Literacy Crisis
According to the 2024 NAEP (National Assessment of Educational Progress), only 1 out of 3 students reads at grade level. Many people immediately blame learning loss on COVID, but the truth is that COVID is an easy scapegoat. Nobody can deny the impact of COVID, but the truth is that the cracks were forming long before the virus shut down schools. The steady decline in reading scores has been a slow boil, trending downward across all demographics (especially the most vulnerable students) for decades. COVID exposed parents stuck at home with their children to their daily struggles in a way that previously only their teachers were intimately familiar with. With reading scores and literacy rates at all-time lows, many are asking how this crisis festered in silence for so long and what can be done to resolve it.
Abandoning Phonics
Nineties kids likely remember Hooked on Phonics commercials running throughout their childhood. The program emphasized the importance of understanding the phonics (the individual syllable sounds, known as phonemes, that combine to make a word) during a time when many schools were moving away from phonics-based reading programs. Instead, a new approach called Whole Language Learning (or Whole Reading) replaced traditional, phonics-based instructional methods. Rather than teaching root words, affixes, or even just how to sound out the syllables of words, Whole Reading relied on teaching reading through context and memorization. Students learned to memorize sight words, then used context clues (such as the first and last letters of a word or pictures) to guess words they didn't know. By 2012, the Whole Reading approach had proliferated in elementary schools, and few students still learned phonics methods. Initially, the approach was widely lauded. Reading scores improved in grades K-3. However, teachers noticed a startling problem when those same students reached the intermediate grades —those formerly high scores dropped dramatically. How could such high-performing students suddenly forget how to read? The answer was simple: they hadn't learned how to read. Instead, they had been taught to memorize specific words up to third grade.
Long Term Damage
Educators say that up to third grade, kids learn how to read, and then afterward, kids read to learn. Reading becomes the primary means of delivering new information. Studies show that half of all fourth grade text will be incomprehensible if a student is not reading at grade level by the end of third grade. This fact explains why Whole Reading fails students after third grade. Fourth grade introduces new vocabulary, often topic-specific, such as social studies or science terms. Traditionally, students used phonics to sound out new words, helping to identify ones they'd heard before. However, students who learned with Whole Reading were not trained to sound out words. Instead, they look at the first and last letter of the word and guess based on known words with the same beginning and end. Unfortunately, since they're unfamiliar with the new word, they often guess incorrectly. The context students previously relied on disappears, leaving them unable to identify and use the new context clues in higher-level reading. Until fourth grade, pictures provided the context for difficult words, but textbooks don't offer visuals for every passage. If students can't identify roots and affixes from Greek/Latin or loanwords (words from other languages), they can't use those higher-order context clues to determine the meaning of a new word. This phonetic deficit leaves many older students scrambling and confused about why they suddenly struggle after years of reading success. Once that deficit is established, reading issues have a snowball effect. The frustrated student reads less, preventing them from acquiring new words and stunting their reading comprehension, even as they are promoted to higher grades, making it increasingly impossible to comprehend more complex material.
What's the Solution?
Whether reading issues stem from COVID, poor instructional methods, or a learning disorder, students past fourth grade can still improve their reading. Three areas of focus can quickly increase reading fluency and comprehension if modeled and practiced regularly:
1) Learning Phoneme Sounds
Learning to sound out words will feel basic to older kids because, well, it is. Phonics should be taught early. Because this may feel "childish" to older kids, they may resist. Overcoming this resistance is critical to reading improvement. Once they associate sounds with words, they'll begin to recognize sound and spelling patterns, which will enable them to identify more words consistently. This "sudden" improvement can be a big confidence boost to keep reluctant readers progressing to grade-level reading standards.
2) Roots, Affixes, and Loanwords
Memorizing individual sight words may be detrimental to sustained reading comprehension, but memorizing the meaning of word parts can give students the context clues they lack at higher grades. Defining common root and loan words from other languages and applying affixes (prefixes and suffixes that modify root words) is integral to reading comprehension. Nearly 80% of words in the English language are derived from or borrowed from other languages. Greek, Latin, French, and German predominate, but it's estimated that up to 350 languages are represented in modern English. When students can understand even a small part of a word, they are more likely to comprehend its meaning and apply it correctly.
3) General Vocabulary Acquisition
The key to reading comprehension is connecting new and previously learned information. Context clues work because students apply Old knowledge to new details. The best way to improve reading comprehension is to expose a student to the widest berth of information possible. Many teachers and parents rely on students' interests to encourage reading, but allowing students to choose their own reading material can create a narrow scope of information that limits growth. Students will consistently choose genres and topics they enjoy because they are safe. And while this means kids read more frequently, conversely, it also means they're never challenged or exposed to new ideas and vocabulary outside their preferences. The broader their range of common knowledge, the larger their vocabulary. Increasing the number of known words will also quickly increase reading comprehension. Reading is a skill humans never stop using.
In school, reading is essential in every subject, including math and hands-on classes. Even kids who grow up into "non-readers" as adults need strong reading skills. They may not be reading many textbooks and novels after graduation. However, they'll still need strong fluency and comprehension to read contracts, emails, text messages, warning labels, manuals, and directions, to name a few. With regular practice, reading skills can improve at any age. Regardless of age, it is never too late to become a better reader.
Summer is a fantastic time to improve reading!
If you’re worried that your student is falling behind in reading, take advantage of our 1-to-1 service. 1-to-1s are offered in blocks of six sessions. During these sessions, we discuss and assess the student’s struggles, then work together to create a personalized plan to target meet their reading goals.
