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Florida Reading Quarterly, June 2002
Interview with Nancy Doda Stanley: The International Reading Association (IRA) has established a
commission Doda: One of the great tragedies is that, in the transition from elementary to middle school, our children stop reading, and they literally do not choose reading as an activity of pleasure. When we see young adolescents who are not reading, the question they raise to us is, “Why would anyone want to read?” There is a sense of vacuousness that has taken hold of middle-school youngsters. Unfortunately that disenchantment with reading is the greatest challenge we face. Another challenge is that we have a significant number of struggling and nonreaders in middle grades. I remember teaching in the seventies where I had first-grade and twelfth-grade-level readers simultaneously in the same classroom. That discrepancy still continues today, and unfortunately there are large numbers of children who are nonreaders or emergent readers in the sixth and seventh grades. Adolescent illiteracy is a challenge that is presented to us as a country and certainly not just in Florida. Another important issue for educators has to do with selecting appropriate practices and programs for literacy development. Over the course of my career, literacy development has centered primarily on the language arts dimension. Our greatest need is to move reading into the cross-curricular area. For example, in middle schools we have science, social studies, health, and math teachers embracing strategic reading skills for children. We should be working in these curriculum areas so children receive lots of reading instruction not just in the language arts period. Although there has been a tremendous effort from IRA and other organizations to push that agenda forward, we have not yet seen reading embraced as a cross curricular area. Stanley: When discussing content area learning in your address, you made the statement "less is more." Your statements were reminiscent of Harvard's Learning for the 21st Century Group (http://www.21learn.org/) and interdisciplinary learning. Could you elaborate on your position because that seems very different from what states are mandating? Doda: Clearly you understand how I see a return to the separate subjects as the current vehicle by which we disseminate knowledge. I believe this is a retreat rather than advancement for reading. I might add that I am a firm believer that teachers in middle grades have to be experts in their fields of knowledge. They must also be passionate about their fields of knowledge. Minimally every middle school teacher should be double certified and extensively prepared in two fields of knowledge. Then they are better equipped to provide a view of the world of knowledge other than through the single lens of a separate subject. I don't want to suggest that the disciplines of knowledge don't serve us well. I suggest they are together the appropriate lenses through which children should view learning. I advocate integrated and interdisciplinary curriculum models that allow children to see the big ideas, concepts, and even factual content knowledge through larger umbrella issues. For example, a group of middle-school students were recently observed studying a unit on the future. The students were raising questions about quality of life in the future, the environment of the future, and economic and vocational implications for the future. The children were involved in extremely rigorous research doing analyses of future projected trends and past trends. They were extremely involved in doing surveys in their local communities about attitudes about the future. Students who participated were observed using mathematics, science, and language arts skills. Even beyond that, they were using musical, spatial, and kinesthetic intelligences. I saw students who were very engaged in producing, presenting, polishing, and refining their schoolwork. They were doing what real people do in the real world of learning every day of our lives professionally. In those integrated thematic approaches to learning, children don’t abandon the separate subjects. Instead they see the subjects as useful sources of knowledge to help them understand significant problems in the world. I did mention that middle school should be as rigorous as Harvard. In fact middle schools should be more rigorous than Harvard because middle schools still have a way to go according to my definition of rigor. When we are talking about middle schools being more rigorous than Harvard, we are really talking about developing children's capacity to solve real-world problems using knowledge in context. I also find that when we talk about "less is more" it is certainly not unique to my perception. The great criticism of the U.S. curriculum has always been that it is a mile wide and an inch deep. We have recognized that substantive, meaningful chunks of curriculum would be much more powerful in developing skills and higher level thinking skills as well as content knowledge than a whiz bang “cover the textbook approach.” This has been consistently confirmed by best practice research for years, but doing what we know is right is a difficult thing. Stanley: School administrators often ask university professors to assist them in evaluating the plethora of reading programs. Frequently they want an endorsement for the perfect reading program. However, I believe that the best step is to conduct a needs analysis and then choose a combination of programs that address the best practices of adolescent literacy, effective middle schools, learning theory, professional development, and adolescent psychology. What is your reaction to taking a comprehensive approach? Doda: Certain pervasive principles need to be present in any good, solid, middle-school reading program. Unfortunately, historically lots of folks are looking for "the" program, and that has been a tragedy. Often times "the" program is not the correct fit for certain types of learners or a certain type of school context. I agree that schools need to assess their total reading approach as opposed to a single textbook or single curriculum. For example, I noticed in one school that I visited recently there was just a single literature guide they were using. There wasn't a comprehensive approach to literacy development. I hope middle schools will rethink their approach to the way they tackle the reading enigma. People need to begin to enter into the conversation about blending learning theory, best practices, and adolescent psychology. They will discover a cohesive synergism. I also suggest getting into the schools with some actual on-site observations of programs that work. Look for the discrepancies and problems that are actually encountered in the implementation. The real challenge is always in the implementation stage. Great theory and practice don't always translate-- as we have seen with whole language and some of its struggles in implementation. Changing belief systems is one of the hardest aspects of professional development. Our professional development approaches often fall short of helping teachers develop to their full capacity. So often times teachers go to a workshop on collaborative teaching methods or the use of literature circles in the classroom and they have this one-time-shot to learn a new approach to teaching. If it is commensurate with their belief systems they might