All Things Education: Will Flat NAEP Reading Scores Mean More Flat Reading Instruction?

All Things Education: Will Flat NAEP Reading Scores Mean More Flat Reading Instruction?:

Will Flat NAEP Reading Scores Mean More Flat Reading Instruction?

by Rachel Levy

At first I was annoyed with Matthew Di Carlo of the Shanker Blog for criticizing people for things they hadn't yet said. Speaking of the NAEP, he predicted, "People on all 'sides' will interpret the results favorably no matter how they turn out." But, he was right.


The results in my state of Virginia, were reported in The Richmond Times-Dispatch as follows:

Virginia's fourth- and eighth-graders perform better in reading and mathematics than their peers nationwide, but less than two-fifths have a solid grasp of reading and less than half have a solid grasp of math. . . . In math, 40 percent of Virginia eighth-graders achieved proficient scores in 2011, up from 36 percent in 2009, according to the report. Forty-six percent of fourth-graders