The Enduring Influence of the National Reading Panel (and the “D” Word)
What do the National Reading Panel (NRP) report (2000), A Nation at Risk (1983), and the seminal “word gap” study by Hart and Risley (1992/1995) have in common?
First, each of these has become a recurring citation in mainstream media when addressing reading (NRP), school accountability (A Nation at Risk), and literacy (“word gap”).
Next, and quite troubling to those of us in education and literacy, all of these have been debunked.
A wide array of scholars have called into question Hart and Risley’s methods, conclusions, and assumptions. Gerald Bracey and Gerald Holtonhave unmasked A Nation at Risk as a false political crisis. And NRP panelist Joanne Yatvin as well as Stephen Krashen have significantly refuted the validity of the NRP report and process.
Recently, the reading wars have been rebooted across mainstream media; concurrent with that has been a rash of new reading legislation in several states.
In both cases, a common phrase is “the science of reading,” a thin veil for renewed emphasis on systematic phonics—in part driven by advocates for children with dyslexia.
News articles across Education Week, NPR, PBS, and other outlets have praised this so-called need for the science of reading while almost uniformly referring to the NRP as the primary research base for that “science.”
One journalist, Emily Hanford, who won an EWA award for her “science of reading” article, discounted my charged the NRP had been debunked with “One member expressing a minority view does not equal ‘debunked.'”
Here, I want to note that I have discovered many people react strongly to the term “debunk,” seemingly because they interpret its meaning CONTINUE READING: The Enduring Influence of the National Reading Panel (and the “D” Word) | radical eyes for equity
