Note: The Children of the Code video library is also available for viewing and sharing within YouTube, Facebook, and Linkedin.
WHAT’S AT STAKE: More American children suffer long-term life-harm as a consequence of reading difficulties than from parental abuse, accidents, and all other childhood diseases and disorders combined. In purely economic terms, reading related difficulties cost more than the war on terrorism, crime, and drugs combined. VIDEOS: Introduction – Reading Matters – Academic Danger – Emotional Danger – Social Danger / Juvenile Injustice – National Learning Disability – We Need A REFRAME! [Collective Costs: Disabled Democracy – Health – The Economy – Poverty – Price Tags]
WHAT IS READING? Before engaging in the debates surrounding how we should teach reading, it’s important to understand what reading is. VIDEOS: Introduction – The Magic – Inner Voice – Unnatural>Technological – Code Inseminated Language Experience [Dialogues: Perfetti – Allington – Farkas]
CAUSES AND CONTRIBUTING FACTORS: Why is it so difficult to learn to read? The root cause of reading difficulties (in most children) can be understood in terms of the complex interplay between a number of causes and factors. VIDEOS: INNATE / LD / Dyslexia – Parents – Print Exposure – Preschools – Language Gap – Motivation – Reading to Learn – UNNATURAL CONFUSION – Superficial Thinking – Teacher Training – Dysteachia – Resistance – CHILD’S FAULT
READINESS: Children’s innate endowments and early life learning trajectories determine their level of readiness for the challenges involved in learning to read. VIDEOS: Reading Readiness – Nature & Nurture – Sensitive Slopes – Emotion & Cognition – In The Beginning – Language Foundations – Meaningful Differences
SHAME: Building on ‘CHILD’S FAULT‘ from ‘Causes and Contributing Factors‘, this chapter provides a starting point for appreciating the learning-disabling effects of the “SHAME” that struggling readers experience. VIDEOS: Shame – Power of Shame – Fear of Shame – Secret Shame – Public Shame – Avoidance – Emotionally Learning Disabling – Cognitively Learning Disabling
THE EARLY CODE: Understanding the code and its history is essential to understanding the “CONFUSION‘ involved in learning to read it today. The Power of Writing – The Alphabet’s Big Bang – The Grecian Formula – Lend Me Your Ears – The Code of DaVinci – The Rise and Fall of Literacy
THE ENGLISH CODE: Though readiness and readiness differentiated instruction reduce the difficulty, working through the code’s confusing letter-sound relationships is what most challenges the brains of most struggling readers. There is a direct and causal relationship between the confusion in the code and the ‘stutters’ heard in the voice of a struggling reader. Obviously, understanding this confusion is critical to understanding the challenges involved in learning to read. As importantly, understanding how the code became so confused is critical to reframing the experience of struggling readers. The more we understand the accidents and negligence that led to the confusion in the English code the more it becomes obvious that it is absurdly negligent to blame and shame children for their struggle with it. Latin Roots – French Rules – The King’s English – The Chancery Scribes – The 1st Millennium Bug – The Great Vowel Shift – Casting Spells
ATTEMPTS TO REFORM / PARADIGM INERTIA: The story of our attempts to reform the code is fascinating and understanding these attempts, and why they failed, sheds important light on the social, political, institutional, and even scientific inertia that limits our understanding of the challenges involved in learning to read. Introduction – Ben Franklin’s Alphabet – Noah Webster’s Spelling – Dewey and Carnegie – Theodore Roosevelt’s Order – The Death of Reform – Mark Twain Reform Champion – Other Famous Advocates of Reform – Paradigm Inertia in Reading Science and Policy Part 1 through 3
THE BRAIN’S CHALLENGE
