Literacy Ladders 2015

This volume is a joint project of the Albert Shanker Institute (ASI), American Federation of
Teachers (AFT), and Core Knowledge Foundation, each of which is dedicated to improving
education and closing the achievement gap through high-quality early education. This volume
is a curated collection of essays on some of the policies and practices required to create an
excellent early childhood education system for all children and on the research supporting
them. Except for the preface, which was written by the acclaimed reading researcher Marilyn
Jager Adams expressly for this volume, all of the essays were previously published in American
Educator, the AFT’s quarterly magazine of educational research and ideas. Most of the artwork
in the volume was cheerfully created by the children of the AFT’s staff.
The Albert Shanker Institute is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization estab-

lished in 1997 by the American Federation of Teachers to honor the life and
legacy of its late president Albert Shanker. The Institute’s mission is to pro-
mote democracy by supporting two fundamental principles: the right of
every child to quality public education and the right of every worker to a
voice on the job.
The American Federation of Teachers is a union of professionals that cham-

pions fairness; democracy; economic opportunity; and high-quality public
education, healthcare and public services for our students, their families and
our communities. We are committed to advancing these principles through
community engagement, organizing, collective bargaining and political
activism, and especially through the work our members do.
The Core Knowledge Foundation is an independent, nonprofit, nonpartisan

organization founded in 1986 by E. D. Hirsch, Jr., that advocates for content-
specific, coherent, cumulative curriculum. The Foundation develops curri-
cula, publishes educational books and materials, provides professional
development for educators, and supports a growing network of Core
Knowledge schools.
Copyright © Albert Shanker Institute and American Federation of Teachers. Permission is hereby granted to
reproduce and distribute copies of the work for nonprofit education purposes, provided that copies are distributed
at or below cost, and that the author, source, and copyright notice are included on each copy. Any other distribution
of these materials is prohibited without first receiving express written permission.
Table of Contents
4 Preface: Knowledge for Literacy
By Marilyn Jager Adams
11 The Magic of Words

Teaching Vocabulary in the Early Childhood Classroom
By Susan B. Neuman and Tanya S. Wright
18 Dual Language Learners

Effective Instruction in Early Childhood
By Claude Goldenberg, Judy Hicks, and Ira Lit
22 Why Reading to Children Is Important

By Susan L. Hall and Louisa C. Moats
30 Building Knowledge
The Case for Bringing Content into
the Language Arts Block and for
a Knowledge-Rich Curriculum
Core for all Children
By E. D. Hirsch, Jr.
42 How Knowledge Helps

It Speeds and Strengthens
Reading Comprehension,
Learning—and Thinking
By Daniel T. Willingham
47 Teaching Vocabulary
Early, Direct, and Sequential
By Andrew Biemiller
52 Oral Comprehension Sets the

Ceiling on Reading
Comprehension
By Andrew Biemiller
54 Beyond Comprehension
We Have Yet to Adopt a Common Core Curriculum That Builds
Knowledge Grade by Grade—But We Need To
59 Advancing our Students’ Language and Literacy

