First, let me get this
off my chest. There has never been any research conducted at
Cambridge or any other university that shows that the order of letters
in a word is not important. That's stupid. Click here for more information.
The Top 10 Myths of Reading Instruction
Sebastian
Wren, Ph.D.
Michael Pressley, in his excellent
book, "Reading
Instruction that Works," concluded with a discussion of what he considered
to be "Ten Dumb and Dangerous Claims about Reading Instruction."
All of his points were excellent, but I wondered if he would say this was
his "top ten" list of dangerous myths about reading instruction.
I agree with all of his points, but there were some myths that did not
make his list that I think are also dangerous. I strongly recommend
picking up a copy of Pressley's book to review his "top ten" list (the
book is well written and highly informative), but here I want to go through
what I think are the most damaging myths and misconceptions about reading
instruction. I'll begin with a myth that did not make Pressley's
"top ten" list, but which I consider to be the most pernicious myth of
all, and I'll count down from there. (You can download a PDF
version of this article if you would rather not read it on-line).
Myth
#1 -- Learning to read is a natural process
Myth
#2 -- Children will eventually learn to read if given enough time
Myth
#3 -- Reading programs are "successful"
Myth
#4 -- We used to do a better job of teaching children to read
Myth
#5 -- Reading involves using syntax and semantics cues to "guess" words,
and good readers make many "mistakes" as they read authentic text
Myth
#6 -- Research can be used to support whatever your beliefs are -- lots
of programs are "research based"
Myth
#7 -- Phoneme awareness is a consequence (not a cause) of reading acquisition
Myth
#8 -- Some people are just genetically "dyslexic"
Myth
#9 -- Short-term tutoring for struggling readers can get them caught up
with their peers, and the gains will be sustained
Myth
#10 -- If it is in the curriculum, then the children will learn it, and
a balanced reading curriculum is ideal
"The 10 Myths of Reading Instruction"
was originally written for the Southwest
Educational Development Laboratory.
