The National Reading Curriculum's Oobleck

Abstract

PUBLIC elementary school teachers are in the fourth year of a mandated national reading A group of federally appointed experimental research scientists, known as the National Reading Panel (NRP), created a report, which is now the cornerstone for the Reading First document and a crucial underpinning of No Child Left Behind (NCLB). All of these federal actions have placed undue pressure on schools by channeling them into a reading curriculum based on systematic and explicit phonics instruction. These mandates have resulted in the creation of commercial commercial programs that claim to use evidence-based reading methodologies that will close the achievement gap and end America's reading problems. Confident of their findings, many of those involved in the NRP believe they have put an end to the 30-year debate over how best to instruct children. In school districts across the country, however, the reading battle rages on, and most teachers are not buying the findings of the NRP. As I read Dr. Seuss' Bartholomew and the Oobleck to a group of third-graders on Read Across America Day, I was struck by the parallels between the magicians in the book and the research scientists responsible for the federal intrusion into the reading curriculum. In the book, King Derwin of Didd is not satisfied with the fog, the snow, the rain, and the sunshine. He orders his magicians to create something new to come from the sky. The magicians happily comply, ignoring the warnings of pageboy Bartholomew Cubbins. Green, gooey oobleck then falls from the sky, wreaking havoc upon the kingdom. The bells cannot ring, the trumpets will not blow, the Captain of the Guards cannot speak, and the farmers cannot do their chores. The king, now stuck to his royal throne by oobleck and realizing the error of his ways, summons Bartholomew and calls for the return of his magicians to end the crisis. But, I can't fetch them, Your Majesty. Their cave on Mountain Neeka-tave is buried deep in oobleck, Bartholomew reports. The magicians are totally un-JAMES W. VENABLE is a reading teacher at Washington Elementary School, Alameda, Calif. aware of the disaster they have inadvertently created. After warnings from numerous Bartholomews, the NRP's oobleck continues to fall from the sky, preventing classroom teachers from making wise instructional decisions. Perhaps because I am a classroom teacher and have experienced firsthand the effect that experimental scientists who adhere to a discrete-skills model of reading have on classrooms, I look upon the results of the NRP with disdain. Safely ensconced in their cave, these magicians fail to see how their generalized findings from studies of atypical children in specialized settings do not transfer to average children. The NRP scientists fail to understand that reading words in isolation is not reading. They are totally unaware that their research, transferred into the hands of policy makers, can be disastrous for children. Their oobleck permeates every aspect of our role as teachers. Many of us see this oobleck as stemming from misinterpretation and misuse, if not outright misinformation. That is, the entire premise of Reading First rests upon a crumbling foundation because the initial analysis was flawed. We know that studies were omitted and misreported. We know that the panel came to faulty conclusions. We are aware of the NRP minority report submitted by panel member Joanne Yatvin. We have read the countervailing research of dissenting scientists in the field of reading and language acquisition. Nevertheless, the oobleck keeps falling upon us and has a huge impact on our professional development and on the ways in which we are mandated to teach and assess language learners. The NRP report did not answer the critical question of how teachers can be educated to teach reading effectively, but the policy makers assume that it did. One state-approved professional developer provides hours of indoctrination on the five major components of reading, taught as if they should be delivered to students as isolated skills that will come together as reading--around fifth grade. …