'Evidence based' policy and it's absurdity

On 16.2.2020, I read an article on evidence in the Sydney morning herald on the internet.

Here are some excerpts from the article.

Presentation to teachers at St.Francis Convent

Yesterday, 15.2.2020 I made a presentation to St.Francis Convent in Kota Kinabalu.
There were 9 teachers who attended my presentation.

The teachers were glad that I had made the presentation and presented me with a small token and a certificate.

Top 50 Dyslexia Blogs

Recently I submitted my Blog name to Feedspot.

I am happy to announce that the founder of Feedspot, Mr. Anuj Agarwal,

and his panel selected my blog as one of the Top 50 Dyslexia Blogs on the web.

Here is the website where my blog is listed as one of the top 50 Dyslexia Blogs.

https://blog.feedspot.com/dyslexia_blogs/

Scientific support for my findings

Yesterday one Jammy Jacobson whose profile says she is a Certified Academic Language Therapist at The READ Center commented on one of my comments in a group on FaceBook I belong called ‘Science of Reading: The Community’.

This was her comment: 

Your posts seem to be the opposite of the science of reading. You tend to attack scientific research and claim your own anecdotes are superior to the work of actual scientists.

Verifiable 'Truths'

Here are some extracts of what one of my connections, Anne McDonald, had written in LinkedIn. She is the Founder, owner, Scotland Study Centre.

“…We have the right to believe whatever we want, no matter how illogical, but we should spread only objective information and verifiable "truths." Spreading unsubstantiated belief systems and propaganda is dangerous.  We need to develop the critical thinking and language skills necessary to distinguish verifiable facts from propaganda/beliefs.

General belief systems aren't a threat, but it's important to combat incorrect and dangerous views when they have a chance of pervading greater society."

Confusion due to many sounds of letters

The second reason why many kids shut down from learning to read, is that teachers do not tell them at the onset that most letters of the English alphabet represent many sounds.

Having learned one sound of a letter and then when a second sound is introduced without the kid being informed that that same letter represents more than one sound, the kid shuts down. Kids predisposed to shutting down disengage from learning to read and are then wrongly classified as dyslexic.

Why kids shut down/ disengage from learning to read

My friend who knows how to do a professional YouTube video is currently not available. As such I am doing this simple video to hopefully convince educators why many kids shut down from learning. I have said over the last 10 years that many smart kids disengage from learning to read when they are confused.

‘When Science and Literacy Collide’ by Mark W.F. Condon

Here are some extracts from the article'When Science and Literacy collide'

I share this slightly wonkish topic here to offer some essential perspective to assertions in the press that teachers aren’t using the science of literacy research in their instructional decisions. That’s of interest mostly because the disappointing end-of-year test scores of reading proficiency have stagnated for 20 years.

For how many more years are we going to dupe the world with the same stuff that has been repeated for years?

What is the ‘science of literacy research’? What does it say about how to teach letter sounds?

IPA, ITA and The Magic Ladder (Part 2)

The following article, extracted from Children of the Code, was posted by me on LinkedIn in September 2015.

Has any educator bothered to comment on my post? No! And why not? Afraid to offend... How will we eradicate illiteracy?

Unfolding the Ambiguity in the Code:

Siegfried Engelmann:

 In other words, we've let the kids tell us what we were doing wrong… The only one that didn't totally strike out was ITA, which was sort of like an adaptation of the International Phonetic Alphabet.

ITA, IPA and David Boulton's Magic Ladder (Part 1)

 

The following is what our David Boulton had said in his LinkedIn exchanges with me. Please read my post on this here.

"Children of the Code avoided advocating solutions so as not to be dismissed as having an agenda other than learning deeper into the challenge. 3 decades of work have culminated in a solution, an entirelydifferent approach to supporting learning to read.

I had said that this is utter nonsense that only the uninformed will believe. Most of America will believe anything that their ‘Gods of education’ say without thinking.

India too has been afflicted with wrong phonics

Last year the parent of one of my past students requested me to help her sister in India whose child was not reading at grade level.

I spoke with the mother, via Whatsapp, and asked her to record how her daughter read a few of the consonants I gave her.

Here is an audio of the sounds (now converted into a video) of the few consonants I had sent her to have it recorded.

Why is it so hard to improve reading achievement?

This post is a response to what I saw on Twitter this morning by Timothy Shanahan.

His post today was;

            Why is it so hard to improve reading achievement? What aren’t we doing right?

I have made many comments on Timothy’s blog posts and he cherry picks comments he is comfortable with and ignores the others which he cannot respond to.

If a child can speak

On 27.12.2019, I came across an excellent blog by Mark Anderson @ Manderson. The author had taken great pains to write the article. He has done extensive reading but is still groping in the dark as to why many children cannot read in English.

Unfortunately, he is looking for research reports and is unable to think for himself. He is not going to find any research reports telling him the wrong ways the letter sounds are taught. He has to wait for research students doing research based on what is in my blog.

Following are a few excerpts from his article with my comments as usual.

Is phonics the culprit

Yesterday, 23.1.2020, I read a post by one Amy Gibbons which stated the following;

There is 'little or no evidence' that phonics improves reading, study finds.

Academic says we should consider 'alternative methods of reading instruction', despite minister's support for phonics.

Empirical evidence

An educator who had worked in several positions for 45 years and who is 80 years old and now retired – said on 11.1.2020 in a comment on one of my posts;

“As long as it is empirical, Americans are comfortable

but if it isn't empirical it is suspicious stuff.”

What has happened to the common sense of the American people?