READING RECOVERY IS NOT PHONICS, DOES POORLY IN NZ c:\doc\web\97\10\rr.txt From: " McNee" To: "educan" Copies to: "ECC" Subject: Reading Recovery/ Waste... Date sent: Mon, 22 Dec 1997 13:45:18 -0000 I have no doubt that the supporters of Reading Recovery have done their best to present it favourably on the web. It is the brainchild of Dame Marie Clay, a former president of the International Reading Association which,since it was set up, has not done much to promote phonics. Indeed, because the IRA was promoting look-say so energetically, a group of New York philanthropists set up the Reading Reform Foundation in 1961 to counter the effects of the IRA. Reading Recovery also comes from New Zealand, which has managed to project an image of successful teaching of reading - yet Whole Language (not phonics) is MANDATED in NZ state schools - the failure must be great. Doris Ferry ascribes the failure of the pupils brought to her to neglect of phonics in NZ schools, and both businesspeople and parents are concerned about poor literacy in NZ. Reading Recovery was introduced to Britain. It is very expensive, and now after being used for some years, disenchantment has set in. Certainly here in Britain there are better, cheaper programmes that were never considered. I asked Dame Marie why the aim was INTERvention, and not PREvention, and she replied that that was not her remit. Even on today's net messages INTERvention is discussed, when most of today's special needs are in reading, and the failure could be prevented, is caused by neglect of phonics-first. As someone wrote yesterday, getting it right first time is far easier than trying to fix things after bad habits and self-doubt have developed. Warnings can be found from Bonnie Grossen, Gail Coulter and Barbara Ruggles, in OQE Forum Sept.1997; "Reading Recovery Research" from the National Right to Read Foundation, VA; "An analysis of the Empirical Validity of Reading Recovery" by Prof. Patrick Groff, Prof. Emeritus of San Diego State U, available from Patrick Groff, Attention of Camille Graphics Office, San Diego County Education Office 6401 Linda Vista Road, San Diego, CA $10. The following (from the Language Foundation of Australia newsletter) is a summary of Groff: "It is clear that Reading Recovery has unquestionable shortcomings in methodology. 1. RR is based on unverified Whole Language programmes. 2. Teachers of RR are warned against using sequences of any kind. 3. Students should "search" for what they think the text will say in a 'personalized search for meaning'. 4. Phonics is approached inan analytical way, starting with a word and breaking it down, rather than starting with letters and building them up. Phonics information has far less usefulness than context cues. The student "must pick up detailed information about print for himself". 5. It assumes that children learn to read and write naturally as they learn to walk and speak. (Why, then, would we need RR?) 6. There is no control over spelling patterns or hierarchy of difficulty, under the assumption that all lphonic patterns are equally difficult and can be learned at random. 7. The training of RR teachers is long and intensive with no objective criteria of assessment. ------- Groff maintains that "On available figures (including Center et al. Aust. 1995) a third of students fail on RR." Jennifer Chew (TES March 24 1995) commented on a Thomas Coram Research Unit report on RR: "Over the 20 months of the study, the RR children had about twice as much time spent on them as the "phonological intervention" children, and 3 or 4 times as much time as the 'control groups'. The RR children made only 8 months' progress in the past year of the project. In other wirds, they did not even keep up with the clock after their special tuition. .... The report is less than fair to the Direct Instruction (DISTAR) scheme. ...it mentions two American studies as if they cast doubt on the long-term effects of the scheme on children's comprehension. The truth is that both studies are complimentary about DISTAR, and one showed positive effects, even on comprehension, right up to 9th grade. Here are some more facts. The 1994 Butterfly Project produced an average of 15 months' gain in reading age in three weeks. Children were taught in groups and the cost was £250 per child. (Remember that RR produced 17 months gain in reading age in 8 or 9 months, with individual tuition costing more than £1,000 per child). A study in Cumbria which used a scheme involving "reading with phonology" produced a much better rate of improvement than RR. "Phonological intervention" is not genuine phonics teaching. Good phonics teaching can ensure whole-school high standards, even in inner-city schools. We are still not being given fair comparisons between RR and the alternatives. The information is disturbingly partial, in both senses of the word." ----- Why not try DISTAR, home-grown American? I think any good, systematic phonics programme would work for both initial and remedial teaching of reading. If there is any opportunity to try more than one programme, let me know and I will send you my intensive-phonics "Step by Step". Comparing results in terms of reading age, Improvement Ratio and financial cost is such an obvious thing to do, so why does it never happen? The very least that administrators should require before making a choice is the Improvement Ratio. Given my own experience, and the Butterfly quoted above, I reckon a minimum Improvement Ratio of 3 (I.R.3) (3 months' gain of reading age in 1 calendar month) should be expected/required, and programmes should provide this information up front. In the Cumbria study mentioned above, the I.R. of one component crept up to 2.1. I spent a morning watching a really good teacher taking 4 sessions of RR. He had all the right qualities of a teacher (in my opinion) BUT - he had swallowed whole the procedures of RR, and as I watched, I kept thinking, "What a pity he's not teaching intensive phonics." I think he had never SEEN intensive phonics being taught. Mona. EDUCATION CONSUMERS CLEARINGHOUSE