US: 'An open letter to all who care about making sure every child in America learns to read' - relevant worldwide
Posted: Sat Jan 19, 2019 10:39 am
At the time of posting this article, or 'open letter', the reading debate has ratcheted up in America largely thanks to the contribution made by journalist Emily Hanford. Thanks to Twitter and other connections, we know that problems with teacher-training in reading instruction is worldwide and pioneers continue to raise awareness worldwide in mainly English-speaking countries.
Clearly I am endeavouring to track some of these developments via the IFERI forum (largely thanks to Twitter and some other networks) but the thing that struck me in this piece was a point made about teachers being expected to make their 'professional choices' when they haven't been informed well enough to do so in reality. Does the topic of Kate Walsh's article via the National Council for Training Quality site have relevance in your region or country?
Clearly I am endeavouring to track some of these developments via the IFERI forum (largely thanks to Twitter and some other networks) but the thing that struck me in this piece was a point made about teachers being expected to make their 'professional choices' when they haven't been informed well enough to do so in reality. Does the topic of Kate Walsh's article via the National Council for Training Quality site have relevance in your region or country?
https://www.nctq.org/blog/An-open-lette ... ns-to-readAn open letter to all who care about making sure every child in America learns to read
Kate Walsh
January 2019
As our nation embarks upon a new year, we must acknowledge a sobering reality: that so many more children could read if only teachers knew how to teach reading. The continued struggle for our children's literacy is both frightening and urgent, but the good news is that we know how to fix it—if only we had the will.
Five decades of research directed by the National Institutes of Health, interpreting America's high rate of reading failure as a public health crisis, has led to a seismic increase in our understanding of how we learn to read—accomplishing the educational equivalent of putting a person on the moon.
What ideology could possibly trump good reading instruction? It is a fierce ideological obsession that cuts across all facets of teachers' preparation: the belief that every student is so unique that the best teaching practices cannot be applied.