Why Johny Still Can't Read by Rudolf Flesch (1981)

Rudolf Flesch (1911-1986). Interesting guy (wikipedia bio)
Why Johny Can't Read: And What You Can Do about It (1955)
Why Johny Still Can't Read: A New Look at the Scandal of our Schools (1981)

Flesch advocated the use of phonics rather than sight reading, to enable students to sound out unfamiliar words.

So, the "reading wars" have been going on for at least 60 years and some trace it back to the writings of Paulo Freire (1920s), John Dewey (1890s) and the Romantic / Naturalistic thinking of Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778). My point here is that the longevity of the "reading wars" is explained by deeply held differences in cultural, psychological, philosophical and political world view - not differences in scientific findings as is usually claimed.

Meaning: If you don't like Tony Abbott because you believe he is a closet global warming denier or because he has no sympathy for the boat people then if the same Tony Abbott pushes for back to basics phonics teaching in schools then you don't like that either because how could someone who is so bad get anything right.

But anyway. The reason I have bought Rudolf Flesch's 1981 book is this 2003 review: What Is the Best Way to Teach Reading?:

Flesch listed the “10 favorite alibis” he collected from “the whole stack of letters” he had received from educators, many of which “were full of personal abuse.” He devoted a chapter each to debunking these alibis.

Sadly, these alibis are still highly relevant thirty years later:

“Everything Is Hunky-Dory” was one of them. Of course, this was sheer denial, and Flesch said so. Things were bad then, a fact as demonstrable as anything in educational research. They are worse today.

“We Do Teach Phonics” was another alibi. He pointed out that there had indeed been a change but only to “window-dressing token phonics” tacked onto fundamentally unaltered look-and-say methodology, which was continuing to do major damage.

Some letter-writers claimed that “No One Method Is Best.” Flesch countered that no method could work that did not correspond to the nature of the subject — that learning to read necessarily involves being able to decipher phonetic symbols in the same way that learning how to type involves becoming familiar with the keyboard.

An additional argument from his critics was that “English Isn’t Phonetic.” Flesch demonstrated that English is, in fact, almost entirely “phonetic and decodable.”

Another charge was that “Word Calling Isn’t Reading.” But word guessing isn’t either.

Then there was the blame-the-victim game, which yielded the most alibis: “Your Child Isn’t Ready,” “Your Child Is Disabled,” and “It’s the Parents’ Fault,” all of which are now embodied in school policies today. Next was “Too Much TV.” And the final alibi was “We Must Teach All Children,” as if there are some ineducables among us, “the sons and daughters of lowborn riffraff who are too dumb to learn how to read,” as Flesch characterized the implications of this mindset among educators.

In short, Flesch’s thesis — although wildly popular among parents certain that something was wrong with reading instruction in America — was denied, rationalized, obfuscated and ultimately ignored by America’s education establishment.

And the Australian education establishment, too.

Why Jaydon can't read

Over the past few days there has been another breakout of the "reading wars" in the pages of The Australian. These articles are behind a paywall. Here are some extracts, with original links, from my delicious bookmarks.

Fortunately, the original and far better researched article by Jennifer Buckingham, Kevin Wheldall and Robyn Beaman-Wheldall is available: WHY JAYDON CAN’T READ: THE TRIUMPH OF IDEOLOGY OVER EVIDENCE IN TEACHING READING

The format of this wonderful article is that it asks and answers questions, makes assertions and backs up everything with evidence (72 endnotes to studies and further articles).

I'll just provide the subheadings which comprise the questions and assertions and encourage you to read the original:

• What is effective reading instruction?
• Why do so many children still struggle to learn to read?
• Many teachers are not using the most effective methods for teaching reading
• The ‘Peter effect’ in language skills—One cannot give what one does not possess
• Teacher education does not prepare teachers to use effective reading instruction
• Why are teachers not taught or required to use effective evidence-based reading instruction?
• What can be done?

