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“The fact that teachers need better training to carry out
deliberate instruction in reading, spelling, and writing
should prompt action rather than criticism”.
Moats, 1999
Compounding poor teacher training are low content standards, low achievement expectations, curricula that are not aligned with assessments, poorly designed assessments, and the inflated or skewed reporting of achievement outcomes. Students meeting “baseline” performance are often skimming the surface of being “at risk” and far from level of proficiency that teachers should desire and that the public should demand.
The readings listed below describe these challenges in greater depth.
“What Education Schools Aren’t Teaching about Reading and What Elementary Teachers Aren’t Learning,” National Council on Teacher Quality, Executive Summary, May 2006.
Over the last 60 years, scientists from many fields including psychology, linguistics, pediatrics, education, neurobiology, and even engineering have been studying the reading process. This science of reading has led to a number of breakthroughs that can dramatically reduce the number of children destined to become functionally illiterate or barely literate adults. By routinely applying the lessons learned from the scientific findings to the classroom, most reading failure could be avoided. It is estimated that the current failure rate of 20 to 30 percent could be reduced to the range of 2 to 10 percent.
Over the last few decades, scientists have set out to persuade educators and policymakers of the significance of these findings, urging them to put aside whatever notion they had of how reading should be taught to adopt these practices. Still, the resistance from many educators to change has been palpable….
Given this observed but not well documented resistance, the National Council on Teacher Quality (NCTQ) decided to examine what aspiring elementary teachers are learning about reading instruction during their formal undergraduate training. Accordingly, we undertook a unique effort to evaluate what education schools teach elementary teacher candidates about reading instruction by examining course syllabi and the texts that must be read for these courses….
FINDING No. 1: Most education schools are not teaching the science of reading.
FINDING No. 2: Even courses claiming to provide a “balanced” approach ignore the science of teaching reading.
FINDING No. 3: Characteristics such as national accreditation do not increase the likelihood that an education school is more likely than others to teach the science of reading.
FINDING No. 4: Phonics is taught more frequently than any other component of reading instruction, suggesting that ideological resistance to the “phonics camp” does not fully explain why the science is being ignored.
FINDING No. 5: Much of current reading instruction is incompatible with the science.
FINDING No. 6: Teacher educators portray the science of reading instruction as one approach that is no more valid than others.
FINDING No. 7: Many courses reflect low expectations, with little evidence of college-level work.
FINDING No. 8: The quality of almost all reading textbooks is poor. Their content includes little to no hard science, and in far too many cases they are inaccurate and misleading.
FINDING No. 9: There is no agreement in the field about what constitutes “seminal” texts.
http://www.nctq.org/nctq/images/nctq_reading_study_exec_summ.pdf
Educating School Teachers, The Education Schools Project, Report #2, September 2006
This report is the second in a series of candid policy papers on the education of educators. It identifies several model teacher education programs, but also finds that the vast majority of the nation's teachers are prepared in programs that have low admission and graduation standards and cling to an outdated vision of teacher education. Both state requirements and accreditation agencies have failed to assure that America's teachers are ready for the classrooms in which they will teach.
The report also includes findings from national surveys revealing how America's principals and teachers feel about the quality of preparation that education schools provide, as well as findings from a study on the relationship between student achievement and teacher preparation.
Educating School Teachers closes with a comprehensive action plan to improve teacher education in America. Recommendations include:
http://www.edschools.org/teacher_report.htm
AFT Policy Brief, NUMBER 19 / JULY 2006
Smart Testing: Let’s Get It Right
How assessment-savvy have states become since NCLB?