implement it. If it's not, then they never have had an opportunity to examine their belief system to begin with. Then it goes by the wayside. So unfortunately, methods are made available to teachers, but we don't go the next step of providing long-term sustained professional development, coaching, and support. Stanley: One of the conclusions of the IRA adolescent literacy focus group which recently was hosted in Orlando went something like this -- we have the knowledge of how to improve middle-school literacy but what we need is a rousing call for action. How can we have a call to action for legislators to focus on this crisis? A website was suggested as beneficial if teachers have the necessary access and time. What do you think would be a good approach to alert the nation to become more aware of the problem of middle-school literacy and the needs of teachers? Doda: I understand there is a recent emerging sense of literacy need among legislators. Living in Washington, DC, I hear a lot of conversations about the essential elements of literacy and questions about reading. Unfortunately, some legislators don't have the knowledge to make the best decisions, and oftentimes they make decisions that may, in fact, negatively impact reading achievement in middle grades. As far as approaches, I think websites make a difference. It is true that many teachers do not have access to technology but it is certainly on the agenda for the future. Since we are thinking ahead, I suggest that websites are appropriate and helpful. In terms of stirring consciousness among folks, the accountability and standards movement has done that successfully. I think people have become increasingly aware of the importance of avoiding declining or flat achievement issues in middle-grades education. Maybe we need more research to target literacy as an area of concern. Perhaps the National Academy of Science could be brought into the conversation in a national summit. We have done that once before, and it would be appropriate again. Stanley: My last question has to do with the issue of equity. A newspaper reported a superintendent as saying, “We don't have time for cultural diversity anymore because we are now in the serious business of raising achievement.” What is your take on equity and standards? Doda: That quote really grabs me because it is exactly that kind of thinking that has gotten us into trouble in the first place. The reason we need to pay attention to achievement is because we haven't paid careful enough attention to cultural diversity. For example, I went into a school which was a fairly culturally diverse community: 65% African American and 30 different languages. It was a very unique place in many respects, but their literature program prescribed literature selections that presumably were made by some higher power. The children had very little African American or Hispanic literature. The stories were not really compatible with the urban quality of life that these young people experienced. A child from that school would have a very difficult time becoming engaged in the literature. It's interesting--how do you get kids to achieve in reading when they are forced to read books that have absolutely nothing to do with their lived experience. My example shows how you can't pursue academic excellence without paying attention to cultural diversity. All of us know that caring about relationships is important in the corporate community, as well as education. For decades we have unraveled some of the corporate productivity equation by looking at their qualities of relationships and dialogues. These qualities are important in both business and learning communities. Fundamentally, learning productivity and whatever we are attempting to do are enhanced when the qualities of relationships and dialogues are improved. So it's befuddling to me that we even question caring as a priority or as a commitment. What else can we do if we want children to be excited about learning other than produce an environment in which there is mutual respect and where children are known as individuals? Also an environment in which the adults treat each other with mutual respect is important. It is in these places where we see true rigor unfold because that’s where human beings are treated in such a way that they are enabled to learn. Finally, one of the most important invitations I can give to practitioners is to visit schools where programs are implemented and their success has been fairly well established. Often times watching a program in a classroom or school is the turning point in beginning to see its merit or inappropriate fit with your own school. Reading about a program is critical, but following it up with visits is even better. A Middle School Program that Works The National Forum (2001) identified criteria to describe high-performing schools that serve students in the middle grades. Such schools are academically excellent, responsive to the developmental challenges of young adolescents and socially equitable, and they provide organizational structures to support and sustain school improvement. The National Forum (West. Brigham, & Lipsitz, 2001) has recognized exemplary middle schools that advocate a cross curricula perspective. Barren County Middle school in Glasgow County, Kentucky is a school cited by the National Forum as an exemplary school. Here are some key practices of Barren County Middle School (Education Week, 2000).
Conclusion Middle schools face the challenge of being caring, developmentally appropriate, and ensuring academic rigor through a curriculum that gives attention to meeting the literacy needs of the students. Adolescent illiteracy is one of the biggest challenges middle schools face today. The curriculum should be integrated and interdisciplinary across subjects with a focus on reading in subjects such as science, mathematics, social studies, health, and language arts. An in-depth approach to learning instead of a broad, shallow approach is advocated. A mile deep rather than a mile wide. Big ideas, concepts, and factual knowledge obtained from real-world subjects and experiences leads to the enhancement of skills and higher-level thinking. A comprehensive approach to literacy and middle-school learning is recommended over any prepackaged program for learning. List of Internet Resources 1. Participants can assess how well their schools meet the National Forum’s
(2001) Schools to Watch criteria by accessing an online survey and comparing
actual school observations with case profiles of identified exemplary schools.
(http://www.mgforum.org/criteria.asp)
List of Nancy Doda Publications Doda, N. M. (1981). Teacher to teacher. Columbus: National Middle School
Association. References Doda, N. M. (1981). Teacher to teacher. Columbus, OH: National Middle School
Association. Nile Stanley is a professor, and poet at University of North Florida and may be reached at nstanley@unf.edu. |
Dr.
Nancy Doda is among the best-known and most highly regarded consultants in
middle-school education. Dr. Doda is in great demand as a speaker and
workshop leader. She began her career in 1974 as a middle-school, language
arts teacher in a Florida middle school that had been acknowledged as an
exemplary school. It was during this time that her commitment to middle
schools took hold. While teaching there, Nancy completed her Masters and
Doctoral degrees in Curriculum and Instruction/Teacher Education at the
University of Florida, Gainesville.