When reading this article, I shook my head frequently in amazement at the inability of those in charge to get it right. Then, later, I realised that part of this head shaking also represented admiration of the authors for their erudite explanation of effective reading instruction combined with a detailed analysis of why it's not happening.

Kevin Wheldall: very nearly all of our children can learn to read

The three-tier model will turn children into proficient readers
by Kevin Wheldall From: The Australian December 22, 2012 12:00AM

IF all children are to learn to read to a good level of proficiency in their first few years of schooling, we need a clear plan to ensure that no child falls through the net.

Such a plan must be both effective and cost-effective. It has become increasingly accepted in recent years that a three-tier, phased model of reading instruction, known as Response to Intervention (RtI), is the best means of achieving this.

The RtI model is predicated upon a first tier of exemplary initial instruction in reading for all students during their first year of schooling (kindergarten in NSW). This first tier of instruction should essentially comprise the best scientific evidence-based instruction.

To the layman this sounds obvious, but in many Australian schools a less effective implicit model of reading instruction has held sway for the past few decades. Much of this approach is highly desirable as a bedrock upon which to build, and it may even be enough for a minority of children, but most will need direct, explicit and systematic instruction in the five pillars of teaching reading: phonological awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary and comprehension.

What is often lacking in initial reading instruction, in particular, is effective, specific instruction in what is known as synthetic phonics; how to relate letters to sounds and to blend letter sounds into words.

Even when afforded such exemplary instruction, there will always be some children who take longer than others to catch on. It is important to identify these low-progress readers as early as possible so that they do not fall too far behind their peers as their difficulties compound.

Children who do not learn to read in the first few years of schooling are typically destined to a school career of educational failure, because reading underpins almost all subsequent learning. A safe strategy is to target students who fall into the bottom 25 per cent of the population for remedial reading intervention, as soon as their difficulties become apparent. Students' progress should be checked regularly, in order to provide intervention for those who need it from the beginning of Year 1, at the very latest.

The RtI model recommends that struggling readers, the low-progress readers who comprise the bottom 25 per cent, should be offered more intensive Tier-2 intervention in small groups of three to four students. Again the instruction provided to these students should be based on what the scientific research evidence has shown to be most effective: essentially the same five big ideas of reading instruction but more intensive and more individualised.

In small groups, teachers are able to be more responsive to the idiosyncratic needs of the students with whom they are working. Small group instruction can be just as effective as one-to-one instruction for children without severe reading difficulties.

Even with a solid Tier-2 small-group reading program in place, there will still be a very small number of students who "fail to thrive", perhaps about 3-5 per cent of all Year 1 students. These are the students for whom we should reserve Tier 3 one-to-one intensive reading instruction, preferably with a specialist reading teacher with a sound background in special education. The same five big ideas are still critical.

What is different, of course, is the intensity of instruction. Having successfully taught the vast majority of Year 1 students the basics of learning to read by Tier 1 and, where necessary, Tier 2 small-group teaching, it is a far more manageable proposition to provide these few remaining students with the individual reading support that they will need, for as long as they need it.

With this three-tier model in place, predicated upon scientific evidence-based reading instruction, almost all, if not all, children will become proficient readers. Of course, the RtI model does not stop at the end of Year 1; it is important to monitor reading progress closely for all students, especially for the first three years of schooling. But by employing these procedures rigorously and teaching scientifically, it is not too much to expect very nearly all of our children to learn to read.

Kevin Wheldall is chairman of MultiLit Pty Ltd and director of the MultiLit Research Unit.

