10 keys to higher literacy achievement : some Dos and don’ts

1. 10 keys to higher literacy achievement: some Dos and don’ts Timothy Shanahan University of Illinois at Chicago www.shanahanonliteracy.com

2. 1. Provide substantial amount of reading and writing instruction • Students should receive 2-3 hours per day of reading and writing instruction/practice • This time can be spread across the day and even across subject matters • 10,000 hours to be an expert at anything (this provides almost half of that)

3. 2. focus on key outcomes • This time should be divided among word learning (decoding and meaning), oral reading fluency, reading comprehension, and writing • Teaching of these have all been proven by research to raise achievement consistently • This means that students would receive 90 hours – 135 hours per year working on key aspects of literacy

4. 3. Be goal focused, Not activity focused • Many teachers organize their instruction around activities • Each of these key outcomes can be translated into learning goals (standards) • Be specific as to what students need to be able to do with assignments and hold them to it (and get them there) • Organize instruction around goals, specify goals in lesson plans, match activities to goals rather than the other way around

5. 4. Avoid test preparation • Many schools analyze comprehension test data by question-type • Teachers and students spend lots of time on item practice • Standardized reading comprehension tests measure a single factor (Davis, 1944; Kirsch, et al., 1993; Spearritt, 1972) • This is due in part to the nature of reading comprehension • And, in part, to the nature of testing

6. An example of question types not mattering.

7. Another example

8. Evidence test text matters matter?

9. 5. lots of reading within instruction • Students need to practice their literacy • Much of the fluency time should be spent reading and rereading texts aloud • Much of the reading comprehension time should be spent reading texts silently • Much of the word time should be spent reading words

10. 6. Build stamina • Most students engage in “conversational activities” very well • But much literacy work is more of a monologue • Can they sustain the conversation themselves (with the text as conversational partner)? • Increase the amounts of reading and writing and reduce the amount of support over time

11. 7. Require writing about text • Summarization • Analysis • Evaluation • Synthesis • Writing about text is more powerful than reading, reading/studying, reading/discussing

12. 8. Teach with complex text • When students are starting out, it is important to facilitate “reading” – so keep the texts relatively easy (95% accuracy) and provide a lot of support • From Grade 2 on, teach from more demanding texts (80-85% accuracy), but provide scaffolds and repetition • Teach with texts of varied difficulty • Facilitate student reading of “frustration” texts

13. 9. literacy should increase knowledge • Much of the focus on reading instruction emphasizes skills, strategies, techniques • However, the content of texts matters, too • It is essential that students increase their knowledge of our cultural heritage, the social world, and the natural world • Do NOT reduce the amount of science, social studies, literature, the arts—but do make sure that literacy is a big part of these subjects

14. 10. Engage students at a high intellectual level • Literacy activities should involve lots of analysis, critical evaluation, problem solving, and synthesis of ideas • Discussions and written analysis should encourage students to determine what texts say, how the texts work, and the value of texts in relationship to other texts • Students need to learn and practice explaining answers on the basis of text evidence