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Smith’s American Reading Instruction- Stahl’s Epilogue and Pearson’s Article

Smith’s American Reading Instruction- Stahl’s Epilogue and Pearson’s Article. Judy Sheehan. Epilogue by Norman A. Stahl. Stahl asks: Is Smith’s book still important in the 21 st century? American Reading Instruction is: “a touchstone of the past” (p. 413) and

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Smith’s American Reading Instruction- Stahl’s Epilogue and Pearson’s Article

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  1. Smith’s American Reading Instruction- Stahl’s Epilogue and Pearson’s Article Judy Sheehan

  2. Epilogue by Norman A. Stahl • Stahl asks: Is Smith’s book still important in the 21st century? • American Reading Instruction is: “a touchstone of the past” (p. 413) and “can be a comfort while bringing wisdom to the reading profession in this time of political and pedagogical unrest” (p. 413). Stahl’s Epilogue

  3. Stahl’s Epilogue Continued • The book’s staying power -breadth and depth without the benefit of technological research - deserving of a dissertation award -shows doctoral students the importance of historical research. -has become THE source on the history of reading instruction of the masses (pp. 413-414). Stahl’s Epilogue

  4. Stahl’s Epilogue Continued • Stahl asks: what can be gained by multiple reading of Smith’s text? • 1. History teaches us first and best. • 2. Pendulum swing continues and is predictable. • Children will survive the swinging and still learn to read. • 3. Reading is now really a profession now. • 4. Literacy professionals have had more success than failure. (pp. 416-417) Stahl’s Epilogue

  5. P. David Pearson : “Setting the Scene for Reading in the 1960s” Carry-over Developments Up to 1935 and Cont. 1965 • -Readiness program- learning with a slow, easy beginning • -Look-say method spread over years • -Vocabulary set up in order of decreasing frequency of usage • -skills lessons/practice • -reading of stories • -silent reading in areas of children’s interest and experiences • -importance of meaning • -small group instruction • -teacher as mediator, students as recipients • -reading as a perceptual process • -translation of written to oral

  6. Setting the Scene: 1960s Reading continued • 1935-1965- Look-say approach -- revised and extended in the middle third of the century -- 90% of students learned via this method • -consisted of: high frequency sight words, practiced in formulated stories, teach phonics based on known words Setting the Scene

  7. Setting the Scene: “Conventional Wisdom of the 1960s” Elaborations from 1935-1965 • -controlled text difficulty continued in the 1960s • -more involved skills practice • -domination of the frequency principle paralleled whole-word or look-say approach (pp. 419-422) Influence of Jeanne Chall’s (1967) seminal work, Learning to Read: The Great Debate • Chall’s New Principles: - grade 1 goals of comprehension, interpretation, and contextualization of phonics instruction - Skills not mentioned but still had a role.

  8. Pearson’s “The Legacy of Scholarship of the 1960s” Debate- What is the best way to teach beginning reading? • “First Grade Studies”- Empirical Research, Gov’t funded study -studies involved comparison of different teaching methods -findings: any alternative to traditional basals resulted in equal or greater performance; researchers could now focus on the importance of the teacher • Gov’t programs resources: -Title I -Federal Right to Read Program • OVERALL FINDING- END OF THE TRADITIONAL LOOK-SAY BASALS; HOWEVER, ALTERED BASALS DOMINATED THE MARKET IN 1970s-1980s Legacy

  9. Legacy of Scholarship Continued • Chall’s work - used critical review to investigate empirical research, basal readers’ content, and excellent classroom teaching practices -Findings: importance of early attention to code in early reading instruction • Recommendations: change in method, reexamine prevalent ideas about content, reevaluate grade levels, new test development, improve reading research

  10. Legacy of Scholarship Continued CHANGES: • analytic phonics moved to beginning of grade 1 • change in content- adaptations of children’s literature • single-component testing • criterion-referenced tests • curriculum-embedded assessments • skills management systems • basals comprised of two parallel systems: reading/embedded skills • teacher manuals= student text surrounded by teacher’s guide- suggestions/questions SHIFT IN THE EARLY 1970s: more difficult texts, more phonics, and a new skills development program NO CHANGE: teacher still as mediator with students as recipients; reading still a perceptual process of translation (pp. 422-429) `

