We did a phone interview with Ernie Balajthy this week, and he spoke about how important it is for teachers to know the cognitive skills and subskills kids need to become good readers. He was so even-handed about both authenticity and skills, about the social and the individual that I found his frankness winning.
And to be honest, in teaching all three of my own children to read, I reached a specific point where the 'immersion' in a home culture of reading just wasn't enough and I needed to move to direct instruction in exactly the skills each child needed. This is not unlike what Paul McKee said years ago: How much phonics does a child need? Just enough.
I believe that when a child is trying to solve the problem of how words work, that phonics instruction is a seed that falls on fertile ground. So the big question is: when is the ground fertile, and how can an adult tell?
Marlin: How do you know if they're ready?
Crush: Well, you never really know, but when they know, you know, y'know?
This is why balanced instruction is so important. A knowledgeable teacher has to know not only what kinds of skills to insert in instruction at the right moment, but also how to watch a kid closely for signs of what they want and need. Balajthy suggested that in the past twenty years the phrase 'balanced instruction' has been used so poorly that it's hard to tell what it means.
For many beginning readers the knowledge teachers need in-hand is what it takes to read words efficiently and effectively. We have seen the phrase 'automatic and accurate' for fluent readers, but I think these words tell little about what we want to lead kids toward. Too often word study is neither efficient for a kid nor effective. I always ask: what's the shortest route to help this kid read text like this? What kids get in programs is often a laborious, circuitous route that doesn't help them work with the texts they want to read.
Don't get me wrong, I understand that all K-2 kids need to have a complete introduction to English sounds and letters. But this is so often hammered and repeated beyond effectiveness and efficiency that I have seen it turn kids off to reading--a reading identity phonicked to death. Ultimately, to become proficient readers they have to practice, so the biggest question to ask is "What will make them want to practice?" This is a complicated mix of competence with skills, interest in what they read, and an identity that wants to include reading.
I'm messing around with this right now by trying to revisit my failure as a young piano player. More about this in the next post.
