Dr. Sam is upgrading the blog site this week- The regular blog returns next week
This week, I’m getting the blog site ready so that I can add a new feature. The working title for that feature is Dr. Sam’s Common-Sense/Common Ground Minutes. These will be short hot-topic videos discussing key literacy issues. The regular blog will continue as always, but there will be a special page on the blog to house these short videos. I’m hoping to have the first one ready by next week.
On the topic of the regular blog continuing, I have two important interviews coming up. One is with Laura Robb, Tim Rasinski and David Harrison. It is about their new book, Promote Reading Gains with Differentiated Instruction. The interview is already complete. It will be posted as soon as the book is ready for sale.
The other upcoming interview will be with Ken Nesbitt. It will be about his wonderful children’s poetry site and the many resources available at the site. So- lots of good things coming up.
By the way, Bruce Hewitt’s proposal for ending the reading wars is generating a lot of interest on SPELLtalk. If you missed my interview with him last week, here is the LINK. Part of the reason for creating the videos around using common sense to find common ground is aimed at achieving the day when there are no sides.
Until next week, this is Dr. Sam signing off.
Dr. Sam Bommarito (aka, the guy in the center taking flak from all sides)
Copyright 2023 by Dr. Sam Bommarito. Views/interpretations expressed here are solely this author’s views and do not necessarily reflect the views of any other person or organization.
PS If you found the blog through Facebook or Twitter, please consider following it to ensure you won’t miss future posts. Use the “follow” entry on the sidebar of the blog.
Dr. Sam Bommarito interviews Bruce Howlett, author of Sparking the Reading Shift, about a plan to end the reading wars.
In the spirit of bringing in voices and ideas from all sides, I recently conducted this interview with Bruce Howlett from Sparking the Reading Shift. Bruce and his co-author, Dr. Caitlin Howlett, have drawn up a rather complete and ambitious plan to end the reading wars. I find this plan intriguing because it proposes using ideas from all sides and focuses on successful strategies rather than a single one-size-fits-all plan. While I may not agree with every point, I do find that their proposal is one that should give us all hope for finding common ground in what has so far been the endless reading wars. The Howlett’s work has attracted the attention of Jan Wasowicz, founder and CEO of Learning by Design. Their plan appeared in this week’s posts on Spell-Talk. Please see a screen capture of Jan’s letter below:
Here is Bruce’s Biography. It is taken from his website LINK.
These are the highlights of the interview. The interview was conducted in advance of the publication of the article. I timed the interview posting to come immediately after the article’s publication. In case you want to jump to a particular topic in the interview, the highlights are time-stamped.
Dr. Sam’s reflections & some upcoming events and posts
As I mentioned last week, I’ve interviewed several different literacy leaders from several different perspectives. This includes last week’s interview with Marnie Ginsberg, Ph.D. the Founder and CEO of Reading Simplified LINK, and an interview of Nora Chahbazi and her speech first instructional system LINK. Other interviews included Denise Ritchie and her work at the THRASS institute LINK, Jan Richardson, and her work with Guided Reading LINK, LINK and Penny Slater & Kathy Roe and their work at HFL Education which adapts the work of Tim Rasinski in teaching prosody LINK. That is only a partial list of literacy leaders I have talked to. What all these leaders have in common is that they have created research-based ways to help children learn the decoding skills they need and do that in a way that also promotes comprehension. What I like most about Chris’s ideas from this current interview is his statement to “exclude nothing” (16:13 on the video). Because Chris came from a background of working in a building that included both OG and RR, he had direct experience in working with ideas from all sides. Using ideas from all sides to implement reading programs has been a constant theme in my own writing on this topic. In that sense, Bruce and I are kindred spirits. I truly believe the path to ending the reading wars lies not in one side or the other declaring victory, but rather it lies in all sides showing a willingness to use the best of all worlds, regardless of whose particular world the research-based practices come from.
I have been championing the idea of avoiding the dichotomies often associated with discussions about the teaching of reading and replacing that dichotomous thinking with a search for common ground LINK, LINK, LINK. I think if you look carefully at the work of the folks I talk about in the paragraph above, there really is a great deal of common ground in what they propose. There are many things that teachers can adapt and start to use in their own teaching. I’ve long advocated having more talk and less arguing. That means that all sides must avoid using straw man versions of the other sides. I wrote an article for Literacy Today on that very point, LINK. Perhaps Bruce’s post can become the spark that marks the beginning of the end of the reading wars.
In one of my earlier blogs, I wrote about Amanda Goodwin and the insights she developed when working on the two special issues of the Reading Research Quarterly. I hope we can follow the example set by her in that article LINK. Those two special issues included several peer-reviewed research articles and ideas from several different perspectives LINK. In her article, Amanda described how, in the process of peer review, researchers who at first viewed themselves in different camps found themselves shifting more to the center:
“Some researchers probably started out thinking they were in different camps, but during the editing process, that changed. You know, in an academic journal like RRQ, we ask experts to review each article and give the authors anonymous feedback. A lot of them pushed the authors to say more about the gap between research and practice and to consider differing perspectives. And when they revised their articles, those researchers who started out in separate camps seemed to move more to the center and acknowledge and welcome other views. So, overall, I’d say that the experts agreed that it’s valuable to conduct various kinds of scientific research that aims to better understand and meet children’s complex and varied needs — not to insist that there’s a single, “one best” way to teach reading.”
