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NCTQ’s “Case Closed” Brain Image Post Plugs Pearson’s RICA Reading Te$t for Teachers. Fails the Smell Test!

August 2, 2019 By Nancy Bailey 7 Comments

Post Views: 263

Kate Walsh, President of the astroturf National Council of Teacher Quality (NCTQ), a group that pretends it’s for teachers and schools when it’s really about privatization, recently published an article “Case Closed” implying that teachers are “science deniers” when it comes to teaching reading.

But Walsh’s brain imaging illustration is taken from a research article that has little to do with her foggy claims, and her objective appears to be to plug the California RICA test (Online Reading Instruction Competence Assessment) by Pearson. The RICA test is a money-maker and the push to get states like California to pay for it is concerning.

The test was almost thrown out since it was considered a financial burden on applicants, doesn’t respond to needs of high-risk children, exacerbates California’s teacher shortage, and that “passage rates based on gender, ethnicity and other factors demonstrate bias.”

The “reading research community,” whose names we don’t see, inundated the California legislature with letters supporting the test.

If teachers come from state or private colleges where they learn to teach reading, shouldn’t we expect universities to do their job? Why must taxpayers spend money on an outside test to prove teachers know how to teach reading? Even if education schools need improvement, the RICA test isn’t going to fix that.

Walsh promotes RICA with brain image pictures where children’s brains light up. She states, If a picture is worth a thousand words, I’m thinking that these two images should have long ago put an immediate end to any debate over what teachers need to know before being entrusted with teaching children to read.

But the 2010 article cited under the pictures “Brain sensitivity to print emerges when children learn letter speech sound correspondence” has nothing to do with what she says!

The authors aren’t stating that their research shows proven science for reading. They’re demonstrating that the brain shows activity in a certain area when children make letter-speech connections compared to letter sounds in a number’s game. But children could as easily be looking at letter sound connections in books in a traditional reading program.

The control group does not get exposed to letter-sound combinations at all, but a numbers game. The study has nothing to say about the value of any particular method of learning letter-speech sound combinations. It’s basic research looking at a narrow question about areas of brain activity.

Many journalists and individuals, like Walsh, who support corporate privatization of public education, have been casting teachers as unable to teach reading. They blame education schools as failing to instruct the “science of reading.” This is a serious charge since reading instruction is an important part of what teachers do, and children who don’t learn to read well will likely struggle to learn other subjects and benefit from school.

Walsh, like other critics, has no teaching degree or experience teaching reading to children. Some reading professors who legitimately have reading credentials also sign on to the NCTQ line of thinking. Why?

NCTQ is funded in part by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and other corporations which provides grants to their favored projects. The NCTQ has been highly critical of career teachers, education schools, and public education.

Teach for America’s, Wendy Kopp, used to be on the board. Isn’t it interesting we never hear criticism of Teach for America corps member and how they teach reading with only five-weeks of training?

NCTQ fails to take into consideration variables that could affect reading instruction in today’s current anti-teacher anti-public-school climate:

  • Underfunding of public schools.
  • Overcrowded class sizes.
  • Teachers with few credentials (see Teach for America, Relay Graduate School of Education, etc.).
  • The teacher shortage.
  • Homelessness.
  • Poverty.
  • ELL students.
  • Students with disabilities in inclusive classroom settings.
  • Underfunded special education.
  • Lacking reading support programs.
  • Unregulated for-profit and online teacher training programs.

Walsh’s inaccurate reference raises questions about other fMRI brain imaging. For years parents and teachers have read reports and claims surrounding brain imaging pictures with the intent to connect phonics instruction to benefit children learning to read. Most of us are not neurologists and we rely on what these experts tell us.

Many teachers will also scratch their heads and tell you they’ve been teaching phonics and sounds in their reading instruction programs for years! They’ve been introducing vocabulary and concentrating on reading for meaning too.

My point is not to dismiss brain imaging studies related to the importance of letter-sounds and the reading connection, but to question whether some individuals could use these studies to make unfair claims about teachers and their education school preparation, and their ability and willingness to teach reading the best way.

Every child comes to school with a variety of strengths and weaknesses when it comes to reading. Reading is rarely one single difficulty with one solution. Every child is different. For some, learning to read at the proper development is no problem. Other children require more intensive instruction.

