History of Reading Instruction

1. History of Reading Instruction

2. Colonial Times • _______________ • Most influential American in the history of modern reading instruction • Published the New England ______________________ • 24 million copies were sold (2nd in sales only to the Bible) • Population in 1800 was 5 million • By the early part of the 20th century, population increased to over 100 million

3. Mid-1800s • __________________: fate of democracy was seen to depend on the wisdom of the majority • The more ___________ the population, the greater its collective wisdom • Concern turned to how _________ was ___________ and how best to instill the desire to learn

4. __________________ • Secretary of Education for Massachusetts • Disdain and disgust of ___________ • Wife published an early _____________ reader • “Frank had a dog, his name was Spot.” • __________ philosophy of reading: _______________ teaching of reading

5. 1950s • Illiteracy rates were steadily _____ • 1955, Rudolph Flesch published _________________________ • 30 weeks on the best-seller list • 1981, Rudolph Flesch published _____________________________

6. His appeal was as intensely political: “I say, therefore, that the word method is gradually destroying democracy in this country; it returns to the upper middle class the privileges that public education was supposed to distribute evenly among the people. The American Dream is, essentially, equal opportunity through free education for all. This dream is beginning to vanish in a country where the public schools are falling down on the job.”

7. and impassioned: “It seems to me a plain fact that the word method consists essentially of treating children as if they were dogs. It is not a method of teaching at all; it is clearly a method of animal training. It's the most inhuman, mean, stupid way of foisting something on a child's mind.”

8. 1970s • _____________________ • More _______ version of the look-say method • Relies on _________________ but the words memorized are whatever happened to be in the “________________________” the children are required to read • Reading is a _________, unconscious process best fostered by _______________________

9. Reading Recovery • Developed by ____________ (teacher in New Zealand) • ____________ program for struggling readers • Draws upon both _________ and ________________ theory • In America, it served as a transmission device for ________________

10. To resolve the conflict? __________________ The first large-scale research: • In early 1960’s, __________ conducted a large-scale cooperative experiment to evaluate the effectiveness of phonics and “look-and-say” approaches • In 1967, Chall published a book “Learning to Read: The Great Debate”, which is a classic in the literature

11. Results of Chall’s Study: • Children who were trained through the _____________ method demonstrated an early advantage in rate and comprehension of silent reading and perhaps in interest, fluency, and expression as well. In contrast children who were taught ___________ exhibited the early advantage in word recognition, particularly for untaught words, and maintained it throughout. • Furthermore, children taught with the ________ method not only caught up with but surpassed their ________ peers in silent reading rate, comprehension, and vocabulary by the end of the second grade.

12. The teaching programs that included _________________ resulted in significantly better word recognition, better spelling, better vocabulary , and better reading comprehension at least through the third grade.

13. 2nd large-scale research: The U.S. Office of Education Cooperative Research Program in First-Grade Reading Instruction was conducted between 1964 and 1967. The combined analyses of the First-Grade Cooperative Studies were published in 1967 and were directed toward three questions:

14. 1. Which of the approaches to beginning reading instruction produces the best reading and spelling achievement at the end of first grade? 2. Does the effectiveness of the approaches vary with the reading readiness of the students? That is, are any of the approaches especially effective or ineffective with low-readiness students? Are any especially effective or ineffective with high-readiness students? 3. To what extent are various pupil, teacher, classroom, school, and community characteristics related to achievement in reading and spelling at the end of first grade?

15. Results: 1. Which approaches were most effective? The approaches that, one way or another, included _________________________ consistently exceeded the straight look-say approaches in word recognition achievement scores. 2. Did the relative effectiveness of the approaches vary with the readiness of the students? In general, the answer was no. There appeared to be no basis for the widely held belief that systematic phonics instruction is useful only for _____________ children. 3. To what extent is first-grade reading achievement determined by community, school, classroom, teacher, and pupil characteristics ? The projects produced __________________ for this issue.

16. National Reading Panel • ________________________ instruction is beneficial for beginning readers • Big ideas ~ 5 • Discussed throughout the course

17. The Overall Picture • ______________ Approach TeachKnow 10 words 10 words • __________ Approach (sounds & blending) TeachKnow 10 sounds 350 “3 sound” words 4,320 “4 sound” words 21,650 “5 sound” words

18. What Do Phonics Programs Teach? There are many different phonics programs. A central aspect of each of these programs is that working knowledge of the ___________________________ is crucial to proficient reading. Differences in details: • What fonts should be used for initial reading instruction? Should initial instruction be exclusively conducted with uppercase letters or lowercase letters?

19. Reading First • The No Child Left Behind Act signed into law by President George W. Bush on January 8, 2002, established _________________ as a new, high-quality evidence-based program for the students of America. • The Reading First initiative builds on the findings of years of _____________, which, at the request of Congress, were compiled by the _______________________. • Ensuring that more children receive effective reading instruction in the early grades is of critical importance to the President and the nation.

20. More on Reading First • Reading First is a focused nationwide effort to enable _____ students to become successful early readers. • Funds are dedicated to help states and local school districts eliminate the reading deficit by establishing high-quality, comprehensive reading instruction in kindergarten through grade 3. • Building on a solid foundation of research, the program is designed to select, implement, and provide professional development for teachers using _______________________________, and to ensure accountability through ongoing, valid and reliable screening, diagnostic, and classroom-based ____________________. • North Carolina’s Reading First Program