The Challenge of Complex Texts
LITERACY LADDERS | 3
PREFACE
Knowledge for Literacy
T
he very purpose and promise of
schooling is to prepare students
for responsible adult lives—to
be civically minded and
informed, to pursue higher education,
and to find gainful work that allows them
to grow and contribute to society. Tragi-
cally, a significant percentage of U.S.
students leave high school unable to read
well enough for college, career, or citi-
zenship. Given technology’s accelerating
impact on the labor market alongside
trends in globalization, this shortfall has
dire consequences for our children’s
social, physical, and economic well-
being. Ensuring that schooling fulfills its
purpose and promise for all children is
the urgent objective of the Common Core
State Standards (CCSS) in English lan-
guage arts and literacy.1
A primary component of this objective
is that students be given ample support
and practice in reading, interpreting, and
five grade levels higher2—than those gen- is an overview of major points to bear in
writing about texts as complex as those
erally used in high schools today. But here mind as you read.
that characterize life beyond high school.
lies our great dilemma. All by itself, just
Indeed, the complexity of the texts that 1. Comprehension
increasing the sophistication of assigned
CCSS recommends for high school stu- Depends on Knowledge
texts is unlikely to do much good. The
dents is far higher—by some estimates,
problem in the first place, after all, is that The overarching theme of this collection is
most students are unable to understand that if we wish to advance our students’
Marilyn Jager Adams is a visiting scholar in the such rigorous texts, and people do not literacy, we must devote ourselves to
Cognitive, Linguistic, and Psychological Sciences
Department at Brown University and former
learn from texts that they cannot under- increasing the breadth and depth of their
chief scientist for Soliloquy Learning, Inc. She is stand: They do not even learn new words, domain knowledge.
the author of numerous scholarly papers and much less assimilate new information. This may sound very unmodern. With
several books, including two landmark works, In other words, the promise of the CCSS the internet, it seems that one can get the
Beginning to Read: Thinking and Learning depends unforgivingly on our ability, as answer to virtually any question in a frac-
about Print and Phonemic Awareness in Young
Children, as well as a number of empirically
educators, to raise our students’ language tion of a second. Why, then, should how
validated classroom resources, including Scho- and literacy to levels that enable them to much somebody knows matter at all? The
lastic’s System 44 (2009) and iRead (2013), understand and gain from such texts. And answer is that one can only understand
technology-based programs for building literacy again, for the majority of students, a dra- and learn from language (oral or written) if
foundations. She has served on the advisory matic increase is required. it builds on what one already knows. Thus,
board for several of the Public Broadcasting
System’s educational programs including Ses-
The essays in this anthology are focused the internet can be a wonderful tool for
ame Street and Between the Lions. She also on this challenge. If you are like me, you extending our knowledge of a topic. For
developed a vocabulary assessment for the 2014 will need to read all of these pieces more wholly new topics, however, how can one
National Assessment of Adult Literacy (NAAL) than once to begin to “hear” them and see even know what question to ask? More-
and was on the development team for the Com- how they fit together to inform instruction. over, the internet is notorious for leading
mon Core State Standards for English Language
Arts and Literacy.
In the spirit of an advance organizer, here less savvy readers astray.
4 | LITERACY LADDERS
Through language, novel concepts can thing happens when you encounter each mill.” Rather, knowledge is the very medium
only be communicated in the form of successive word in the sentence. As the of understanding. It is for this reason that
novel combinations of familiar concepts. associations tied to each ensuing word in “Effectively teaching reading requires
The meanings of new words can be ver- the sentence become activated, there are schools to systematically teach the diverse
bally explained only in terms of known subsets of knowledge from different words enabling knowledge that reading with com-
words. Sometimes a new word can be that overlap or fit together, effectively prehension requires” (Hirsch, p. 57).
adequately explained by comparing and becoming superactivated. As these over-
contrasting it with familiar concepts (e.g., lapping associations correspond to the
a mayfly looks like a giant mosquito but it ways in which the meanings of these words 2. Start Early
is harmless). Otherwise, we must define Knowledge, writes Willingham, grows
the word by decomposing it into familiar exponentially: The more you know, the
concepts and then piecing together the easier it is to learn (p. 42). Thus, as Hirsch4
whole. Either way, the usefulness of the points out, the earlier that children are
effort depends on the familiarity of the enrolled in quality preschool programs, the
supporting concepts we offer. Working greater the gains (p. 40). The more they
with young children, for example, the
word tigers might be adequately defined
The overarching know each year, the more they will learn by
the next.
as “large wild cats with orange and black theme of this But what makes a preschool program
stripes”; in contrast, a definition such as good? As Neuman and Wright have noted,5
“large carnivorous felines of Asia” would
collection is that one very important preschool predictor of
surely be far less helpful. to advance our literacy is alphabetic knowledge—includ-
