Do we need to teach vowel blend ai

 

Do we have to teach the vowel blend ai to read the word rain? I believe it is not necessary. Here are a few Tweets and my response.

Jeffrey Bowers @jeffrey_bowers Mar 15 Replying to @mazst  @Spell2Read,   @ManYanaEd, @jeffrey_bowers, @ReadingShanahan, and a few others.

 Most of the kids in that video could not.  A few kids could.  But the lesson is useful for all.  How does a child get to the point of recognising "rain" in an analytic phonics context?  The child knows rain before lesson, and learns its spelling, GPCs, and related words in lesson

Londonjohn @londonjohn9

But have these pupils reached the extended code of /ai/? If they haven't, they'll dissolve when they meet rain.

Rethinking how to teach high frequency words Podcast.

 

                     Stacy Hurst, an assistant professor of reading at Southern Utah University

I listened to a podcast by some Science of Reading advocates and believe they have become desperate to promote their products. Listen to the podcast here and determine for yourself. The following are some extracts and my comments.

At minute 8.03: There is a limit as to how many words can be memorised – I heard 2,000 words.

Broken Record (Part 2)

 

This is a continuation of my Twitter discussion with Marion S. LINK

Luqman Michel Replying to @mazst @TheReadingApe and @GeoffEdinspire

Yes, the word 'with'. When do you teach your students to read this word?

My students learn to read this word in their second lesson and read many sentences containing that word.

Broken record

 

On 7.3.2022, The Reading Ape @TheReadingApe tweeted the following:

'...many first grade readers who struggle to master orthographic-phonological coding and read laboriously while they are doing so, may be more on track for becoming independent readers than readers who memorize words and disregard the alphabetic principle.' (Rayner et al., 2012).

I then tweeted as follows:

If kids learn the alphabetic principle should they not memorise words?

What is wrong in memorising words and at the same time learning the alphabetic principle?

The reading brain - Mark Seidenberg

 

This is a continuation of the Tweets by Alanna Maurin. I am posting this now as, yesterday, I listened to a short video by Mark Seidenberg where he says that there are no multiple ways that the brain can be structured to read.

“Educators have a pretty firm belief that every kid is different and that the challenge of reading is to be able to tailor your instruction for the needs of the child, and their learning style, the way that they happen to learn best. We don’t find that when we study the computational, and behavioral, and neural systems that underlie reading” (Mark Seidenberg) LINK.

As far as decoding is concerned, the above video should have put paid to the frequently quoted saying ‘One size doesn’t fit all’. 

A fictitious tale by a SoR proponent Dr. Brittney Bills

 

The following is a Twitter discussion between Dr. Brittney Bills and Alanna Maurin in December 2020. I did not take part in the discussion.

Dr. Brittney Bills @Brittne79358065

“Imagine a nation where 99% of our third graders read at or above grade level and where our high schools are dominated not by students who are discouraged and frustrated but by confident young adults who are preparing to fulfill their life mission.” - Denise Eide

Flash cards - Twitter Discussion with Elizabeth Brown

                                                      Flash card for teaching Dolch Words

I learned quite a bit from Elizabeth Brown on a long Twitter discourse. Here are somethings she tweeted and my comments:

Elizabeth Brown @PhonicsMom Replying to @luqmanmichel @ReadSimplified and 2 others

With 100% whole word methods, they used flashcards for everything. Now with balanced literacy, the predictable readers are used for new words, but they also send home hundreds of high frequency sight words to be memorized with flash cards.

Students with Reading Difficulties (OHRC)

Recently there has been many tweets on ‘Ontario Human Rights Commission Executive Summary’.

What is new in that summary? NOTHING!

Is there anything in the summary that has not been said before? NOTHING!

The term used by them is ‘Students with reading difficulties’.

Elsewhere they have terms such as:

i.                     At risk children

ii.                   Unskilled readers

iii.                 Child with special education needs

iv.                 Etc.

Blind leading the blind on Orthographic Mapping

 

On 16.2.2022 Maggie Downie Tweeted the following:

Maggie Downie 💙#takebackbritain@MaggieDownie Replying to @JoAnneGross1 and @ReadingShanahan'

'Also, OM (Orthographic Mapping) occurs when readers view a written word while hearing it pronounced' (Maggie quoting Ehri)

This is bizarre.  This is Look and Say stuff.

Arguing for argument sake

 

                                                       Debate only for the love of truth.

In yesterday’s post Angie Neal Replying to @DoctorSam7 @PATSTONE55 and 5 others had said:

“I’m not arguing for the sake of argument.”

