{"id":5486,"date":"2020-02-25T08:00:37","date_gmt":"2020-02-25T13:00:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/braindevs.net\/blog\/blog\/?p=5486"},"modified":"2020-02-24T19:23:51","modified_gmt":"2020-02-25T00:23:51","slug":"how-to-help-struggling-readers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.braindevs.net\/blog\/how-to-help-struggling-readers\/","title":{"rendered":"How to Help Struggling Readers?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Reading interventions can suffer from two lamentable problems.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

First<\/em>, they can — paradoxically — benefit strong readers without helping weak ones. Here we see the dreaded “Matthew Effect,” where the rich get richer — in this case, the strong readers get even stronger.<\/p>\n

Second<\/em>, they can require lots of training in complex theories and pedagogical strategies.<\/p>\n

We would, of course, like a strategy that benefits everyone — especially the weaker readers. And, one that can be implemented without lots of time-consuming, pricey training.<\/p>\n

If that sounds good to you, keep reading…<\/p>\n

It’s So Simple, It Just Might Work…<\/h2>\n

Researchers in Great Britain wanted to test a remarkably simple proposal<\/a>. What would happen if classrooms stopped teaching “leveled” short reading passages, and simply read two long, challenging books<\/em>?<\/p>\n

To answer this question, they worked with ~350 12-13 year-olds, and 20 teachers, in 10 schools. Teachers chose long novels that they deemed challenging; often, they chose books typically reserved for “higher ability” students:\u00a0Frankenstein,<\/em>\u00a0for instance, or\u00a0Now Is the Time for Running<\/em>.<\/p>\n

The researchers insisted that the teachers move at a fast pace. The classes had only 12 weeks to get through both challenging books. In fact, some participating teachers worried that the combination of challenging book + fast pace would be too much.<\/p>\n

As long as they moved briskly, teachers had lots of freedom. Most read the books aloud for long stretches of time. Others used audio-book recordings, or had students take turns reading in circles. Many would stop to ask or answer questions. Basically they used their teaching skills in whatever way they deemed fit.<\/p>\n

So, what happened? Were the teachers right to worry about the challenging book and the fast pace?<\/p>\n

Dramatic Results<\/h2>\n

To measure the effect of this strategy, the researchers used a test of “reading age.” Students in these classes took that test before and after their 12-week reading adventure.<\/p>\n

Students in all the groups they measured improved, including the average<\/em> readers and the advanced<\/em> readers.<\/p>\n

But, what about the struggling<\/em> readers? That is: what about those who were more that a grade level behind in their reading?<\/p>\n

Their “reading age” score improved by 16 months<\/em>. Three months of this strategy produced almost a year-and-a-half worth of gain.<\/p>\n

That’s astonishing.<\/p>\n

I should note: those struggling readers remained well behind their peers. But, gosh, they were a lot less behind than before. In other words, this intervention produced a reverse-Matthew Effect<\/strong>: everybody got richer, but the poor started to catch up<\/em>.<\/p>\n

A Hidden Surprise<\/h2>\n

Part of this research finding, by the way, surprised the researchers.<\/p>\n

Half of the teachers in the study simply relied on their experience to make this strategy work. The others got a day-and-a-half of training in…<\/p>\n

cognitive reading processes […], and\u00a0pedagogic strategies including reading the text aloud\u00a0in class at a fast pace, inference-making, guided group\u00a0reading and the use of graphic organisers.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

How much difference did that additional training make? Um. None<\/em>. Students who had “untrained” teachers made as much progress as those who had “trained” teachers.<\/p>\n

It was the\u00a0strategy,\u00a0<\/em>not the training<\/em>, that helped. (To be clear, the training led to some statistically significant differences, but not in the ultimate measure:\u00a0who learned more<\/em>?)<\/p>\n

So, as far as we can tell from this research, we don’t need fancy training to make this strategy work. Our own teacherly experience is — on average — enough.<\/p>\n

Boundary Conditions<\/h2>\n

First<\/strong>: this research was done with 12-13 year olds in an English education system. It might not apply to your teaching context. And, it isn’t remotely claiming to be a method for teaching students to read in the first place.<\/p>\n

Second<\/strong>: I don’t know if this research has been replicated. We’re always more comfortable with a strategy when it’s been shown to work many times.<\/p>\n

Third<\/strong>: the fact that this strategy seems to have worked for reading<\/em> doesn’t mean it will work in other disciplines<\/em>. We should not assume that, say, students will learn to play the violin simply by hearing someone play the violin; or learn to do math simply by watching others solve math problems.<\/p>\n

At the same time, I do find this research helpfully intriguing. In fact, if you’re thinking about this strategy, I encourage you to read the initial study<\/a>. It’s unusually well written. And, it includes helpful details — including comments from teachers in the study.<\/p>\n

If you give this a try, I hope you’ll let me know how it goes. According to the initial study,\u00a0the students loved it<\/em>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A surprisingly simple reading strategy produces remarkable benefits for struggling readers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":5488,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[47],"class_list":["post-5486","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lb-blog","tag-reading"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.braindevs.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5486","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.braindevs.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.braindevs.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.braindevs.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/18"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.braindevs.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5486"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.braindevs.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5486\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5491,"href":"https:\/\/www.braindevs.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5486\/revisions\/5491"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.braindevs.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5488"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.braindevs.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5486"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.braindevs.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5486"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.braindevs.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5486"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}