Reading is a right!

Reading is a right! More specifically the ability to read is a right. A right, according to the Ontario Human Rights Commission, we as teachers are struggling to satisfy in our classrooms. The report finds many issues ranging from the classroom to the societal that are currently having a negative impact on student performance. There are issues such as lack of funding that are standing in the way of students learning to read that we, as teachers, don't have much say in. We do have a say in what happens in our classroom however. Emily Hanford at APM Reports wrote an article about the methods we are using in our classrooms today. In particular some of the methods students have been taught such as "look at the picture" or "skip the word and come back after you have read the others words" served to essentially make our students really good at guessing what the word might be. None of these methods actually teach the student how to decode the word they are stuck on. How does that then help them to read something like an emergency exit sign that lacks helpful visual pictures? In short it doesn't and you now might see why the ability to read is now considered a human right.

The problem faced by many teachers who were themselves students in a post-'80s school system is that these are the methods that were taught to them as they learned to read. I am one of those teachers. Not only do we have to contend with the fact that our methods of teaching reading have to change, but we also need to address that the way we were taught to read was incorrect as well. In some ways it is right to say that teachers will need to relearn how to read before they can accurately teach students. In order to do this there needs to be a shift in priorities coming from the top. More funding will be needed for teacher education. Teachers will need more than a single hour long workshop on a professional development day in order to learn the new best practices identified in the Ontario Human Rights report. Teachers Colleges will need to instruct student teachers on teaching the basics like phonics and how to establish a reading program. The fact that I had to get an additional qualification, for approximately $600 of my own money, just to be able to have a concrete idea on how to teach reading says that there is something wrong with how things are running at the moment.

So what will need to change? First teachers need to move away from the MSV methods of teaching reading. As mentioned, it only teaches students how to make good guesses as to what the word might say. As teachers we will need to start teaching evidence based decoding methods that actually have students look at the words and figure out what they really say. No more guessing. Second, in order to move away from the MSV methods, society needs to realize that many teachers will have learned how to read in the same way they are teaching. Money will need to be put into educating teachers on new methods that address the problems brought up in the human rights report. Third, teachers will need to let go of a lot of the self-blame I have been seeing. Far too many teachers take on the responsibility for their student's reading problems when in reality it comes down to being given incorrect or incomplete knowledge on how to teach reading. All this is to say that what needs to change? When it comes to reading education: a lot, and not just within the walls of a classroom.