Here is an article on BBC written by one Sophie Hardach on 10th March 2023. This was a copy-paste article about which the author knows zilch about. LINK
Here are extracts from the article and my comments.
At the age of 13, however, Alex was diagnosed with dyslexia, a learning difficulty that affects reading and writing. According to test results, his English reading level was that of a six-year-old.
Read my post on this in 2010. LINK
On 30.11.23 I read a tweet by The reading mum, Ph.D. @readingmumngr
If your child struggles with a concept, they have yet to understand it. Sometimes, they are not developmentally ready. Other times, you need to show them another way they can better learn that concept.
What has been your experience?
I replied as follows:
What if that kid is struggling with a concept that has been taught wrongly?
How can a child scaffold when the first scaffold is damaged?
I am only talking about decoding/reading.
I am from the audit field and started teaching to find out why kids were able to read in Malay but not in English. There is a Chinese saying - A journey of 1000 miles starts with the first step.
My question is - what if a kid's first step is to the East when he actually wants to go West?
Here is a Twitter discussion between Dr. Sam Bommarito and me.
Luqman Michel @luqmanmichel Nov 8
Dr. Sam Bommarito, the simple view of reading says:
Reading comprehension = Word Recognition X Language Comprehension.
Almost all of my students were unable to answer comprehension questions found at the back of the book when they read the passages. But all of them could answer when I read to them.
Is it a language comprehension problem or a word recognition problem?
If it is not a Language Comprehension problem, then where does the Reading Comprehension problem come from?
How is it that kids who have gone to school for 2 or 3 years have a word recognition problem?
Here is a comment on LinkedIn by Amy McGovern, Associate Director of Continuous School Improvement Services/ Reading Specialist at CESA 9, &The Reading League Wisconsin~ Board Member
“We absolutely MUST do knowledge-building, read-aloud, writing, and language-building. The simple view of reading requires it—Word Recognition X Language comp = Reading Comp.
If we ignore language comprehension, which was NEVER the intention, then of course, the equation is going to break down. We need to pay attention to the language comprehension strand as well."
Here is my reply:
Of course, this is part of the equation. No one will ever say Language Comprehension is unimportant.
Below is a Tweet asking an excellent question and a reply that is equally good. It is like many other such tweets where the twitter says he/she is serious but never replies once I have tweeted in response.
Jackie Connell @jackielconnell Aug 30
Why is our education system so deeply committed to pre-boxed intervention programs? Models almost exclusively designed by people who do not represent the learners or communities they are intended to support. Legitimate question. Not rhetorical. Please answer.
Angelina Gerard @awolgerard Aug 30
You have to consider, that most educators are people who enjoyed & did well in school, so most see education through the lens they experienced, making it challenging to consider approaches they never needed or experienced, taking the creativity out of the problem solving process.
This is exactly what I have been harping on for many years.
Here is a tweet by ‘The Madwoman in the Classroom’ @heymrsbond
As a teacher, I call out bad teachers and bad teaching because those people and practices make my life harder.
Some of us are working our asses off to build more sustainable school systems and some people are undermining us at every turn.
Jeff McDougall
Who defines bad teachers? You? What research do you do to make this definition? All teachers work their asses off is a better way to start.
I have seen many such tweets asking some serious questions but the Tweeter does not respond to replies. But, I decided to reply anyway.
This is another small part of the discussion between David and Andrew.
Oppenheimer is another example of Paradigm Inertia in science. One of his students at Caltech by the name of David Bohm proposed an alternative theory for quantum mechanics and at that time Oppenheimer called a conference of the world’s leading physicists without inviting Bohm to it and sad, we are going to do everything we can to disprove him and if we can’t disprove him we are all going to ignore him. The same kind of paradigm inertia paralyses science. So science is an instrument that can be trusted when it's looking inside of a space that we kind of can agree on but it's not very good at seeing outside of its box and the history of scientists is full of examples of this Paradigm inertia which is at the heart of what's going on in the reading Wars and in The Sciences of today.
This is interesting coming from two guys who ignored my comments.
I have said this before and I say it again there are puppeteers who are pulling the strings of many of these educators.
These guys cannot be that stupid to disagree with me about phonological awareness deficit not being the cause of dyslexia. Why did many of the researchers/educators want research reports from me to support what I wrote to them? Can’t they think for themselves? LINK
"The task is not to see what has never been seen before, but to think what has never been thought before about what you see every day." -- Erwin Schrödinger (1887 - 1961)
Please read
my blog post on Tim Rasinski and his tweets before continuing with this. LINK
Tim Rasinski says that reading is not natural and he bases his argument on what David Boulton and his team have depicted in Children of the Code.
Here is a tweet I commented on and was questioned and my replies:
Evan Robb @ERobbPrincipal Aug 15
To have a great team you must surround yourself with like-minded people!
@MichelLuqman
Where do I find people who can think?
Most of the educators on Twitter have a herd mentality and wear blinkers. They base everything on research reports and rarely think. Read what Daniel Kahneman said about research reports. LINK
Note:
Since 2010, I have been questioned on my credentials and asked for research reports when common sense should prevail. This over-reliance on research reports as if they are the gospel truth is one of the main problems facing education.
Firstly, Tim Rasinski need to learn the art of reading before talking about teaching reading. He has to learn that before replying tweets he must read the tweets he intends to reply. Secondly he needs to listen to what others have to say with an intention to understand what others, who may know the science of decoding, have to say.
Here are tweets between Tim and me on 11.8.2023.
Luqman Michel @luqmanmichel
Children whether taught phonics or not will be able to read nonsense words. The brain has an innate ability to read.
Tim Rasinski then tweeted something from the Children of the Code. LINK
