Make Your Voice Heard! Oregon's New Literacy Framework

 The Oregon Dept. of Education is asking for feedback from stakeholders: educators and families about literacy support! Please complete this survey!

K-5 Literacy Framework - Community and Professionals Input Survey

Here's what I wrote: 

Needs for teaching literacy

Every teacher needs training in how to teach based on the Science of Reading with deep dives into professional development in systematic, evidence-based reading instruction.

Every elementary school teacher should get training in LETRS or a similar program to help them understand what they need to do to teach reading. Programs in addition to LETRS are: The Reading League Online Academy, CORE Learning Accelerated Reading Achievement with the Science of Reading, AIM Institute for Learning & Research Pathways to Proficient Reading Course, The Center for Literacy and Learning has a couple of options for virtual coaching and online learning, The Big Dippers, EBLI For educators, and Keys to Literacy Keys to Beginning Reading PD course.

The state needs to get involved in Higher Ed Colleges of Education. They need to be teaching future teachers how to teach reading. It needs to happen NOW. Look to Eastern Oregon for a model.

Literacy priorities

That schools are NOT teaching our children to read. Just providing a list of evidence-based programs to choose from isn't enough. Teachers need systematic professional development to get them to STOP asking kids to guess words based on pictures and context. If the teacher continues to use strategies that are proven to not effectively teach most kids, even the most evidence-based program is not going to help.

Ongoing support is KEY. Literacy coaches should be funded, and they should have extensive knowledge in how to teach reading effectively.

As part of that ongoing support, providing PD around effective ways to use data to support students often gets pushed aside. Schools do the required screening, but if they are still looking at data in first grade and saying things like, "oh, he's fine, he'll catch up, so he doesn't need any help," that data is useless. Often data is collected but there are no tiers of support and that is how kids fall through the cracks.

Helpful strategies

Systematic, evidence-based instruction based on the 5 big ideas of beginning reading (phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, comprehension), Instruction should be evidence-based, engaging, systematic, cumulative, and explicit.

Data-based decision making - using screening data to make sure that students who need additional instruction and intervention are actually getting it.

Tutoring or intensive intervention for students in middle school who lost so much in the last few years of elementary school.

What questions do you have for ODE about the Literacy Framework or revisions?

I want to know if schools and districts will get professional development around literacy and the Literacy Framework. Again, making changes to the literacy framework so that it aligns with best practices in teaching reading, isn't going to change anything at the school level unless PD is provided and ongoing support happens for ALL schools.

What else should we know about you and why you are invested in literacy education for Oregon's children?

My son was diagnosed with a specific learning disability in reading and writing just after the 2nd grade, but it took us 3 months after he started 3rd grade to get him any services. He never once met any of his goals on his IEP, and the ONLY reason he's ever learned to read is that I shell out thousands of dollars a year to have him tutored with instruction that aligns with the science. I didn't trust that the school would take care of him or help him and I was right.