Teach Effectively!

Disadvantaged children who read poorly appear to be likely to develop internalizing behavior problems during the later elementary years, according to a study reported in Child Development by Brian Ackerman (University of Delaware, US) and colleagues. Although it is not the case when they are younger, by the time they reach fifth grade, children from lower socio-economic situations who have reading problems are more likely than their peers to have their teachers report that they have withdrawn behavior, somatic complaints, and anxious-depressed behavior.
Continue reading ‘Reading-internalizing connection’

Here are links to some pretty vapid resources on teaching:

• http://www.ehow.com/how_13757_teach-reading-students.html
• http://www.ehow.com/how_11465_teach-teenager-with.html
• http://www.ehow.com/how_13153_help-child-with.html
• http://www.ehow.com/how_11461_teach-teenager-with.html
• http://www.ehow.com/how_13756_teach-students-with.html

If I was more efficient, I wouldn’t need more days in the week, more hours in the day, more minutes in the hour….

In the New York (NY, US) Times Diana Jean Schemo reported that state governments are preparing to lengthen school days in response to poor outcomes for students. Mayhaps those who advocate more school time should consider adopting more effective teaching methods?

Link to Ms. Schemo’s story (free subscription may be required).

So, I was poking around the Internet, working on background for a presentation and paper on the meaning of the adjectival phrase “evidence-based,” and I stumbled upon Tracy Allison Altman’s Evidence Soup. Although it appears much broader, it shares some proclivities with Teach Effectively, so I wanted to note it here.

The array of topics Ms. Altman covers in Evidence Soup is broad. As befits the subject of her posts, there are many entries on evidence-based health care and business management. But there are also comments on the effects of star athletes on sports franchises’ bottom lines. Most importantly for our readers, there is a section on education.

Ms. Altman’s explication of her system for awarding cans of soup (equivalents used elsewhere include stars, mice, etc.) is a worthy place to start. I like the use of “show me the evidence,” a phrase that long-timesuffering readers of TE will remember me quoting from Og Lindsley in January of 2005.

Now, if I could just write with the wit and clarity that Ms. Altman’s blog displays…sigh.

The What Works Clearinghouse released new reports this week. Here are the topics, the foci, and links to the reports.

• Beginning Reading: Reading Recovery®—View the report.
• Dropout Prevention: Middle College High School; Twelve Together—View the reports.
• Early Childhood Education: Words and Concepts—View the report.
• English Language Learning: Bilingual Cooperative Integrated Reading and Composition (BCIRC)—View the report.
• Middle School Math: Transition Mathematics—View the report

The first one sort of mystifies me. The WWC used as evidence of effectiveness of RR a study that essentially showed the basic RR method was less effective.

Zig Engelmann’s original plan for publishing his recollections of the Follow Through Project called for PDFs of chapters to be available on Zigsite.com for two weeks each. In response to people who learned of their availability too late, he as created “something of a curtain call.” Get ‘em while you can!

DURING THE WEEK OF MONDAY, MARCH 12, ALL CHAPTERS WILL BE ON FOR ONE WEEK, THROUGH SUNDAY MARCH 18. Then, for sure, they will not return.

Over on Teacher Magazine, founding editor Ronald Wolk has a column decrying public education’s core curriculum. He recommends an examination of and debate about the core curriculum. I wonder whether there is need for such debate. In fact, I wonder what people mean by “the core curriculum.”

Be that as it may, I was pleased with Mr. Wolk’s emphasis later in this column. There he turned the argument to the importance of teaching reading.

Being able to read proficiently is the crucial prerequisite to becoming educated. Many of the people who built this nation and made enduring contributions to society had little or no formal education: George Washington, Patrick Henry, Abraham Lincoln, Andrew Johnson, Andrew Jackson, Robert Fulton, Thomas Edison, Herman Melville, Walt Whitman, and millions of ordinary citizens. Once they could read, they acquired the knowledge they needed to be productive workers and good citizens (even without a core curriculum or the enormous benefit of the Internet). And, by and large, they learned what they wanted to learn, and the more they learned, the more they wanted to learn.

I’ll quibble with whether they learned what they wanted to learn, but it would be a minor philosophical debate about the meaning of the verb “to want.” Otherwise: Here! Here! Let’s teach reading. And let’s teach it effectively.

Link to Mr. Wolk’s column.

The folks over at the Access Center provide a Web-based learning module on the third component of early reading—fluency—that should be valuable to lots of folks.

Effective Interventions for Struggling Readers—Fluency is a 2.5–3 hour module designed to promote knowledge and understanding of the third essential component of reading: fluency. The purpose of this module is to help provide teachers with the knowledge and tools necessary to provide effective reading interventions for students who struggle with reading fluently.

There are downloadable documents, slides, and etc. Jump to the page. By the way, I presented a paper via teleconference for the Access Center a few years ago and it’s available from the site; they collapsed a couple of hours of presentation and discussion into about 1.5 pages, but some of the right info is there.