Great news from Chicago! Rejoice!

Thanks to the Sun-Times for sharing the good news that Chicago Public Schools is laying off nearly 1,000 teachers and staff (August 5).
This bold move frees up the budget to buy more expensive and unvalidated technology, technology that will be obsolete by the time it is in use. 
We will all rejoice when Bill Gates reaches his goal of being worth 100 billion.

Stephen Krashen
Professor Emeritus
University of Southern California

Original article: http://chicago.suntimes.com/news/chicago-public-schools-to-lay-off-494-teachers/

Little support for California’s public libraries

Sent to the Los Angeles Daily News, August 4.

Julie Beth Todaro and Audrey Church are right when they argue that  "Shelving LAUSD’s school librarians would widen the learning gap," (August 3). Making the situation worse is data showing that California's public libraries are not well-supported.

California cities captured seven of the bottom ten places in the public library category of the recent (2015) "America's Most Literate Cities report." The report analyzes data from 77 cities with populations of 250,000 and above, and is based on number of branch libraries, holdings, circulation and staffing.

The bottom ten:
68. Los Angeles
69. Anaheim
72. Bakersfield
73. Sacramento
74. Chula Vista
75. Stockton
77. Santa Ana

Study after study has confirmed that library quality and professional library staffing are directly related to reading achievement.  More access to books, combined with helpful librarians, means more reading, and more reading means higher levels of reading achievement.

No wonder reading achievement is low in California.

Stephen Krashen
Professor Emeritus
University of Southern California

original article:  http://www.dailynews.com/opinion/20160803/shelving-lausds-school-librarians-would-widen-the-learning-gap-guest-commentary
Julie Todaro is president of the American Library Association. Audrey Church is president of the American Association of School Librarians.

Too little discussion about education

(Re: California State Election.)

I have dedicated my entire working life to education. As a result, it is particularly important to me, and, I am sure, to all citizens, that candidates for the state senate and assembly include strong and specific campaign statements regarding their views on education.  One of the primary responsibilities of state government is education, but other than pious pronouncements that education is "important," the candidates in my district rarely mention it.

A few candidates argue for increased investment in preschool. Although some preschool programs are very helpful, many other preschool programs these days are very academically oriented, in order to prepare children for kindergarten, now called "kindergrind" by some educators.  There is no evidence that this kind of tough love is effective. In fact, in an article last May, Psychology Today reviewed child development research and concluded that "early academic training produces long-term harm."

Very young children are being pushed into excessive amounts of science, technology, engineering and math ("STEM") regardless of their personal interests, just as university students are, because of the widespread belief that there is a shortage of American experts in these fields. Several studies have shown, however, that this is not so. 

Are the candidates aware of this issue?:

Some candidates propose more funding for technology, another two-edged sword. A  recent major review of computer use in 70 countries done by the Organization for Economic Organization and Development concluded that providing schools with computer technology has no academic advantage. My suspicion is that this is because implementation is in the form of pre-packaged programs developed by publishers and is not under the control of the real experts, the teachers.

How do the candidates feel about the use of technology in schools?

And what are their thoughts about the following?

- California has consistently had the lowest reading scores in the nation, and studies relate this problem to a lack of investment in libraries and librarians. Are the candidates committed to more support for our libraries and librarians?

- Bilingual education was dismantled in California in 1998 by prop 227, despite strong evidence that properly organized bilingual programs help language minority children acquire good academic English. In the November elections, Californians will vote on a proposal that will reverse aspects of 227 and once again allow districts to set up bilingual programs that help minority students. Do the candidates have a position on bilingual education?

- Children in California and in the rest of the country undergo a massive amount of unnecessary and expensive testing that does not contribute to their learning. Arizona State University professor David Berliner, for example, has reported that increasing testing does not increase school achievement. Have the candidates carefully examined the impact of testing on our students?

