Overcoming Reading Challenges

List of figures/tables/images

Figures

1. Figure 2.1. The Reader, Task, Text
2. Figure 4.1. Information from Testing
3. Figure 4.2. Assessment Framework
4. Figure 5.1. Expectancy-Value Continuum of Motivation
5. Figure 7.1. Relationship of Terms
6. Figure 9.1. Four Levels of Vocabulary Knowledge
7. Figure 9.2. Cup
8. Figure 9.3. Conceptual Word Knowledge
9. Figure 9.4. Comprehension Flowchart

Tables

Table 2.1. Tasks of Reading

Table 2.2. Receptive and Communicative Processes

Table 2.3. Grade Level Differences in Readers, Texts, and Tasks

Table 3.1. Ms. Hatkes Center Chart

Table 3.2. Sample Picture Books and Comprehension Strategies

Table 3.3. Common Difficulties

Table 4.1. Observation Protocol

Table 4.2. Challenges of Assessment in School

Table 5.1. Challenges to Motivation in Reading in School

Table 5.2. ABCDEs of Instruction to Encourage Motivation

Table 6.1. Books to Discuss Agency

Table 7.1. Books to Teach Skills

Table 8.1. Sound-letter Relationships

Table 8.2. Common Vowel Patterns

Table 8.3. National Assessment of Educational Progress Fluency Scale

Table 9.1. Challenges in Comprehension and Vocabulary

Table 9.2. Text Structure

Table 10.1. Common Core Standards Writing Goals for Elementary

Table 10.2. Common Core Standards Writing Goals for Middle and Secondary

Table 10.3. Challenges of Middle School Literacy

Table B.1. Renewable and Nonrenewable Energy Concept Sort

Images

Acknowledgments

When we sat down to write this book, we were not alone. We want to thank the many students, teachers, and friends along the way who have taught us and continue to teach us in our lives. We want to especially thank our families, Mabel, Marcus, and Matthew (from Margaret) and Tori, Caleb, and Victor (from Dixie), who have supported us along as we wrote this book. Truth be told, this book would not have been written without their generous encouragement and support. And to our readers, thank you.

In many districts across the US, kindergarten students are considered reading “at grade level expectations” if they enter kindergarten reading early reader books with sentences like, “Here is a cat.” and “I see a dog.” This expectation may exceed what you may think young readers should be able to do once they enter school. Some of you may think that young children entering school should primarily know the alphabet and how to count to twenty whereas some of you may think reading at this level is right on target. Who determines these benchmarks of when children should be reading in school? The answer to this question is more complex than you may think. In fact, literacy scholars have spent decades trying to answer this question. The quick answer is that national and state level educational policies directly inform student expectations and benchmarks for reading. Expectations of when children should be reading are high stakes for schools, parents, and children. If children are not reading on grade level reading they may be considered “at risk” with the recommendation for additional in-school services as well as remedial support out of school. Schools understand that a child who is considered a poor reader in first grade will most likely remain a poor reader at the end of fourth grade (Juel, 1988). Historically, educational reform efforts aimed at improving student literacy achievement outcomes for low-performing students who were not at benchmark flourished in the early 1990s and 2000s. In the 1990s, the US Congress approved the formation of the National Reading Panel (NRP) to outline effective, research-based instructional approaches to teaching reading (NICHD, 2000). The NRP reviewed the findings from the National Research Council which designated areas central to reading instruction: phonemic awareness, phonics instruction, fluency, comprehension, and vocabulary (Snow et al., 1998).

Based on these findings, the Reading First Initiative legislation in the US, within the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB, 2001), was created. This initiative emphasized that all public school children in the US should read at or above grade level expectations by third grade. The Reading First Initiative defined scientifically-based research and outlined through the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB, 2001) specific curricula and activities schools must use to teach reading. These literacy curricula programs had the five pillars of reading instruction outlined by the NRP (i.e., phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, comprehension, and vocabulary). Schools had to adopt literacy curricula that was “scientifically-evidenced based” on these pillars and schools were required to only use research-based literacy curricula in schools in order to receive federal funding.

Schools across the nation were sent the message, “If it isn’t proven to work through research, you can’t count it toward instruction” (Manzo & Diegmueller, 2001, p. 5). In response to these initiatives, states and school districts increased accountability measures for schools and set in place measures to ensure that teachers taught these prescriptive literacy curricular programs to “fidelity” (Allington, 2013). What resulted for many teachers in schools across the US was increased pressure to adhere to standardized curricula at all costs and practices that emphasized “teaching to the test” to ensure that students performed adequately on state mandated literacy assessments.

Critical scholars emphasized that these scientifically-based research literacy programs lacked cultural relevance as well as engaging and authentic tasks and literature for students (Vaughn et al., 2022). In addition, teachers faced an extreme lack of autonomy because they were required to follow the script detailed in the lesson plan without any modification. As Allington (2010) counseled, “Such federal education policy during this time, adopted a narrow, ideologically defined notion of ‘scientifically-based reliable reading research’ and to date there is no compelling evidence that reading standards have improved as a result of NCLB” (p. 7). Literacy reform efforts continued with Race to the Top (Department of Education, 2009) where teachers received pay for performance scrutiny of their reading instruction (Vaughn et al., 2021). Aggressive practices continued with the requirement of letter grades to schools state-wide according to their students’ performances on standardized literacy assessments with state departments of education taking over schools considered “failing.” With the Common Core State Standards (National Governors Association Center for Best Practices & Council of Chief State School Officers, 2010, CCSS), national standards were set in place to provide benchmark expectations of what students should be focused on per grade level and what expectations students should accomplish.