Literacy Blogs

Teacher question: In the current era of readily available teacher-created materials through open marketplaces, and given the critical importance of print materials for beginning readers—particularly for multilingual learners and students with disabilities—what does current research indicate are the best practices regarding the optimal amounts of extraneous visuals to truly support their literacy development effectively?   Shanahan responds: I hope most teachers are not spending a lot of time “creating” instructional materials. Some do, of course, but they tend to be a tiny minority. I’d rather their time be spent on figuring out students’ learning needs. Of course, there are those cut-and-paste artists who create “new” ...

Teacher question: I hope you can help me as I have learned, and continue to learn, new things from your blog. Is there any benefit to using dictionaries in middle school? Is there any research you can share that discusses the pros/cons of using a dictionary in middle school? The students are native speakers, but there are some ELLs. Shanahan replies: The value of the dictionary depends upon your purpose. If the idea is to teach word meanings or to facilitate reading comprehension, then provide the definitions directly Wright & Cervetti, 2017). All the looking-things-up and choosing among definitions increases “cognitive load.” That is, the ...

Teacher question: Could you recommend a strong vocabulary curriculum that my school could adopt? Shanahan responds: Because I work with various companies, I never recommend particular programs. However, while there are vocabulary programs, this is an area where teachers are often expected to go their own way. Given that, let me suggest the scope of an outstanding vocabulary curriculum. My focus here is on what needs to be taught, rather than on the instructional approaches needed to accomplish this. Overall, an ideal vocabulary curriculum would encourage the teaching of six things. First, the ideal vocabulary curriculum would aim to increase students’ knowledge of the meanings of ...

Teacher question: I'm a curriculum and instruction supervisor for a smaller district. We feel like we have a pretty firm grasp on assessing and diagnosing when it comes to phonemic awareness, decoding, fluency, and comprehension. However, we're struggling with vocabulary. Is there any assessment you would recommend that would give us a feel if a student is approaching standard or at standard for that area? Shanahan responds: In recent years, I’ve become concerned about the amount of school testing. My complaint isn’t with the annual accountability tests (though, those are on overdose, too). No, my grievance is with the many screening and monitoring tests at epidemic levels in our schools. ...

Teacher question: I don’t get the reason for trying to make students read “like historians” or read “like scientists.” Many of my students aren’t likely to even go to college and even if they did they probably won’t be historians or scientists. I understand why it makes sense to teach students how to study a history or a science textbook so they can pass the tests on those, but “read like a…”, why? Shanahan response: You are definitely correct that most students will never become literary critics or English professors, mathematicians, historians, or scientists. Some will, but most will not, and even when ...

Teacher question: Are there any resources that provide a list of morphemes to teach at each K-5 grade level? I have been looking for a definitive list of morphemes that is organized by grade level like the Fry sight word list. I often come across research about how L1 and L2 students acquire morphemes, but I am looking for a list that represents the morphemes that students will most likely see in print at each K-5 grade level. Does anything like that exist? Thank you for your time.   Shanahan response: The short answer to this question is, “No, I don’t know of such a list.” But when have I ever been satisfied ...

  I often use this space to challenge myths about the teaching of reading.       And there are a bunch of those. (Sisyphus ‘R Us.)     Which one caught my eye this week?       A blog follower raised a question about educational policies aimed at getting all kids up to a third-grade reading level by Grade 3. He was surprised about my response, and maybe you will be, too.       There is a slew of studies that reveal the persistence of reading problems... for instance: http://www.shanahanonliteracy.com/blog/persistence-of-reading-problems-research-based-fact-or-urban-myth#sthash.rtzSGGAi.dpbs Those studies show that kids who are struggling with reading in the primary grades continue to ...

Blast from the Past: These days we're again hearing much about how requiring classroom reading time makes kids lifelong readers and fosters a love of reading. Given how widespread such practices are these days, one would think that reading is more popular than ever. Of course, that isn't the case. Perhaps requiring students to do something on teacher time isn't the best way to true love. This blog entry from 2017 makes the case for approaches aimed at getting kids to build reading into their lives instead of into ours. I'm intrigued by teachers who find ways to push books ...

Blast from the Past: This blog first posted August 16, 2015, and was reposted on September 25, 2021.This blog entry is an evergreen. What I mean by that I didn’t need to change a word. What it took to teach vocabulary effectively was as true then as it is now. It is important that students develop rich vocabulary. This is both an issue of knowledge of the world and language, since vocabulary is the connection between these key reading assets. This blog entry straightforwardly addresses what it takes to develop this resource in our students. Teacher question:  What do you recommend is ...

Blast from the Past: This blog was first posted on June 10, 2014; and reposted May 13, 2023. When it first appeared, it was the fourth in a sequence (just type “How to Organize Daily Literacy Instruction” into the search engine to find the others). A teacher had queried me about, Daily 5, a popular organizational plan. I was critical of it because it emphasized classroom activities rather than learning. I wrote about my own framework that had been successful in supporting efforts to improve reading achievement. That scheme calls for 2-3 hours per day of reading and writing instruction ...