Yesterday's Election - Time for a Change

Yesterday’s election has prompted me to begin blogging about a topic that I have wanted to write about and document for some time now. The time has arrived for me to weigh in on it. The question about Reading Recovery’s effectiveness has been debated for quite a while. There are two sides to every story. In reviewing the data as a school principal when my students were failing miserably, I found studies that claimed that RR was wonderful. Most of these studies were completed, it seemed, by researchers that were involved intimately with RR’s success – they had a stake in it. Other studies, on the other hand, revealed data that showed that RR did not out-perform other reading interventions for a variety of reasons. These reasons raised some red flags for me and my data team. Here are some of the red flags. In the next several blogs I will expand upon these in terms of advocacy for children.

One of the weaknesses of RR is the heavy use of subjective decision making in determining who (it’s only designed for Grade 1 students) will have RR.  Subjective decision making, not independent data, also determines when the child is removed from RR, or who stays for the full 20 weeks. Students with deficits such as phonemic awareness, have great compensatory skills, such as word memorization because they cannot sound out words. Those students often don’t qualify for help but need it the most.

RR may look like it helps in the short term, but data reflects a different story. The gains students make are not sustained. There is no tracking of students who receive RR unless your school district tracks students.  And when the district tracks students, often times, the students who have received RR need subsequent help later anyway.

“Reading Recovery lessons include all five essential components of reading instruction identified by the National Reading Panel (2000). The panel cautioned against making phonics instruction the dominant component in a reading program, either in the amount of time devoted to it or in the significance attached. They acknowledged that learning to read and write is a complex process. Within a comprehensive approach, Reading Recovery teachers understand the importance of phonemic awareness and phonics for beginning readers and writers. During lessons, teachers attend to letters, sounds, and words and incorporate learning about letter-sound relationships during the reading and writing of extended text and as explicit, direct instruction.” From the RR website…
http://www.readingrecovery.org/reading_recovery/phonics/index.asp

The purpose of RR is to bring students up to average readers IN THEIR CLASS. The problem with that is that from one class to another class, average is different. This STANDARD is not standardized! Think PA school funding equality issues….

And with those red flags I will leave the blog for today!!