Academic Jibberish
Stephen Krashen, RELC Journal. 43 (2): 283-285, 2012. “Some scholars have slipped so far into the stylized talk – excuse me, discourse – of academia that important ideas are rendered virtually incomprehensible to most people. Because it sometimes seems that scholarship is valued by other academics in direct proportion to its inaccessibility, some individuals may have an instinctive aversion to
A Short Paper Proposing That We Need to Write Shorter Papers
Stephen Krashen, Language and Language Teaching 1,2: 38-39. 2012 When we ask the time, we don't want to know how watches are constructed. Georg Christoph Lichtenberg (1742-1799)Our current journals in language education are full of long papers. A typical journal might have, at most, five major papers. Sometimes we have to write long papers, but much of the time, it's unnecessary: the papers
YESTERDAY
STEM Fever
Sent to the Wall Street Journal, Jan. 3Sandra Stotsky thinks that the "Common Core Doesn't Add UP to STEM Success" (Jan 3) and that all high school students should be required to take trigonometry and precalculus to be ready for the brave new world of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math. Even if the STEM crisis were real, this is not a good idea. Of course, advanced math classes
JAN 02
The common core ignores the evidence
Sent to the Los Angeles Times, January 2, 2013Al Austin, in his letter to the Times (Jan 2) notes that the common core calls for "a sharp reduction" in literature in schools in favor of increased exposure to informational text. This policy was created without any empirical evidence. The common core designers ignored (or were not aware of) not only studies showing that reading literature
JAN 01
Japan's 2020 push to English: A suggestion to the "panel of experts"
Sent to the Japan Times, May 31, 2013.Experts have criticized Japan's reform plan for English for not including enough hours of English instruction to accomplish its goals and have also noted the lack of resources and staffing ("English to get 2020 push but teachers not on the same page," Dec. 31, 2013).There is an easy way to help solve both of these problems and ensure that growth in E
DEC 31 2013
The Compelling (not just interesting) Input Hypothesis.
Stephen Krashen The English Connection (KOTESOL). 15, 3: 1It is by now well-established that input must be comprehensible to have an effect on language acquisition and literacy development. To make sure that language acquirers pay attention to the input, it should be interesting. But interest may be not enough for optimal language acquisition. It may be the case that input needs to be not just in
The Compelling (not just interesting) Input Hypothesis.
Stephen Krashen The English Connection (KOTESOL). 15, 3: 1It is by now well-established that input must be comprehensible to have an effect on language acquisition and literacy development. To make sure that language acquirers pay attention to the input, it should be interesting. But interest may be not enough for optimal language acquisition. It may be the case that input needs to be not just in
The Compelling (not just interesting) Input Hypothesis.
Stephen Krashen The English Connection (KOTESOL). 15, 3: 1 It is by now well-established that input must be comprehensible to have an effect on language acquisition and literacy development. To make sure that language acquirers pay attention to the input, it should be interesting. But interest may be not enough for optimal language acquisition. It may be the case that input needs to be not just
DEC 30 2013
Lifetime readers (October, 2004)
Letter published in Education Week October 20, 2004, as More on How to Produce Lifelong Reading Habits In his letter to the editor, Hugh Calkins asks what reading method is most likely to produce lifelong readers ("Why Is There No Answer to This Reading Question?"Letters, Sept. 29, 2004). A number of studies describe how dedicated readers developed their interests in reading, but a val
DEC 28 2013
What research really says about "explicit and structured" phonics
Sent to the West Australian (Dec. 28) "New reading rules for kids," (Dec. 27) states that " ...international research has found that explicit and structured teaching of phonics - the relationship between letters and sounds - is the most effective way to teach reading." Not so. What research says is that the impact of explicit and structured phonics is strong only on tests in w
DEC 27 2013
No shortage of high-tech workers