Teachers should be well-prepared through their education schools to teach reading. Public schools should have small enough class sizes that permit teachers to address student needs.

Parental concerns should never be dismissed without consideration, and parents and teachers must work together to help children with reading difficulties overcome the real problems found in public schools and reading classrooms that detract from good reading instruction.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Filed Under: Featured Tagged With: Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, brain imaging, fMRIs, National Council on Teacher Quality (NCTQ), NCTQ, phonics, reading, Reading Instruction

Comments

  1. Roger Titcombe says

    August 2, 2019 at 8:30 am

    This is an example of ‘neurobabble’ Here is an article about neurobabble in the ‘Guardian’ newspaper.

    https://www.theguardian.com/science/shortcuts/2015/may/05/win-argument-pseudo-scientific-neuro-gibberish-neuroscience

    Learning to read involves a succession of personal conceptual breakthroughs. The idea that these can be meaningfully represented in terms of macroscopic zones of the brain ‘lighting up’ in MRI scanners is utterly lacking in any genuine scientific evidence..

    It is corrupting education because it can be made to fit with the knowledge-based instruction approach that is so attractive to those keen to displace expensive, experienced, argumentative teachers (like Nancy) from the school system.

    I am a retired science teacher and I know that understanding is rooted in the refinement of personal concepts (schemas). These personal breakthroughs are like the ‘Eureka’ moment of Archimedes when he realised that flotation has as much to do with weight of the water as it has to the weight of the floating (or sinking) object. Are we being asked to believe that a significant number of the neurons in the brain of Archimedes rearranged their connections in the instant that he had his flash of insightful understanding?

    I argue here that such ideas are a Trojan Horse for ‘regime change’ privatisation in education.

    https://rogertitcombelearningmatters.wordpress.com/2019/02/17/the-knowledge-based-curriculum-self-evident-or-a-trojan-horse-for-educational-regime-change/

    Reply
    • Nancy Bailey says

      August 2, 2019 at 10:29 am

      Thank you, Roger. All good points.

      Reply
    • Duane Swacker says

      August 2, 2019 at 4:06 pm

      Thanks for the links, Roger!!

      Reply
  2. Carrie says

    August 2, 2019 at 9:24 am

    I have taught the reading theory and methods course at my university for a long time.

    Over the summer I got an email from someone asking for my literacy course syllabus who was clearly not who she said she was: an education major from Bethel College who was going to transfer to my university soon and wanted to see if my course was redundant to the one she took at Bethel.

    Have you heard anything about NCTQ on the hunt again for syllabi?

    The RICA costs our students $171, the CSET costs $247-$297, and the edTPA costs $300.

    Reply
    • Nancy Bailey says

      August 2, 2019 at 10:36 am

      Thank you, Carrie. I appreciate your reminder of the CSET and edTPA costs which seem to be more about discouraging young people to become teachers! I’ve known those preparing to be teachers who resent this.

      As far as the syllabus, I have not heard anything about NCTQ doing this, but who knows? What is obvious is the continuing criticism of education schools and career teachers by these groups, and their push for more and more ways to make a profit on anything having to do with public education.

      Reply
  3. Michael Honel says

    August 2, 2019 at 2:48 pm

    I know one thing, I won’t learn how to play the piano from even the finest teacher if I don’t practice. Access to books and a real, certified librarian to help students select appropriate books they are interested in, is absolutely vital. I started reading stacks of books in the fourth grade. Early in the sixth grade I was transferred from to the highest reading group.

    Reply
    • Nancy Bailey says

      August 2, 2019 at 3:01 pm

      Excellent point! As a LD reading resource teacher I worked on phonics, but I think what really helped was lots of reading practice. We read together as a group and had access to stories that students found interesting.

      I am happy you found the joy in reading. I also agree about librarians and libraries. There’s concern about the loss of school libraries and librarians especially in poor schools. But unfortunately I don’t know what if anything is being done about it.

      https://nancyebailey.com/2018/04/21/poverty-reading-the-sad-and-troubling-loss-of-school-libraries-and-real-librarians/

      Thank you for taking the time to comment.

      Reply

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