Episode 176: Quick Q&A: Why Shouldn’t We Level Students and What Should We Do Instead?
Why shouldn’t we level students?
Professor and researcher Kristin Conradi-Smith from episode 143 says, “We lack research for differentiation by text levels.There's simply no support for it.” Teaching with a leveled reading, sometimes known as guided reading, approach isn’t the most effective way to teach or learn to read.
Instead, we can
- Support students’ access to complex texts through scaffolds and building knowledge using language comprehension.
- Use students' prior knowledge and match that knowledge to text topic demands.
- Read text sets - a group of texts on the same topic - to build students’ knowledge and vocabulary.
- Practice and model oral reading fluency, rearead, and use comprehension strategies.
Resources
- Episode 143: Maximizing Small Group Reading Instruction
- Matt Burns F&P BAS and LLI Research
- Matt Burns Leveling Students: Why we do it, why we shouldn’t, and what we should do instead
- Tim Shanahan Should We Teach at Reading Level?
- Tim Shanahan blogs What does the Easter bunny have in common with the independent reading level?
- Tim Shanahan presentation Science of Reading Levels
- Dr. Kristen Schrauben Science of Reading What I Should Have Learned in College Private Facebook Group Presentation Giving Up F&P
We wrote a book! The Literacy 50-A Q&A Handbook for Teachers: Real-World Answers to Questions About Reading That Keep You Up at Night
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