Yet the role of prior knowledge in under- ing the abilities to recognize, sound, and
standing language runs far deeper than students’ literacy, we write the letters (p. 11). In the wake of the
these examples show. The core definition of must increase their Early Reading First Initiative,6 most early
a word is only a tiny fragment of the mean- childhood education programs include
ing that makes it useful in understanding domain knowledge. activities intended to develop alphabetic
language. Neuroimaging confirms that the knowledge. Yet, evidence abounds that
full meaning of a familiar word extends most such efforts contribute little at all to
broadly through the mind, including asso- their students’ alphabetic knowledge.7
ciations to every trace that your experience This is not good. We must do a better job
with that word or its concept has left in your developing children’s alphabetic knowl-
memory. For instance, your full knowledge edge. Unfortunately, there are fifty-two
of the word “apple” extends to the traces in are related to one another, they are the letters (since children must learn the capi-
your memory of the many apples in your life candidates for the intended sense and talized and lower case forms), which is a
and how they have looked, felt, tasted, nuance of each of the words in this context. lot. Worse, the letters look a lot like each
smelled, or sounded (e.g., when you bit into, Meanwhile, the syntax of the sentence other, and their names rhyme with each
dropped, or sliced them); of where you were selects from these overlaps and organizes other. Worse still, they must be learned
and what else and who else was there with their roles and relevance so as to create a very, very well. Perhaps understandably,
each apple; of picking apples, peeling “best-fit” reconstruction of the author’s some have voiced concern that teaching
apples, and bobbing for apples; of cider, intended message in your mind.3 the letters is developmentally inappropri-
apple pie, caramel apples, and Waldorf sal- Alternatively, consider what happens ate for preschool and kindergarten chil-
ads; of apple trees, teachers’ apples, and if—whether due to vocabulary or reading dren. Yet the fact remains that the
poison apples; of “rotten apples,” “apple- difficulties—you cannot recognize a word developmental inappropriateness of first
cheeked,” “apple a day,” and the “Big Apple;” at all. What you lose is not just the meaning grade is brutal for children who do not yet
of Adam and Eve, William Tell, George of that particular word, but also the work it know the alphabet on entry.
Washington, Steve Jobs, the Beatles, and so was supposed to do in selecting the appro- Take care to fit letter work and play into
on. The more strongly or frequently any priate dimensions of the meanings of the every day—have the children sing them,
such association has been tied to the apples other words around it. In between—to the march to them, chant them, name them,
in your life, the more strongly it dominates extent that you recognize the word but match them, play games with them, and
your overall concept of an apple. But all of have scant knowledge of its meaning and write them over and over. Keep it light, and
your experiences, be they direct or linguis- usage—your understanding is commensu- keep it fun, but do make sure the children
tic, are there—all waiting to be used in mak- rately impoverished. learn. Happily, rote memorization profits
ing sense of “apple” the next time you see or The bottom line, as Hirsch (p. 33) sum- more from revisits than cramming. This
hear it. marizes, is that “In order to become better means that, given daily attention, the let-
When you encounter the word “apple” at reading with understanding, you already ters can be well-supported in developmen-
in conversation or text, it will automatically have to be able to read with understanding.” tally appropriate ways in the time
activate its entire, extended complex of In other words, as Willingham (p. 42) points surrounding activities that are cognitively
associations in your mind, and the same out, knowledge is far more than “grist for the more absorbing.
And what should be those cognitively reduces to word salad. and so on. What is stored directly with any
absorbing activities? Most important are But again, there is good news. When the particular concept (or individual) is only
activities designed to build the language, same sentence is expressively read aloud that knowledge that belongs especially to
knowledge, and modes of thought on to a child, the shifts in the reader’s pitch it: a robin is a medium-sized woodland
which understanding written text depends. and timing convey its structure and make bird that is mostly grey with an orange
Of these three dimensions, it is language— it comprehensible. Further, unlike the breast and that eats worms; a vulture is a
or, specifically, vocabulary—that is most ABCs or phonics, learning syntax is natu- hawk-like bird with brownish-black feath-
measurable. Consequently, efforts to build ral; it is our birdsong. Research shows that ers except on its head and neck (which are
children’s reading comprehension are children come to grasp a new syntactic naked) and that eats carrion; a canary is a
often focused on vocabulary per se.
But again, words are not just words.
What makes vocabulary valuable and
important is the knowledge to which each
word points and the understanding
afforded by that knowledge. Developing a
serviceably rich representation of a word—
of the ways the word is used, and of the
knowledge that the word represents, and
with which that knowledge, in turn, is asso-
ciated—necessarily requires many differ-
ent encounters across many different (and
understandable!) contexts. Unfortunately,
as Neuman and Wright report, remember-
ing to adequately repeat and revisit new
vocabulary is nearly impossible in the busy
multi-task environment of the classroom