I like debating which some may read as arguing. When I realise I am wrong I say sorry and move on. No one will be able to continue arguing when I have said sorry. No one will remember the event after a short period.  

Tweets by Angie Neal - Part 2

 

Angie Neal @angie_neal Replying to @DoctorSam7 @AGoninan @reading_league @ReadWellAlaska

Part of the reason it’s difficult to have a strong dyslexia screening is because it’s difficult to tease out instructional casualties who have never received systematic and explicit instruction in PA and phonics.

Readers of this thread - note that dyslexia screener difficulties are BECAUSE OF INSTRUCTION THAT IS NOT EVIDENCE-BASED!

I then twitted.

I believe you got this wrong. Tell me, please, how there can be instructional casualties if no PA and phonics have been taught.

My comment now:

It was Dr. Reid Lyon who first coined the words ‘Instructional Casualties’ more than 20 years ago. However, no one has ever said what it is that has been instructed wrongly that cause kids to disengage/ shut down from learning to read. I believe I am the first person to have written on why kids shut down/ disengage from learning to read. Read more in my post here.

Dr. Nancy Hennessy, President of IDA between 2003 and 2005 said “We still don’t have the capacity nor the will to change what it is that we are doing with reading early on and so consequently unless we make those significant changes we are not only going to lose the dyslexics but I am also concerned about these other children; these other struggling readers.” Read more here.

What does Angie mean when she says; note that dyslexia screener difficulties are BECAUSE OF INSTRUCTION THAT IS NOT EVIDENCE-BASED!

It is such misinformation that is spread by SoR proponents that irks me.

Angie Neal @angie_neal Replying to @DoctorSam7 @PATSTONE55 and 5 others

I’m not arguing for the sake of argument. I’m responding to baseless claims in the name of every parent who has told me their child wanted to kill themselves because they were taught to read using approaches and curriculum that had no evidence kids should have learned to read.

My response now:

This SoR advocate wants us to believe that kids told their parents that they wanted to kill themselves because of 'approaches and curriculum'. What utter rubbish is this? Would you ever believe that a child would ever say 'they wanted to kill themselves because they were taught to read using approaches and curriculum that had no evidence kids should have learned to read'?

 

Tweet by Angie Neal and my comments

 

                                                                         Angie Neal

Angie Neal @angie_neal Feb 20th 2022.

The only limitation is KNOWING  95% of all children are cognitively capable of learning to read, but they aren’t because of unproven, unreliable, non-evidence based methods. If we knew we could cure 95% of all cancers, would you be ok with only 32% being cured?

I responded as follows: Replying to @angie_neal @DoctorSam7 @ReadWellAlaska @AGoninan @reading_league

I believe you got this wrong. Engelmann had said that only a fraction of 1 % of his hundreds of 'dyslexic' students was unteachable. Do listen to my interview at

https://youtube.com/watch?v=KJl-IFrGiQk for the real reasons why kids are unable to read.

“Are men interested in literacy?” A tweet by Faith Borkowsky 16.2.2022

 

High Five Literacy@FaithBorkowsky·

Why aren’t more men following my Facebook High Five Literacy page?

Do men read? I hope so…

Are men interested in #literacy? It doesn’t look like it.

I’m sure every father wants to see his child reading. And I know male educators want their students to read.

I just don’t think enough men take an active role in advocating for better #reading instruction.

We need male role models for kids, and we need men involved with literacy initiatives.

Do We Need a New Definition of Dyslexia?

 

       Curriculum casualties, of which there are millions, could be virtually eradicated…(IDA)

International Dyslexia Association and National Institutes of Child Health and Human Development’s definition of dyslexia is:

Science of Reading Advocates half-truths and misdirection - Dr. Sam Bommarito

 

Here are some extracts from Dr. Sam Bommarito’s blog post and my comments.

Sam:

We know that SOME (not all!) Science of Reading Advocates use half-truths and misdirection to promote a very limited and limiting way of teaching.

We know that some SOR advocates use tactics like swarming, personal attacks, and misinformation to dissuade educators with views other than their own from speaking out. I call those advocates the “my way or the highway” crowd. I’ve personally experienced the tactic of misinformation, and I’ve been swarmed many times. But not all advocates of direct instruction agree with the pronouncements of the “my way or the highway” crew. A well-known advocate of direct Instruction has accused some SOR folks of “making that stuff up” when it comes to their claims about the efficacy of the long-term use of decodables.