>>> “A lot of people are thinking about reading in terms of pretty narrow definitions of comprehension,” says Forzani. “But of course we want kids to be able to make inferences and interpretations beyond just literal interpretations, right? We want them to be able to make higher level inferences and to be able to evaluate and critique text.”
Forzani points to research from the UK, where reading curriculums were widely reimagined a few years before the US did the same thing. “They shifted attention to really focus on teaching phonics, which is good and important,” she says. “But then they’ve also seen, ‘Wait, we did too much of that focus and now we lost sight of really comprehending at a high level.’” <<<
Huh?
"Higher level" analysis while have to be built on top of basic comprehension.
And how exactly is phonics (very early "what words are on the page") displacing comprehension (much later; something you do with those words once you have them)?
The article tries to claim that we should take those claims with a grain of salt because people have been complaining about kids' literacy rates since time immemorial. The difference is that now it is measurably true.
I also think that anecdotal evidence is evidence nonetheless. If teachers active for many years start to ring the bells they are probably onto something, even if the official statistics are yet to come.
The author of the article starts by acknowledging a historical bias that generations have apparently always had against each other. They then explore, keeping an eye on their own potential biases, the evidence that literacy genuinely appears to be lower in younger generations. I don't know what more you could possibly ask from them.
This seems bad on its face, but I wonder if this is specific to reading comprehension or to all comprehension?
If our society moved from text to video as the primary way to transmit information, would our ability to communicate and comprehend the world necessarily be diminished?
Text has been around for only a blip compared to oral communication. I love reading, and it feels bad to see it decline, but I'm trying to be open-minded about what comes next.
When I was young, I was amazed at how they would try to teach us English grammar and spelling, then have us read books like Huckleberry Finn that undid 6 months to a year worth of English language education. When you are young and you do not really a firm grasp of the right way to do things, being forced to spend substantial time “reading” books that show the wrong way is counterproductive. It was like having a construction crew building a structure by day and a demolition crew destroying it by night.
It is a wonder we learned anything at all and it made English tests a hellish experience, since it was never clear what was actually correct. This was on top of English itself being a confusing language (see all of the words ending in ough if you need an example). English teachers seemed to assume we had some magical ability to know the right answer after confusing us with conflicting examples, and we rarely did. It is no wonder back then that they said the same things about us.
If they want to improve literacy, they should replace the required reading with books that have no flaws in the spelling and grammar to reinforce English lessons. Then we might see student literacy rise as students stop being so confused.
For me, books like Huck Fin were how I learned English, I don't think we even had grammar lessons(some weird teaching style that was popular in CA at the time).
I personally did not find the slang & creative language used in such books confusing.
For my sins, I teach middle school. There’s plenty of different angles on this, but I’d like to highlight a recent one that may not immediately occur to people here without young children: COVID retirements hit the elementary schools particularly hard.
Teaching high school on zoom is one thing, now imagine teaching 3rd. So the veteran elementary teachers retired or quit, and there’s no adequate pipeline to replace them, especially in underserved communities.
Coming through the system now is a cohort of children whose k-5 teachers have been a rotating cast of subs and ineffective new hires, and it shows.
One argument I've seen forwarded elsewhere is that school methods have tracked university methods.
According to the argument, watering down standards to increase retention (and revenue) gained legitimacy in the sixties as the higher education act empowered administrators to increase the size of their ranks and policy views at colleges across the country. These colleges trained education majors according to their new philosophy, who became a new rank of principals and superintendents in the eighties and onwards, promulgating the transactional and nihilistic view of the purpose of teaching.
On the one hand, it sounds farfetched. On the other hand, all five of the teachers and professors over 50 whom I've raised the topic to over the years agreed wholeheartedly.
I learned to read by being read to: typically on a relative's lap with the book in my lap. They were not trying to teach me how to read, but my language centers took care of the job, just like they did for spoken language, long before schools could muck it up. Reading has always been fast and effortless for me, requiring no conscious attention - again, just like spoken language. Much later I studied the linguistics of language, grammar, spelling systems, etc. which revealed the wonders of our natural language skills. I recommend the natural method for everyone. Be sure to check for eyesight problems, though.
15 comments
[ 4.1 ms ] story [ 40.0 ms ] threadForzani points to research from the UK, where reading curriculums were widely reimagined a few years before the US did the same thing. “They shifted attention to really focus on teaching phonics, which is good and important,” she says. “But then they’ve also seen, ‘Wait, we did too much of that focus and now we lost sight of really comprehending at a high level.’” <<<
Huh?
"Higher level" analysis while have to be built on top of basic comprehension.
And how exactly is phonics (very early "what words are on the page") displacing comprehension (much later; something you do with those words once you have them)?
I am reminded of this xkcd, which I just realized Im about a decade behind on.
https://xkcd.com/1414/
I also think that anecdotal evidence is evidence nonetheless. If teachers active for many years start to ring the bells they are probably onto something, even if the official statistics are yet to come.
The author of the article starts by acknowledging a historical bias that generations have apparently always had against each other. They then explore, keeping an eye on their own potential biases, the evidence that literacy genuinely appears to be lower in younger generations. I don't know what more you could possibly ask from them.
If our society moved from text to video as the primary way to transmit information, would our ability to communicate and comprehend the world necessarily be diminished?
Text has been around for only a blip compared to oral communication. I love reading, and it feels bad to see it decline, but I'm trying to be open-minded about what comes next.
It is a wonder we learned anything at all and it made English tests a hellish experience, since it was never clear what was actually correct. This was on top of English itself being a confusing language (see all of the words ending in ough if you need an example). English teachers seemed to assume we had some magical ability to know the right answer after confusing us with conflicting examples, and we rarely did. It is no wonder back then that they said the same things about us.
If they want to improve literacy, they should replace the required reading with books that have no flaws in the spelling and grammar to reinforce English lessons. Then we might see student literacy rise as students stop being so confused.
I personally did not find the slang & creative language used in such books confusing.
Teaching high school on zoom is one thing, now imagine teaching 3rd. So the veteran elementary teachers retired or quit, and there’s no adequate pipeline to replace them, especially in underserved communities.
Coming through the system now is a cohort of children whose k-5 teachers have been a rotating cast of subs and ineffective new hires, and it shows.
According to the argument, watering down standards to increase retention (and revenue) gained legitimacy in the sixties as the higher education act empowered administrators to increase the size of their ranks and policy views at colleges across the country. These colleges trained education majors according to their new philosophy, who became a new rank of principals and superintendents in the eighties and onwards, promulgating the transactional and nihilistic view of the purpose of teaching.
On the one hand, it sounds farfetched. On the other hand, all five of the teachers and professors over 50 whom I've raised the topic to over the years agreed wholeheartedly.