“…When done appropriately, annual state-administered tests provide useful feedback about student learning and can guide the system to ensure that schools, teachers, and staff get the supports they need to help all students meet academic expectations. For decades, the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) has embraced state-level assessment as a crucial component of a standards-based education system. But we’ve always insisted on a fundamental requirement: These exams must test what the state expects teachers to teach and students to learn as part of their state standards. Where there’s a mismatch between the content that’s expected, the content that’s taught, and the content that’s assessed—and when the results are used to judge students, schools, and teachers—it’s no wonder that folks in schools toss up their hands in frustration. Without strong, clear state content standards and tests aligned to them, state-level testing is compromised and results are suspect. Unfortunately, this crucial alignment is too often assumed to be in place by politicians and pundits eager for bottom-line results…”
http://www.aft.org/presscenter/releases/2006/smarttesting/Testingbrief.pdf
AFT News Release, July 20, 2006
AFT Report: Connecticut’s K-12 Tests are Not Aligned with Content Standards
“Connecticut needs to align its K-12 assessments with the state’s educational content standards…”
http://www.aft.org/presscenter/releases/2006/smarttesting/connecticut.pdf
National Center for Education Statistics, National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP)
The Nation’s Report Card, 2005, Grade 4 Public Schools, Snapshot Reading Report for Connecticut
“…The percentage of students in Connecticut who performed at or above the NAEP Proficient level was 38 percent in 2005. This percentage was smaller than that in 2003 (43 percent), and was greater than that in 1992 (34 percent)…”
“…In 2005, Black students had an average score that was lower than that of White students by 33 points. In 1992, the average score for Black students was lower than that of White students by 34 points.
In 2005, Hispanic students had an average score that was lower than that of White students by 31 points. This performance gap was narrower than that of 1992 (43 points).
In 2005, students who were eligible for free/reduced-price school lunch, an indicator of poverty, had an average score that was lower than that of students who were not eligible for free/reduced-price school lunch by 33 points. In 1998, the average score for students who were eligible for free/reduced-price school lunch was lower than the score of those not eligible by 35 points….”
http://nces.ed.gov/nationsreportcard/pdf/stt2005/2006452CT4.pdf
How Well are States Educating our Neediest Children?,
The Fordham Report, 2006
Student Achievement Grade: D
Education Reform Grade: D
Achievement Trends: Limited Progress
“…Connecticut could well have the nation’s “best and brightest” teachers, but without schools prepared to work with all the Constitution State’s children—African-American and white, rich and poor—many of those on the low end of the state’s economic totem pole will likely never have the freedom to see just how far their minds can take them. It will take much stronger standards, rigorous accountability, and a dynamic charter school sector for the state to finally toss its achievement gap into the deep blue sea…”
For Connecticut’s ratings, go to page 36 in the full report below. http://www.edexcellence.net/doc/TFR06FULLREPORT.PDF
The State of the State of English Standards, Thomas B. Fordham Foundation, Sandra Stotsky, 2005.
Connecticut received an overall grade of F, ranking 49 out of 50. Overall “GPA”: 1.09/4.0 National Average: 2.41
“…Everyone knows that standards are not sufficient unto themselves. They are the foundation of a sound education but not the entire edifice. They set forth the skills and knowledge that the state wants its young people to acquire,but the acquisition process itself has many elements. Teachers must be intellectually and pedagogically equipped to teach what’s in those standards; curricula and textbooks (and literature readers) must be aligned with them, as must tests. Without these and other pieces firmly in place, the best of standards may have little impact on achievement….
Mindful of this problem, Dr. Stotsky did not settle for evaluating the standards alone. She also looked into whether they are being used to inform state assessments, teacher preparation, teacher testing, and professional development. Her findings in this regard are sobering: few states are successfully aligning their tests, teacher training and professional development with their K-12 academic standards. .Indeed,22 jurisdictions flunked this part of the evaluation.
Stotsky offers a number of recommendations intended to point state policymakers toward a sound course of corrective action….”
For Connecticut’s ratings, go to page 34 in the full report below. http://www.edexcellence.net/doc/FullReport[01-03-05].pdf
Report of Licensure Alignment with the Essential Components of Effective Reading Instruction, Reading First Teacher Education Network http://www.rften.org/content/Rigden_Report_9_7_06.pdf
