The National Reading Panel Presentation
Date: June 23, 1998
Place: New York City

As involved members of our local, state, and national reading associations and as experienced school-based professionals, we have strongly supported a balanced approach in the teaching of reading and the English language arts. Such an approach is suggested in the National Research Council report, Preventing Reading Difficulties in Young Children. Initial reading instruction requires a focus on: using reading to obtain meaning from print, understanding the alphabetic principle and phoneme awareness, having a knowledge of the orthographic system with specifics of regular spelling-sound relationships, and the need for frequent opportunities to read and write.

We have stated in the past that there is no one way to instruct all students. Believing that there is has been the source of failure in the past for those students who "don't fit the given program" and have been identified "in need of remediation". Having been down this well-tread path one too many times, we wish to express our concern about any effort to mandate programs of instruction that would limit the teacher's ability to flexibly meet the instructional needs of each individual child. "Central to achieving the goal of primary prevention of reading difficulties is the teacher's knowledge base and experience, as well as the support provided to the teacher." This includes books and materials and ongoing professional development.

It is vital that there is access to appropriate books and reading/writing materials in ample quantities for teachers to implement researched methodologies. In New York State we currently have classrooms with limited or no classroom libraries. One basal textbook does not meet the instructional needs of every child in a classroom. Research demonstrates that having adequate numbers of appropriate books in a classroom is a basic necessity. Teachers and students are more likely to be successful in print- and text-rich environments and yet this finding always seems to get short shrift. Adequate classroom resources for a broad range of students in a given classroom is primary.

On-going, high quality professional development for the classroom teacher is crucial. This kind of growth is based on the experiences, expertise, and personal needs and interests of the teacher. A veteran, first grade teacher of twenty years does not have the same needs as a first or second year teacher. Flexibility and choice are necessary components of successful classroom and school learning environments.

Past efforts to address issues of intervention and remediation have led to lists of mandates and guidelines at the federal and state levels that have confounded local efforts to address the specific instructional needs of all children. Setting benchmarks, standards, and testing protocols without providing the minimum classroom resources and ongoing professional development is counter productive and destructive. We know and have known what is necessary to teach all our students basic literacy yet we continue to reexamine the needs, restate the goals in new terms, redesign better tests, and ignore the teacher as the primary agent for success.

The design of professional development at the school level needs to take into account what we know about adult learners. Just as those nations with whom we are so often compared, we need to examine ways to build time into the school day for teachers to collaborate with their colleagues. Designing lessons, coaching each other in effective strategies, and conducting classroom based research are the primary ways a professional educator stays engaged in his/her ongoing development. These are the situations in which teachers and their students thrive.

Replicable researched programs are an easy panacea but they are an illusion. We have had these programs with us for over twenty years. Why have they not been successful over the long haul? The teachers who were involved in creating such instructional programs were allowed the time for reflective discussion and flexible integration of the new practice into their existing repertoire. Working as teacher researchers along with the university collaborators is what really made the difference. If hundreds of districts chose to implement Success for All, the teachers' experiences at those hundreds of sites would be different from each other as well as the original site in Baltimore. That depth of teacher understanding, empowerment, and flexibility is what made the original site-based implementation so successful.

Schools are not factories with assembly lines. Imposing the same "program"on evey child, without a recognition and understanding of the developmental patterns of literacy acquisition, does not work. These understandings develop over time and in collaborative ventures focused on student learning.

This time around, why not really follow through on what we know about teaching, learning, and literacy acquisition? We need to develop exceptional teachers, for only they can develop strong literacy programs.

The National Reading Panel Presentation
Date: June 23, 1998
Place: New York City

As involved members of our local, state, and national reading associations and as experienced school-based professionals, we have strongly supported a balanced approach in the teaching of reading and the English language arts. Such an approach is suggested in the National Research Council report, Preventing Reading Difficulties in Young Children. Initial reading instruction requires a focus on: using reading to obtain meaning from print, understanding the alphabetic principle and phoneme awareness, having a knowledge of the orthographic system with specifics of regular spelling-sound relationships, and the need for frequent opportunities to read and write.

We have stated in the past that there is no one way to instruct all students. Believing that there is has been the source of failure in the past for those students who "don't fit the given program" and have been identified "in need of remediation". Having been down this well-tread path one too many times, we wish to express our concern about any effort to mandate programs of instruction that would limit the teacher's ability to flexibly meet the instructional needs of each individual child. "Central to achieving the goal of primary prevention of reading difficulties is the teacher's knowledge base and experience, as well as the support provided to the teacher." This includes books and materials and ongoing professional development.

It is vital that there is access to appropriate books and reading/writing materials in ample quantities for teachers to implement researched methodologies. In New York State we currently have classrooms with limited or no classroom libraries. One basal textbook does not meet the instructional needs of every child in a classroom. Research demonstrates that having adequate numbers of appropriate books in a classroom is a basic necessity. Teachers and students are more likely to be successful in print- and text-rich environments and yet this finding always seems to get short shrift. Adequate classroom resources for a broad range of students in a given classroom is primary.

On-going, high quality professional development for the classroom teacher is crucial. This kind of growth is based on the experiences, expertise, and personal needs and interests of the teacher. A veteran, first grade teacher of twenty years does not have the same needs as a first or second year teacher. Flexibility and choice are necessary components of successful classroom and school learning environments.

Past efforts to address issues of intervention and remediation have led to lists of mandates and guidelines at the federal and state levels that have confounded local efforts to address the specific instructional needs of all children. Setting benchmarks, standards, and testing protocols without providing the minimum classroom resources and ongoing professional development is counter productive and destructive. We know and have known what is necessary to teach all our students basic literacy yet we continue to reexamine the needs, restate the goals in new terms, redesign better tests, and ignore the teacher as the primary agent for success.

The design of professional development at the school level needs to take into account what we know about adult learners. Just as those nations with whom we are so often compared, we need to examine ways to build time into the school day for teachers to collaborate with their colleagues. Designing lessons, coaching each other in effective strategies, and conducting classroom based research are the primary ways a professional educator stays engaged in his/her ongoing development. These are the situations in which teachers and their students thrive.

Replicable researched programs are an easy panacea but they are an illusion. We have had these programs with us for over twenty years. Why have they not been successful over the long haul? The teachers who were involved in creating such instructional programs were allowed the time for reflective discussion and flexible integration of the new practice into their existing repertoire. Working as teacher researchers along with the university collaborators is what really made the difference. If hundreds of districts chose to implement Success for All, the teachers' experiences at those hundreds of sites would be different from each other as well as the original site in Baltimore. That depth of teacher understanding, empowerment, and flexibility is what made the original site-based implementation so successful.

Schools are not factories with assembly lines. Imposing the same "program"on evey child, without a recognition and understanding of the developmental patterns of literacy acquisition, does not work. These understandings develop over time and in collaborative ventures focused on student learning.

This time around, why not really follow through on what we know about teaching, learning, and literacy acquisition? We need to develop exceptional teachers, for only they can develop strong literacy programs.