Sent to the Los Angeles Times, Dec. 27, 2013.In "Its no sin to be rich," (Dec. 27), Richard Riordan and Eli Broad state that jobs that don't require higher education "have left the country" and the "good jobs" that will stay require technological know-how. They conclude that we must work harder at educating our workers in technology. It is not clear that there is a d
DEC 25 2013
Arne Duncan responds to Krashen criticisms, sort of (Jan 4, 2011) on The Situation Room (CNN)
Wolf Blitzer asks Arne Duncan about my criticisms of his Washington Post article. Duncan responds, sort of. My comments are included. Duncan Washington Post article at: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp- dyn/content/article/2011/01/02/AR2011010202378.html?referrer=emailarticle My criticisms at: http://voices.washingtonpost.com/answer-sheet/education-secretary-duncan/a- response-to-arne-duncan
A Fundamental Principle: No Unnecessary Testing (NUT)
A Fundamental Principle: No Unnecessary Testing (NUT) Stephen Krashen(An earlier version of this paper was published in The Colorado Communicator vol 32,1. Page 7, 2008)Summary: Do not invest 4.5 billion on new standards and tests. Instead, work on improving the NAEP to get a picture of how our students are performing, and continue to use teacher evaluation to evaluate individual student perfor
DEC 19 2013
Advanced math: Offer, don't require
Sent to the Denver Post, Dec. 19, 2013Sandra Stotsky thinks that the "Common Core fails to prepare students for STEM" (Dec. 17), and that all students should be required to go way beyond Algebra II to be ready for the brave new world of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math. Even if the STEM crisis were real, this is not a good idea. Of course, advanced math classes should be offere
Show us the evidence
Posted on State Impact: Ohio - Eye on Education - http://tinyurl.com/ltoc4xqIn the class described in "How the Common Core is Changing How Kids Learn in English Class," (Dec 16), the teacher urges students to "cite evidence" for their statements, part of the push for increased nonfiction in the schools. Ironically, there is no scientific evidence that anyone can cite that suppo
Do other countries teach better?
Sent to the New York Times, Dec. 19, 2013The Times asks "Why Other Countries Teach Better?" (Dec. 18). But there is no clear evidence that they do. The most powerful factor in developing well-educated citizens, not mentioned by the Times, is poverty: When researchers control for the effects of poverty, our students score near the top on international tests. A survey from the Organization
DEC 16 2013
Are readers nerds?
ARE READERS NERDS?Adrienne Schatz, Amy Panko, Kim Pierce, and Stephen Krashen Reading Improvement 47 (3): 151-153, 2010Some people think that readers are nerds, "book-worms" who don't get out much, don't do much, and are simply boring, dull people. The research, however, does not agree with this characterizaton. In fact, the results of a number of studies
DEC 13 2013
Putin and the literacy crisis
Everybody thinks they have a literacy crisis. Putin calls for a special commission to support "literature." The common core in the US has called for more nonfiction. There is no evidence for either of these positions. Nobody mentions poverty and lack of access to books. There is plenty of evidence for providing access to books (libraries).Putin blames "creative class" for de
DEC 05 2013
Language Parents for Second Language Acquisition
Language Parents for Second Language Acquisition Stephen Krashen International Journal of Foreign Language Education, 7(3): 2 Lonsdale (2006) presents an interesting discussion of an aspect of second language acquisition many of us are familiar with but has never, to my knowledge, been discussed in print, the concept of “language parents.” A “language parent,” like an actual parent, is somebod
Do we need a new test for teacher-candidates?
Sent to Education Week, Dec 4, 2013Developing and requiring a new test for teacher-candidates is based on the belief that something is wrong with teacher preparaton ("Performance-Based Test for Teachers Rolls Out," Dec. 4).The evidence suggests the opposite is the case. When we control for the effects of poverty, American students rank near the top of the world on international tests. Al
DEC 03 2013
The common core is NOT the answer to low PISA scores.
Sent to the San Francisco Chronicle, Dec 3, 2013The media has learned nothing from the extensive research done on international test scores in the last decade ("U.S. Students Get Stuck in Middle of the Pack on OECD Test," December 3). Study after study shows that the strongest predictor of high scores on these tests is poverty, a conclusion that is backed by a number of other studies sho