- There is a strong movement from publishing and computer companies toward "competency-based education," which is a new form of online programmed learning that may result in daily testing. There is little evidence that it works. A recent report from the National Governor's Association, an organization enthusiastic about competency-based education (CBE), states that there have been "only a few rigorous evaluations" of CBE programs.  How do the candidates feel about competence-based education?

About 40% of the state general fund budget goes to K-12 education, and another 10% to higher education. It is arguably the most important function of our state government.  We need to know more about the candidates' positions on educational issues.

Stephen Krashen
Professor Emeritus, USC, Rossier School of Education

Targeting 1 and Targeting 2: working paper

I propose here that there are two kinds of targeting of grammar. My goal here is NOT to argue in favor of one or the other, but simply to state the two positions.

Targeting 1 (T1):

1.     The goal is full acquisition of a rule in a short time, so complete that the rule can be retrieved easily and used in production. Because we are talking about acquisition, this cannot be done by direct instruction, and requires comprehensible input.

2.     But if the goal is full acquisition, so complete that you can retrieve the rule after a short amount of time, there is pressure to provide concentrated comprehensible and interesting repititions until the item is fully acquired.

3.     The source of the rules to be targeted is external, from a syllabus made by others.  Our job is to find a story or interesting activity that will include lots of comprehensibe/interesting repetitions of these items. (This is why we get questions such as "do you know a story which I can use for teaching the conditional?"). Thus, Targeting 1 is a way of "contextualizing grammar," defined here as beginning with a target grammar rule and finding a context that will help make it comprehensible.

Note that the goal is not successful monitoring using a consciously learned rule, it is acquisition. Only acquired competence can result in smooth, fluent production.

Targeting 2 (T2):

1.     The goal is comprehension of a story or other CI activity.

2.     This will not require as many comprehensible/interesting reps as in Targeting 1: The goal is comprehension of the story or activity, not full acquisition of the rule in a short time.

3.     The source of the rules to be targeted is internal, from the story.

4.     This kind of targeting may result in full acquisition when used in one or just a few sessions, but it generally results in partial acquisition. Full acquisition comes when the item is used again, in another story or activity.

5.     The goal is understanding the story.

6.     Hypothesis: Grammatical rules targeted in this way are much more likely to be at the students' i+1 than items used for Targeting 1.

7. Hypothesis: At the end of the term (e.g. one academic year), Targeting 2 will result in the full acquisition of many of the rules imposed on us in Targeting 1. This hypothesis needs to be tested by research.

My previous arguments (Krashen, 2013) against targeting are arguments against Targeting 1, not Targeting 2.

Note that Targeting 1, taken to extreme, can lead to a return to the audio-lingual method: If there is major pressure to "master" a given rule so that it can be used in production, and when this cannot be accomplished in the amount of time/comprehensible reps provided, teachers may be tempted to force production, resulting in pseudo-acquisition: either highly monitored or memorized language, not genuinely acquired language.

Of course I fully understand that many teachers have no choice but to do Targeting 1.

Thanks to Karen Rowan, Jason Fritze, Linda Li and Contee Seely for comments on earlier drafts of this note.

Krashen, S. 2013 The Case for Non-Targeted, Comprehensible Input. Journal of Bilingual Education Research & Instruction 15(1): 102-110. Available at www.sdkrashen.com, "language acquisition" section.

Race to the Top for Tots: The Real Goal of Pre-K Education in the US

USNews reported on research concluding that "Early education is a disaster in the US" because of low teacher compensation and preparation.  The study misses the point. The goal of pre-K in the US is to provide the private sector with another area of opportunity for profit. This is working out very well for the greedy minority who make money selling useless products to the pre-K market.

We are told that pre-K must be more academic, with more assessments and more materials, often involving expensive technology, in order to prepare children for the hard work they will have to do in kindergarten (sometimes called "kindergrind").

The fact that some research indicates no long-term advantage for pre-K tough love doesn't matter. Vanderbilt researchers have concluded that pre-K training resulted in "poorer work stills" and more negative feelings about school in kindergarten, but this has not stopped the race to the top for tots.

