The Science of Reading
Lately, many of us in educational circles are hearing a lot of talk and often debate about The Science of Reading (SoR). The question is, what is it exactly and what are some of the common misconceptions about the instruction it supports?
What is the Science of Reading?
Reading is a remarkable cognitive process that opens doors to knowledge and information and is essential to learning across all subject areas. The SoR refers to the scientific research and evidenced based practices that inform how people learn to read and how they can best be taught.
Teachers must know what reading entails, how children learn to do it and, consequently, how it can be taught most effectively (Such, 2021).
The SoR is closely related to the field of cognitive science as it provides insights into the cognitive processes involved when reading. This helps us to understand how readers comprehend, remember, and engage with written text. Emphasising that reading and the process of learning in general is in fact very complex.
The research is based on the notion that learning to read is a ‘biologically secondary’ skill meaning that it is not innately acquired and requires explicit instruction. This is where the SoR research prioritises the importance of students being able to ‘crack the alphabetic code’ early and efficiently (particularly within the first 3 years of schooling). Learning to crack this alphabetic code in a complex language such as English can be challenging and the research highlights the need to teach phoneme grapheme correspondence in a systematic manner to achieve fluent decoding.
A common misconception about the SoR is that this body of research is only concerned with ‘bringing back phonics instruction’ or that it is a specific program that schools need to follow or adopt. This simplified version of the research dismisses the fact that the SoR prioritises the key pillars of reading, including phonemic awareness (the ability to recognize and manipulate individual sounds in words), phonics (the relationship between letters and sounds), fluency (the speed and accuracy of reading), vocabulary development, and comprehension, valuing all of these as being equally important for skilled reading.
As we know, reading is not only about decoding written symbols. It involves learners being able to comprehend and create meaning from what is read. Therefore, it is just as important that students’ progress beyond phonics to a more advanced form of reading. This includes students grasping the complex nature of the English writing system and developing their knowledge of subjects and associated vocabulary to build comprehension.
Scarborough’s Reading Rope (2001), demonstrates the complexities involved in learning to read. The strands of the rope woven together represent the intricacies involved with skilled, competent reading. The rope demonstrates that achieving automaticity in the key areas of Language Comprehension and Word recognition are of equal importance in achieving skilled reading and that text comprehension and creating meaningful connections to what is read is the ultimate outcome.