  11. Pearson’s “Developments in the Last Third of the Century” • Why was reading suddenly a main topic of inquiry for scholars in various disciplines? • POSSIBILITIES: -Reading was central to success in many areas in and out of school. or -Scholars outside of education felt that “educationists had it all wrong” (p. 429) – sounds familiar. Developments

  12. Developments Continued • -fundamental shifts in perspectives of reading and writing occurred in the 1970s • -conceptual revolutions in cognition, sociolinguists, and philosophy deeply affected reading curriculum and instruction of the 1980s-1990s Developments

  13. OVERVIEW OF DEVELOPMENTS • LINGUISTICS- shift in the 1960s-1970s from conventional structural perspective to transformative generative grammars • PSYCHOLINGUISTICS-children = language participants and invented their own rules about oral language • COGNITIVE PSYCHOLOGY- paradigm shift in psychology in the 1970s-1980s from behaviorist to intellectual, cognitive -SCHEMA THEORY considers prior knowledge, interpretation differences due to various or limited background knowledge • SOCIOLINGUISTICS-Need to accommodate children’s use of dialect in reading/writing learning; expansion of literary contexts to include all settings, not just school Developments

  14. Linguistics/Psycholinguistics Research • Linguistics: -Charles Fries’ research- not everything needs explicit teaching- acquired from oral language -Chomsky- humans are born with the ability to acquire community language • Psycholinguistics: -Brown & Goodman-found that children learn actively, infer rules, and test them -Goodman & Smith- oral reading errors=view of reading comprehension processes Developments

  15. Psycholinguistics: Smith’s Influential Text Smith’s Understanding Reading (1971) • Reading is learned as a member of literate society. • not taught- shift from focus on teacher to student. • a constructive process with decision-making & predictions based on previous knowledge Developments

  16. PSYCHOLINGUISTS’ INFLUENCE ON CURRICULUM AND INSTRUCTION: • meaning-making literacy experiences • devalue skills • the value of natural language patterns/ texts for beginning readers-using own knowledge and prediction strategies • errors as a way to understand reading process/strategies • rethinking of what needed to be taught Developments

  17. Cognitive Psychology: 70s-80s • -enabled psychology to expand constructs such as intention, motivation, etc. to include other phenomena: perception, attention, comprehension, learning, memory, executive control of all cognitive processes • Prominent studies in reading: -basic processes such as text comprehension, story grammars, expository texts (text-analysis tradition) • STUDIES: FOCUSED ONLY ON STRUCTURE, NOT READERS’ KNOWLEDGE Developments

  18. Schema theory: Influences • Related to Piaget’s developmental theories and types of learning: assimilation and accommodation • Frederic Bartlett- cultural schemata theory predated constructivist cognition and learning models by 60 years=readers actively construct meaning, rather than receiving it Developments

  19. Sociolinguistics • Labov, Baratz, Shuy =major contributors • Issues: Dialect (its own developed linguistic system) and reading (requires accommodating use of dialect) • Contributions: expanding the meaning of context to include all literacy experiences, knowledge and language as socially and culturally constructed, expansion of our view of language and behavior Developments

  20. SOCIOLINGUISTIC INFLUENCE on Reading Instruction • Holding off until oral language was standardized • recognition that children can translate a standard English text into a dialect, not making errors • recommended changes in the classroom- less competitive, learning from each other Developments

  21. Literary Theory Perspective: 80s • “New Criticism” - the primary tradition of literary criticism post-WWII until the 1980s - students/teachers focused on the true meaning of text • Reader-response theory -authority to the reader=affected teaching practices -Rosenblatt’s texts- her view=meaning is in the transaction between the reader and the text Developments

  22. The Pedagogical Correlates of New Perspectives • COMPREHENSION- FOCUS OF THE 70s-80s • LITERATURE-BASED READING-late 80s • PROCESS WRITING-mid 80s • INTEGRATED INSTRUCTION • WHOLE LANGUAGE (and its DEMISE) New Perspectives

  23. Comprehension on Center Stage • Part of reading classrooms from the 30s-70s • Chall’s influence continued • Center for the Study of Reading (federally funded study) placed nat’l attention on comprehension -research from that study and others focused on strategies to improve comprehension through instruction, monitoring, organizers, etc. New Perspectives

  24. Literature-Based Reading: late 80s • Intensified greatly in the late 80s (appeared briefly and intensely after Chall’s work too) • BASALS: HAD EXCERPTS AND ADAPTATIONS - reducing vocabulary difficulty and grammatical complexity and taking out offensive material-words/themes • Literature had supplementary role in school reading programs - children selecting and independently reading own books- occurred even in the 60s-Book clubs and literature circles-voluntary structures, teacher-influenced cultural practices (ways to interact and support each other) New Perspectives