• MultiLit = Making Up Lost Time In Literacy
• MUSEC = Macquarie University Special Education Centre

Some selected follow up links from MultiLit and MUSEC sites:

Media Publicity in 2012: Links to various hard hitting media articles on the perverse failure of our institutions to implement needed reforms, for example:

• Miranda Devine: We've failed to give kids education they need
• Universities 'refuse to accept the evidence' on reading
• Jennifer Buckingham: Why our kids still cannot read

Welcome to MUSEC: Special Education research opportunities
MUSEC Briefings: a community service to inform educators and other professionals about the evidence base for a variety of educational practices, some of which may be regarded as controversial
Research Publications: Links to books, academic journal articles, instructional materials, conference papers (copies of most available on request from MultiLit Pty Ltd)

why have our governments ignored expert advice on reading for a decade?

An Open Letter to all Federal and State Ministers of Education

In a recent article in the Australian (“Bell tolls for classroom reform”, 12/12/12), Geoff Masters, Chief Executive of the Australian Council for Educational Research is reported as being extremely disappointed (as any Australian would be) at seeing Australia ranked 27th in the PIRLS international survey of children’s reading abilities, and quotes him as urging that we should be looking at such questions as “How well are we teaching reading? How well are we preparing teachers to teach reading?”

These are not new questions.

In March 2004, The Australian published an open letter addressed to Dr Brendan Nelson, then Minister for Education, Science and Training, signed by 26 senior people in the fields of psychology, education, speech pathology, audiology, and linguistics, expressing concerns with literacy levels in Australian children and especially concerns with the way in which reading was typically being taught in Australian schools. The letter asked the Minister to commission a review of the approaches to reading instruction adopted in Australian schools.

The Minister did so, instituting towards the end of 2004 a National Inquiry into the Teaching of Literacy in Australia and particularly asking the Committee conducting this inquiry to report on the current state of teacher education and the extent to which it prepares teachers adequately for reading instruction. This Committee submitted its report in December 2005. This Report and associated summaries of it has since been removed from the Federal Government’s web site, but the material can still be read at the website of the Australian Council for Educational Research: see Teaching Reading: Report and Recommendations

The Report made 20 recommendations. Several of these focussed on improving the preparation of student teachers for being able to teach children how to read, since the Committee had found clear evidence that this was currently inadequate. The Report was favourably received by the Minister, and also by various national bodies concerned with children’s reading difficulties, such as Learning Difficulties Australia. But none of the Report’s 20 recommendations was ever acted upon. (In January 2006 Dr Nelson assumed a new portfolio, so there was a new Minister for Education from that date; she did respond to the Report, but not by acting on any of its recommendations.)

In June 2009 the Hon Bill Shorten, then Parliamentary Secretary for Disabilities and Children’s Services, set up a Dyslexia Working Party to write a report for him proposing a national agenda for action to assist people with dyslexia (difficulties in reading). This report was submitted to him on January 10 2010. It can be obtained from Helping people with dyslexia: a national action agenda

The report made 19 recommendations for actions to deal with dyslexia in the Australian population. One of these was that in all teacher-training courses teachers should be made fully familiar with the research on how children learn to read, why some children find it so difficult, and how such difficulties can best be treated.

In September 2012 the Dyslexia Working Party received a Federal Government response to its report, over the signatures of the Minister for School Education, Early Childhood and Youth and the Parliamentary Secretary for Disabilities and Carers. This response indicated that the Government proposed to take no action on any of the Working Party’s 19 recommendations.

So Federal Governments have known about this problem for nearly a decade, and have received advice from two independent committees of investigation about how to deal with the problem. This advice has been ignored.

And so the results from PIRLS showing that so many Australian children are now very poor readers, though certainly disappointing, are not surprising to anyone who examines what happens in schools, and compares it to what research has clearly shown to be effective in promoting successful reading development. The 2005 National Inquiry into the Teaching of Literacy (NITL) pointed to, and urged us to follow, the direction towards evidence-based practice taken recently in both Great Britain and the USA following national reports compiled by eminent experts in reading development. However, little productive change has eventuated at the policy level, much less at the classroom level. Indeed if the recommendations of the NITL were adopted, wholesale retraining of teachers would be necessary to provide them with the understanding of literacy not presented to them in their own teacher training.

