Literacy Blogs

15 July, 2015

The Spirit is Willingham, but the Flesch is Weak

Teacher’s Question: I have read a few articles and books by Daniel Willingham in the past, and I wonder if you are familiar with his work. I recently read an article (attached) about reading comprehension strategies and am curious to know what you think of his ideas. He says that focusing heavily on reading strategies isn’t really necessary. (I often question the need for so many reading strategies, particularly when they take away from reading being a pleasurable activity. I can understand the importance of visualizing, using prior knowledge, and maintaining focus, but teaching the other “strategies”, in my opinion, is confusing ...

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10 July, 2015

Disciplinary Vocabulary

          When I was 8, there were two boys, Chris and Paul. They were both tow-heads, gentle and quiet, with loping walks; and both could draw beautifully… if a teacher struggled to draw a straight line or a round circle on the chalkboard, she’d ask Chris or Paul, who could do it, seemingly without effort.           Oh, and by the way, they were identical twins. I couldn’t tell Chris and Paul apart. Few students or teachers could. At the time, I was jealous — not of their sweetness or facility — but of ...

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02 July, 2015

Why Research-Based Reading Programs Alone are Not Enough

Tim, Every teacher has experienced this. While the majority of the class is thriving with your carefully planned, research supported instructional methods, there is often one kid that is significantly less successful. We work with them individually in class, help them after school, sometimes change things up to see what will work, bring them to the attention of the RtI team that is also using the research supported instructional methods. But what if the methods research support for the majority of kids don't work for this kid? Several months ago I read an article in Discover magazine called "Singled Out" by Maggie ...

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20 June, 2015

Making Whole Class Work More Effective

          Recently, I wrote about the quandary of grouping. Small group instruction supports greater student engagement, higher amounts of interaction, greater opportunity for teacher observation, and more student learning. However, the benefits of small group are balanced by the relative ineffectiveness of most seatwork activities. Subtracting the downside of working on one's own away from the teacher from the clear benefits of small group teaching, one ends up with little advantage to all of the effort of orchestrating the small-group oriented classroom.           Despite this, the benefits of small group teaching is so ...

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07 June, 2015

A Disciplinary Literacy Bibliography

Blast from the Past: Since this entry was originally published research on disciplinary literacy has burgeoned. This update increases the bibliography greatly and this big increase in emphasis should encourage and support those who are trying to bring disciplinary literacy to adolescents around the world.            These days I hear a lot of reading authorities talking (and writing) about disciplinary literacy, but they really mean adolescent literacy or content area reading and writing. They don't understand the distinction that is being made.           ...

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17 May, 2015

An Argument About Matching Texts to Students

Blast from the Past:  This entry was originally published on May 17, 2015 and reposted on July 13, 2017. Between the two publication dates much has occurred in the world of challenging text. Various authorities who tout schemes for matching kids to texts have made changes to how they do the matching. In other words, they took criteria for identifying the instructional level and changed the numbers so that kids would be in somewhat more difficult text. That's a good thing as it means more kids will now get opportunities to read materials at their interest levels or their intellectual ...

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13 May, 2015

How Much Text Complexity Can a Teacher Scaffold?

Blast from the Past: This entry was first posted on May 13, 2015 and it was reposted on September 24, 2018. This question has been coming up again recently, so I took a look at my original answer. It is still pretty darn good. Older students have been telling me how much they hate working in what they call the “stupid books,” meaning books at their supposed reading levels that are below their levels of intellectual and social functioning. Despite claims by proponents of “guided reading” giving kids such a steady diet of easy-reading books is definitely not in their best interests. Teacher question:             How much of a "gap" can ...

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07 May, 2015

Should We Teach Spelling? Part II

            My last blog entry was written in response to a fifth-grade teacher who wanted to know about spelling instruction. Although teachers at her school thought that formal spelling instruction, like working with word lists, was a bad idea, it turns out that such teaching is beneficial to kids. The same can be said for studying word structure and its implications for spelling, pronunciation, and meaning.             The best reviews of this research have consistently found that spelling instruction leads to spelling improvement, but it also leads to improvements in reading and writing, so it can be ...

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30 April, 2015

Should We Teach Spelling?

Blast from the Past: This entry was first published on April 30, 2015, and was reissued on January 17, 2018. This issue arises again and again, but the answer doesn't seem to change. If you like this, there was a part II in the first week in May 2015.  I often hear concerns about our students' poor spelling abilities and have been thinking about practical ways to address this issue.  Although we want to continue to steer away from memorized lists that are often not retained, I want to get your feedback about incorporating more word study in your ELA block.  I ...

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23 April, 2015

Round Robin by Any Other Name... Oral Reading for Older Readers

Blast from the Past: This entry was first published on April 23, 2015; and was re-issued on October 19, 2017. Some oral reading questions came up this week that reminded me of this blog. I'd point out that since its release, Tim Rasinski has shown that even struggling college students need fluency work--well beyond the middle school focus of this blog. Finally, last week Jan Hasbrouck let me know that she and Gerry Tindal have updated their oral reading norms: http://www.brtprojects.org/publications/technical-reports/.  Given all of that, this seems timely. Teacher question: I am seeking your advice based on the email correspondence below that I ...

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