  25. Literature-Based Influences • Rosenblatt’s reader response theory • “just plain reading” as important in elementary programs- Anderson et al’sBecoming a Nation of Readers (1985) • Atwell’s In the Middle. . . (1987)-persuasive account of reading reluctant adolescent readers with existing literature and reading workshops • 1988 CA Reading Framework- call for more challenging texts for all grade levels w/ real literature • EFFECTS ON PUBLISHING- 80s-90s: interpretative questions, little vocabulary control, skills in the appendix New Perspectives

  26. Process Writing • Held a strong position in elementary LA curriculum • 70s-80s-Influences Sociolinguistic -writing to real audiences/purposes Psycholinguistic- focus on quality of thinking and problem solving less on spelling and grammar Constructivist-writing most transparent of all instructional activities • Writing as a way to make sense, legitimate and revealing-new view of early writing developments (influenced by Graves and Calkins) • Reading and writing as connected New Perspectives

  27. Integrated Instruction • Two stances re: integration= 1. how to integrate reading with other LA (writing, speaking, and listening) and 2. across subject area • Goes back to Dewey and other progressives- teaching and learning across curricula (little attn until late 80s) • Changed perspective in the late 80s-language/reading best taught with other purposes, activities, and learning activities-sociolinguistic perspective New Perspectives

  28. WHOLE LANGUAGE • MOST SIGNIFICANT MOVEMENT IN THE LAST 30 YEARS • -THE METHOD OF THE 90s • Whole language can be seen as the integration of comprehension, literature-based reading, integrated instruction, and process writing with the strengths and weaknesses of each area included New Perspectives

  29. Whole Language Influences/Tenets/Shifts • Child-centered pedagogy of the progressive • All readers make their own meanings for encountered texts • Authentic activity- real texts/tasks/deeper questions • Integration-w/in LA and b/t LA and other subject areas • Literature was central; phonics in the background • Faith and hope in the teachers • Suspicion of mandates and controls beyond the classroom • Questioned use of basals • -however, activities and tools of whole language were “basalized” -Publishers-backgrounded skills and foregrounded integrated LA activities New Perspectives

  30. WHOLE LANGUAGE OPPONENTS • resistance thru-out the country • some places never accepted it • some implementations- not matching its philosophical or curricular tenets • all kids received the same literature • differing views of skills, conventions, and strategies-inconsistent practices emerged New Perspectives

  31. THE DEMISE OF WHOLE LANGUAGE -“Unintended curriculum casualities” -Questionable applications -Dissatisfaction with any extreme views -Paradigm shift in the ideology of reading research -Increase in the politicization of reading research and policy agenda -Increasing pressure for all educators, esp. in reading to produce measurable results -Dramatic shift in the current model of professional development -Now: Who Holds the High Ground? New Perspectives

  32. Looking Ahead: Will We Benefit From the Lessons of History? • One possibility: the paradigm of basic skills- phonics and heavy skills • -These advocates may gain ground if they can persuade governments at all levels and the educational publishing industry. • -Result would be moderate to substantial shifts: --especially in kindergarten and grade 1 with explicit instruction --Writing aligns w/ whole language: literature-based reading and process writing- similar to early 90s and some 80s perspectives -- RC=Dec* LC returns along with teacher as transmitter of knowledge Looking Ahead

  33. ANOTHER POSSIBILITY: A Hybrid Paradigm • “ecologically balanced” approach • less shifts if this alternative dominates. • authentic texts/tasks, writing emphasis, literature, response, comprehension w/ explicit phonics instruction, word identification, comprehension, spelling, writing • most differences in the early grades • highly contextualized • like whole language philosophically- students as active meaning-makers • favored by the author= respects all of the research in the field, “wisdom of practice,” and professional history of reading -an alternative to the pendulum swinging that has infected the field for the majority of the 20th century. Looking Ahead

  34. References Pearson, P.D. (2002). American reading instruction since 1967. In Smith, N.B. (2002). American reading instruction (pp. 419-486). Newark, DE. International Reading Association. Stahl, N.A. (2002). Epilogue. In Smith, N.B. (2002). American reading instruction (pp. 413-418). Newark, DE. International Reading Association. References

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