We have significant problems in education from the beginning stages, in that we do not teach reading well. We do not use approaches known to be effective in initial reading instruction. As a nation, we do not routinely screen students entering school for underdeveloped pre-reading skills critical for facilitating learning to read, nor do we monitor student progress in learning to read in a manner that allows for successful early intervention with students failing to progress. We do not redress our early system failure during the middle primary years. In the secondary years, we have a significant group of disillusioned students who have lost contact with the curriculum because of these earlier issues. We tend to focus attention and resources upon compensatory educational options instead of emphasising the resolution of our earlier mistakes. The sequence of initial failure-shame-frustration-disengagement-dropout is predictable and ongoing. Currently, it is being addressed piecemeal, as if they were separate problems.

We need a vast shake-up at all levels of teacher training. By turning our gaze to educational practices supported by empirical research we can make optimum use of our resources to complete the task with effectiveness and efficiency.

We, as a group of concerned reading scientists, clinicians and educators, urge your immediate attention to what has become a national disgrace.

Dr Caroline Bowen, Macquarie University and University of KwaZulu-Natal
Associate Professor Lesley Bretherton, Royal Children’s Hospital, Melbourne
Associate Professor Mark Carter, Macquarie University Special Education Centre
Professor Anne Castles, Dept. of Cognitive Science, Macquarie University
Alison Clarke, Speech Pathologist, Melbourne
Emeritus Professor Max Coltheart, AM, Dept. of Cognitive Science, Macquarie University
Associate Professor Elizabeth Conlon, School of Applied Psychology, Griffith University
Professor Linda Cupples, Dept. of Linguistics, Macquarie University
Dr Molly de Lemos, Psychologist, Melbourne
Dr Janet Fletcher, School of Psychology, University of Western Australia
Dr Lorraine Hammond, School of Education, Edith Cowan University
Dr Kerry Hempenstall, Discipline of Psychology, RMIT
Associate Professor Virginia Holmes, Melbourne School of Psychological Sciences, University of Melbourne
Dr Coral Kemp, Macquarie University Special Education Centre
Dr Saskia Kohnen, Dept. of Cognitive Science, Macquarie University
Dr Suze Leitão, School of Psychology and Speech Pathology, Curtin University
Dr Wayne Levick, Learning Disorders Clinic, John Hunter Children’s Hospital, Newcastle
Dr Alison Madelaine, Macquarie University Special Education Centre
Associate Professor Frances Martin, School of Psychology, University of Newcastle
Dr Rebecca Mathews, The Australian Psychological Society
Dr Meredith McKague, Melbourne School of Psychological Sciences, University of Melbourne
Yvonne Meyer, Committee Member, National Inquiry into the Teaching of Literacy
Mandy Nayton, Educational and Developmental Psychologist and President AUSPELD
Dr Roslyn Neilson, Speech Pathologist, Language, Speech & Literacy Services
Associate Professor Kristen Pammer, Research School of Psychology, The Australian National University
Professor Chris Pratt, Australian College of Applied Psychology
Professor Margot Prior, AO, Dept. of Psychological Sciences, University of Melbourne
Dr Meree Reynolds, Macquarie University Special Education Centre
Dr Tanya Serry, Dept. of Human Communication Sciences, La Trobe University
Dr Karen Smith-Lock, ARC Centre of Excellence for Cognition and its Disorders, Macquarie University
David Stokes, The Australian Psychological Society
Dr Hua-Chen Wang, Dept. of Cognitive Science, Macquarie University
Emeritus Professor Kevin Wheldall, AM, Macquarie University Special Education Centre
Dr Robyn Wheldall, Macquarie University Special Education Centre
Associate Professor Cori Williams, School of Psychology and Speech Pathology, Curtin University
Dr Craig Wright, Psychologist, Understanding Minds and Griffith University
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