I‘ll end with that thought from Amanda. “… experts agreed that it‘s valuable to conduct various kinds of scientific research that aims to better understand and meet children‘s complex and varied needs — not to insist that there‘s a single, ‘one best’ way to teach reading.“ Perhaps models like Bruces, will help us operationalize how we can all use common sense to find the common ground in the reading wars. The kids deserve that!
Happy Reading and Writing.
Dr. Sam Bommarito (aka, the guy in the middle taking flak from all sides)
Copyright 2023 by Dr. Sam Bommarito. Views/interpretations expressed here are solely this author’s views and do not necessarily reflect the views of any other person or organization.
PS If you found the blog through Facebook or Twitter, please consider following it to ensure you won’t miss future posts. Use the “follow” entry on the sidebar of the blog.
Dr. Sam Bommarito interviews Marnie Ginsberg, Ph.D. the Founder and CEO of Reading Simplified
I’ve spent the summer looking at various ideas about how to best teach reading. This was done in the spirit of trying to find some common ground and common practices in what some have called The Reading Wars. One of my regular followers suggested I investigate the ideas and work of Dr. Marnie Ginsberg. I’m very glad he did. This interview will give my readers a treasure trove of ideas, including many that are “ready to use for next Monday’s class”. Let’s start by learning a little about Dr. Ginsberg and what she is doing.
Marnie Ginsberg, Ph.D., is the Founder and CEO of Reading Simplified.
In 1999, Marnie searched high and low for answers to the question, “How do you teach reading quickly?”. She found lots of conflicting advice and theories. Overwhelming! She finally ran across ideas that made sense. Before and after school, she tutored two boys in her class who originally were below the 1st-grade level, and their achievement jumped ahead to the middle of 3rd grade!. Armed with this early success between 2013 and 2015, Marnie developed K-5 sets of student materials and training videos for a national, non-profit mentoring organization. Then she began Reading Simplified, which has had over 150,000 email readers enjoy their free trainings and resources, as well as the training and curriculum inside the paid Reading Simplified Academy, which has served over 14,000 teachers and parents. So, as you can tell, many children have been reached over the years with instruction that yields much more rapid achievement gains than mainstream approaches.
This biography is based on highlights from the “Our Story So Far” post on her website. For more details about Marnie and her program, use thisLINK.
These are highlights of the interview. In case you want to jump to a particular topic, the highlights are time-stamped.
Switch It game: Integrate-don’t-isolate-A child learning 13 letter sounds and advancing in PA in 5 days with just eight min. of Switch It per day: LINK
Access to Marnie’s Timeline of Research: Follow the directions at this LINK to download the full timeline pictured below. Each item on the timeline links to the research described. BTW- in addition to these well-chosen pieces, I would suggest readers also examine the work of Duke and Scanlon.
Marnie’s podcast and the blog on Set for VariabilityLINK.
Dr. Sam’s reflections & some upcoming events and posts
Dr. Ginsberg ‘s work can be added to several projects I’ve done interviews about, including Nora Chahbazi and her speech first instructional system LINK, Denise Ritchie and her work at the THRASS institute LINK, Jan Richardson, and her work with Guided Reading LINK, LINK and Penny Slater & Kathy Roe and their work at HFL Education which adapts the work of Tim Rasinski in teaching prosody. LINK. What all these folks have in common is that they have created research-based ways to help children learn the decoding skills they need and do that in a way that also promotes comprehension. Next week, I’ll be posting my interview with Bruce Hewitt LINK about his upcoming piece which is scheduled to appear in Spell Talk. The name of that post is “Our Choice: Rapidly Translate, Evaluate and Adopt Innovative Literacy Methods or Prolong the Reading Wars.” That upcoming post outlines his proposal to effectively end the reading wars by using ideas and practices from all sides in order to create and implement effective practices for the teaching of reading. I think you will find the interview about his ideas quite interesting.
I have been championing the idea of avoiding the dichotomies often associated with discussions about the teaching of reading and replacing that dichotomous thinking with a search for common ground LINK, LINK, LINK. I think if you look carefully at the work of the folks I talk about in the paragraph above, there really is a great deal of common ground in what they propose to do. There are many things teachers can adapt and start to use in their own teaching. By the way, Dr. Ginsberg ‘s ideas add many new things for teachers to consider, and I want to thank her for sharing those resources. So, until next week, this is Dr. Sam, signing off.
Happy Reading and Writing.
Dr. Sam Bommarito (aka, the guy in the middle taking flak from all sides)
Copyright 2023 by Dr. Sam Bommarito. Views/interpretations expressed here are solely this author’s views and do not necessarily reflect the views of any other person or organization.
P.S. If you found the blog through Facebook or Twitter, please consider following it to ensure you won’t miss future posts. Use the “follow” entry on the sidebar of the blog.
BREAKING NEWS: Today Lucy Calkins launched her new website; please look at her ideas on how to rebalance literacy. LINK
