Opinion
School & District Management Opinion

Reading and the Limits of Science

By Thomas Newkirk — April 24, 2002 4 min read
  • Save to favorites
  • Print
The dream of absolute prediction—this method, under these conditions, produces this result—has been a characteristic of utopian thinking from the 18th century on.

In his whirlwind tour that accompanied the signing of the “No Child Left Behind” Act of 2001, President Bush stressed the importance of reading instruction based on “science"—not “what sounds good.” We have, of course, had presidents who were committed to educational improvement, but never one so focused on reading, even to the point of entering the Reading Wars and aligning himself with a particular research base.

The scientific principles Mr. Bush alluded to are laid out in a report from the National Reading Panel, “Teaching Children to Read,” which somewhat redundantly claims to be “an evidence-based assessment of the scientific research on reading and its implications for reading instruction.” According to the reading panel’s project director, Duane Alexander, the goal of the study is to help “ensure that reading instructional approaches in America’s classrooms reflect scientifically based methods.”

This has long been a dream of experimental educational research, to transfer the scientific methods of the hard sciences to school learning. The key question must be: Does the report deliver on its promise to provide a solid, incontrovertible base of research conclusions that can usefully guide classroom practice? Can it help schools move from “what sounds good” to “science”?

The answer can only be no. No, despite the diligent work of the panel, performed under considerable time pressure. No, because the report looks at so few areas and even in these, the research base often yields equivocal results or conclusions that are simply too general to be useful to teachers. No, because the panel chose to look at only one kind of research.

The reading report stunningly fails to find any solid evidence in support of independent reading, largely because it dismisses all correlational studies. Correlation, of course, does not demonstrate causation, but even fields like medicine and epidemiology regularly make use of it when experimentation is difficult (the effects of cigarette smoking, for example). If proficient readers typically read extensively on their own, as the research suggests, it would seem prudent, even scientific, to develop this habit in young readers. I suspect that few of the panel members themselves would want their children in programs that did not include independent reading.

But the study concludes tepidly that extensive silent reading “may” help comprehension. It excludes independent reading from its list of endorsed practices, consigning it to a kind of limbo. Joanne Yatvin, the one dissenting member on the committee, accurately predicted that the report would create suspicion about practices that either were not studied or for which the evidence is not clear-cut. It is, then, only one small step for school districts to shift resources from nonvalidated to validated practices. We can see this happening in some California schools, where teachers have been pressured to remove classroom libraries because they interfered with instruction.

Even the most definitive conclusion of the study, supporting the value of phonemic-awareness instruction for younger children, is hedged with qualifications and areas of uncertainty—white spaces that a teacher must fill. For example, the research has not determined how many months or years a phonics program should last, or how to flexibly meet the needs of different children. The report advocates an “integrated” approach to reading, with phonemic awareness a key early component, but it does not provide the teacher with a plan for that integration. As Ms. Yatvin notes in her dissent, it does not answer the key situational questions teachers must face—when, how much, and for whom?

It may be time to ask if reading science can truly deliver on its promise.

One of the cruel paradoxes of this report, which leaves so much to teacher initiative and flexible decisionmaking, is the way that it has been distorted and used as “research support” for scripted approaches like the McGraw-Hill Open Court series, a linear descendant of the rigid DISTAR program, which allowed almost no room for teacher decisionmaking—or student choice.

But teacher control is never far from the agenda of reading science, either. The dream of absolute prediction—this method, under these conditions, produces this result—has been a characteristic of utopian thinking from the 18th century on. It is, after all, the dream (or nightmare) of the Crystal Palace, that Dostoyevsky attacked in Notes from the Underground, the promise that a certain type of knowledge will allow for constructive and predictable ordering of human relationships.

We now have available almost a century of experimental research in reading, much of it designed to help educators along the road to this predictive certainty. Yet, on the questions most critical to actual teaching, this summary report must point to the promise of future research, a hopeful horizon that keeps receding each year. How long must we wait? It may be time to ask if reading science can truly deliver on its promise. And, like Dostoyevsky, we might ask if we would want to live in this ordered house, even if it could be built.

Thomas Newkirk is the director of the New Hampshire Literacy Institutes and is an acquiring editor for Heinemann Books. He teaches in the English department at the University of New Hampshire in Durham.

Related Tags:
Research Opinion

A version of this article appeared in the April 24, 2002 edition of Education Week as Reading and the Limits of Science

Events

This content is provided by our sponsor. It is not written by and does not necessarily reflect the views of Education Week's editorial staff.
Sponsor
Assessment Webinar
Reflections on Evidence-Based Grading Practices: What We Learned for Next Year
Get real insights on evidence-based grading from K-12 leaders.
Content provided by Otus
This content is provided by our sponsor. It is not written by and does not necessarily reflect the views of Education Week's editorial staff.
Sponsor
Reading & Literacy Webinar
What Kids Are Reading in 2025: Closing Skill Gaps this Year
Join us to explore insights from new research on K–12 student reading—including the major impact of just 15 minutes of daily reading time.
Content provided by Renaissance
This content is provided by our sponsor. It is not written by and does not necessarily reflect the views of Education Week's editorial staff.
Sponsor
Student Well-Being Webinar
Creating Resilient Schools with a Trauma-Responsive MTSS
Join us to learn how school leaders are building a trauma-responsive MTSS to support students & improve school outcomes.

EdWeek Top School Jobs

Teacher Jobs
Search over ten thousand teaching jobs nationwide — elementary, middle, high school and more.
View Jobs
Principal Jobs
Find hundreds of jobs for principals, assistant principals, and other school leadership roles.
View Jobs
Administrator Jobs
Over a thousand district-level jobs: superintendents, directors, more.
View Jobs
Support Staff Jobs
Search thousands of jobs, from paraprofessionals to counselors and more.
View Jobs

Read Next

School & District Management What These New Principals Did to Get the Hang of Being in Charge
Three new principals share their tips to tackle the tricky first year on the job.
7 min read
Image of leaders traveling to a door made out of an upward arrow.
Yutthana Gaetgeaw/iStock/Getty
School & District Management Download How Schools Can Prepare for Sexually Explicit Deepfakes (DOWNLOADABLE)
Three steps administrators should take before a student creates a harmful image with AI.
1 min read
Hand showing phone with face hologram and glowing circle. Social media impersonation. Concept of face swapping, deep fake and personal information protection.
iStock/Getty Images Plus
School & District Management Opinion The Trump Administration Is Bullying Educators. We Can Fight Back
As just about every K-12 teacher or administrator knows, going along with a bully only encourages them.
3 min read
Conceptual illustration of classroom conversations and fragmented education elements coming together to form a cohesive picture of a book of classroom knowledge.
Sonia Pulido for Education Week
School & District Management How 2 School Leaders Limited Distractions and Carved Out More Time for Learning
They removed extra responsibilities from teachers' days and carved out a dedicated academic intervention time.
3 min read
A teacher teaches the Korean alphabet to kindergarten and first-grade students in a dual-language immersion class.
A teacher teaches the Korean alphabet to kindergarten and first-grade students in a dual-language immersion class.
Allison Shelley for All4Ed