

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Students need to apply their skills in daily reading and writing activities.

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Are students reading books, self-selected books every day?

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Are they writing every day?

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Second, systematic phonics instruction should be integrated with other reading instruction

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to create, quote, a balanced reading program, unquote.

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Again, quote, a balanced reading program, unquote, not my words, the panel's words.

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Quality literature should be included in a reading program.

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That means we need to find good books for children to read, help them fall in love with

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books so they can practice their skills in authentic reading context.

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This is the fourth one, should not become the dominant component of a reading program.

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What does the science of reading clown club ask for?

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Phonics, phonics, and more phonics.

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Fifth, it is important to evaluate children's reading competence in many ways, including

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their interest in books and their ability to understand information.

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Yet, what do we do? We assign them a number.

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We give them a standardized test and we give them a percentile ranking.

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Their reading competence is quantified and we give them that number.

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And only the things that can be quantified, like scores on sounding out word measures,

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are measured.

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We measure that which can be measured and if it can't, we say it's not important.

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Further, programs that focus too much on phonics with little time spent practicing reading,

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like books, are likely to be ineffective.

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And again, too much on phonics, unlikely to be effective or likely to be ineffective.

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Now, here is a direct quote.

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Systematic phonics instruction should be integrated with other reading instruction to create a

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balanced reading program.

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One quote, page 2-97, balanced reading program.

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Again another quote, phonics should not be the dominant component in a reading program,

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neither in the amount of time devoted to it nor the significant attached.

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Again, page 2-97, quote.

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And the last one, it is very likely that phonics programs that emphasize decoding exclusively

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and ignore the other processes involved in learning to read will not succeed in making

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every child a skilled reader.

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And then I found this, a variety of ways to teach phonics.

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We tend to think of phonics instruction only as synthetic phonics.

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Synthesize, put together.

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Letter sounds, letters sounds, letter sounds, you put them together to create words.

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Sound it out we say.

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But there are several ways to teach phonics, synthetic phonics, analytic phonics, embedded

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phonics, analogy phonics, which is sometimes called large unit phonics, onset rhyme phonics

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and phonics through spelling.

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And the report said that each of these, all approaches are equally effective.

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And if I were a reading teacher in first, second, third or fourth grade, whatever kindergarten,

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I would try to use a variety of all these things because some children are not standardized

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entities.

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Some will learn better one way, some will learn better the old.

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If you have a variety of ways, you're using more parts of the brain.

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And the last interesting tidbit from the report is this, phonics instruction has been entangled

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with politics and ideology.

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Ideology is using ideas and beliefs to come to a conclusion.

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It's the opposite of science, which uses systematic data to answer questions.

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So I would posit this to you, my find readers.

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The science of reading actually is the ideology of reading because they're not using science

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as much as they're using their preconceived ideas and their values of top-down control

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to come to conclusions about reading instruction.

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All right.

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This has been the reading instruction show.

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I'm your host, Dr. Andy Johnson.

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We've been looking at a definition of reading science or the science of reading.

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And we've been looking at what the national reading panel report actually said about phonics.

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And I know this will make the heads explode of many of my fine friends in the science

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of reading clown club.