Stephen Krashen

http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2016-07-07/early-education-is-a-disaster-in-us-study-finds

Vanderbilt research: Lipsey, M. W., Farran, D.C., & Hofer, K. G., (2015). A Randomized Control Trial of the Effects of a Statewide Voluntary Prekindergarten Program on Children’s Skills and Behaviors through Third Grade (Research Report). Nashville, TN: Vanderbilt University, Peabody Research Institute.

Math teacher bashing on yahoo news

Response to an article on math teacher bashing, published at the Hechinger report and carried ON YAHOO NEWS!!  "We’d be better at math if the U.S. borrowed these four ideas for training teachers from Finland, Japan and China."

Mr. Tucker needs to look at the research. When we control for the effects of poverty, American students do quite well on international tests of math. Our overall scores are unspectacular because there is so much child poverty in the US. Countries and areas with high math scores have much lower rates of poverty. Poverty means food deprivation, poor health care, and lack of access to books. The best teaching in the world has little effect with students are ill or hungry.
I will be happy to post the research citations if Mr.Tucker thinks he can understand the math.
Posted at: http://hechingerreport.org/wed-be-better-at-math-if-the-u-s-borrowed-these-four-ideas-for-training-teachers-from-finland-japan-and-china/

Handout: Issues in SSR

Issues in SSR (Sustained Silent Reading)    Krashen

"They won't read." When students don't read during SSR

1.     The books are too hard.  (Relax, students will choose harder books as they progress)

2.     Fear of evaluation:  Marshall: her practice of having group discussions in which she asked students "informal questions about what they were reading, whether they liked their books, and whether they had recommendations for others" (p. 6) was counterproductive; the discussions "made them feel as if they were being 'tested'" (p. 8). (No accountability.)

3.     Too early in the school year.  (Don't expect reading right away: It takes time to find the right book.)

4.     Rigidity: e.g. desk must be clear, can't leave your desk.  (COMFORT & FLEXIBILITY.)

5.     Disruption, even from the teacher.  (Keep it quiet. F. Shin: A separate time to discuss. Books.)

6.     Must finish every book they start: "Abandoning a book that a reader doesn't enjoy (is) a smart move, not a character defect." Nanci Atwell. (Students are free to abandon a book.)

7.     Books not of interest. "There is no such thing as a kid who hates reading.  There are kids who love reading, and kids who are reading the wrong books."  James Patterson  (Wide selection; time to browse; try the Star Method)

8.     Restriction to books only (no magazines, graphic novels): (Not just books. Free voluntary surfing also ok.)

9.     Massed, not distributed sessions. (A few minutes a day, not all at once.)

10.  Students have to bring their own books.  (Have a good supply of reading material available close by!)

Standard objections to self-selected reading.

1."They read only easy books."

Not true:  Self-selected reading is as hard or harder than assigned (LaBrant, 1958; Southgate, Arnold and Johnson, 1981; Shin and Krashen, 2007, Scholastic: 7% choose below reading level).

2. "They read low-quality books."  But: Schoonover, 1938. – Over 70% on recommended reading lists.

3. "They will only read fiction."

Not true (La Brant, 1958), but even if it were ...

(1)   value of FVR studies based largely on fiction

(2)   Fiction contributes to an expanded "theory of mind" = understand others' states of mind, ways of thinking, compared to nonfiction. (Kidd & Castono, 2013)  

(3)   Fiction readers have more tolerance for vagueness, better able to deal with uncertaincy (Djikic,  Oatley, and Moldoveanu,  2013).

"They stick to the same authors and genres."

The advantage of narrow reading

1.     Good readers are narrow readers (Lamme, 1976)

2.     More comprehensible! (and compelling)

Encouraging reading

1.     Read alouds

2.     Access/Time/Place to read

3.     The star method

4.     The Book Whisperer approach

Home Run Book: One positive reading experience enough to create interest in reading: Trelease.