(p. 14). How might we do better?
Neuman has said it beautifully, “Return
book reading to its original purpose: Learn- structure just by hearing and understand- small yellow bird that sings and is often
ing about ideas and the words that convey ing it remarkably few times.11 Using and kept in a cage; Freddie is my grandmother’s
them.”8 Moreover, organizing the readings extending a new syntactic structure on her canary.
into topical units—such as kings and or his own, however, makes it part of the Similarly, the brain builds categories of
queens, or bees, or deserts—can multiply student’s own productive language reper- verbs based on their core or nuclear mean-
the impact many times over. Topical read- toire. Thus, Neuman and Wright urge early ing. As an example, the meanings of peek,
ings, as Hirsch points out,9 provide a natu- childhood educators to pick topics that can glance, glare, and ogle are all built around
ral and highly productive way of revisiting be enriched across a number of different the core meaning of look; they differ from
and extending new learning (p. 38). Across texts, both fiction and nonfiction, and to each other only in how, why, or at what you
readings, as the books build interlaced complement the read-alouds with lively are looking. As other examples, march,
networks of knowledge, the similarities, discussion, play settings, and other activi- strut, amble, and tiptoe are all variations of
contrasts, and usages of the words gain ties designed to engage the children with the core verb walk, while grumble, whisper,
clarity. In tandem, the stories gain plot and the language and content of the books. whine, and exclaim are all variations of the
excitement, and the informational texts Again, the full meaning of any concept core verb speak.
gain structure and provoke wonder. Fur- in your mind is made up of all of the experi- The brain builds such categories auto-
ther, as the knowledge network is enriched, ences and knowledge with which that matically as a result of its own architecture
the mind is ever better prepared to under- concept has ever been associated over and organizational dynamics; because
stand the language of each new sentence. your lifetime. Yet, if you think about it, the they are natural, categorization games are
Beyond vocabulary, research shows meanings of most words overlap with the fun and easy for children. Even so, giving
that gains in “book language” are among meanings of many other words in one way children conscious, thoughtful awareness
the strongest measurable benefits of read- or another. These overlaps are very effi- of the nature and structure of categories
ing aloud to children.10 The syntax of writ- ciently exploited by the brain. In particular, allows them to examine, edit, and use cat-
ten language is very different from that of the brain makes heavy use of categories. egories purposefully, in service of thinking
oral language—so much so that asking For example, much of what you know and language learning. Further, because
students to read a sentence with familiar about the meaning of any common noun, categorization games inherently require
words but unfamiliar syntactic structure is say, robins, vultures, or canaries is stored children to think carefully about both the
like asking them to solve a math problem with their category, birds: each has wings similarities and differences between the
without the operators: The syntax specifies and feathers, it lays eggs, and it belongs to items to be sorted, they are an exception-
how the words in the sentence are to be the larger category of vertebrate animals, ally efficient and powerful means of build-
interrelated; without it, the sentence which actively eat and move, have hearts, ing vocabulary. In effect, the result is a
separate knowledge network for each word to help them become more knowledge- dents read for just 30 minutes per day, that
or concept that is firmly anchored to and able. The answer, echoed across all of these would be six times more than is currently
clearly differentiated from its cousins. essays, is that the kind of knowledge their norm. The bad news, of course, is that
It is for these reasons that games that required for reading develops first and asking children to read does not ensure
involve categorizing nouns and compar- foremost through reading. Our students that they will read or that they will do so
ing, contrasting, and enacting verbs are need to be engaged in lots more reading productively. It is easy to fritter away 30
recommended in the Foundation levels of than has been the norm. This means more minutes a day. Besides which, just as too
the CCSS. As Neuman and Wright’s study eyes-on, minds-on reading by them, and it many students don’t read well because
so thrillingly demonstrates, these sorts of also means more reading aloud to them. they don’t read much; many of those same
games are more than worthwhile (p.15). students don’t read much because they
In the study they describe, categorization don’t read well.
games worked wonders in narrowing the Each of us is nodding and sighing. We
gap between less-advantaged preschoolers all know this is so. However, the point—the
(including both native speakers and Eng- urgency—of the CCSS is that somehow we
lish language learners) and a comparison must figure out ways to make it not so.
group of upper-middle class preschoolers. There is good news: For students who
As for dual language learners, the can cold read even a below-grade-level text
review by Goldenberg, Hicks and col- Most effective early with decent accuracy (≥95%) and moder-
leagues 12 (p.18) reveals many different
ways of complementing home- and Eng-
childhood education ate fluency (≥100 words per minute), sig-
nificant improvement in reading ease and
lish-language instruction. Building, dis- programs are efficiency tends to come with surprisingly
cussing, categorizing, and exploring new little practice—provided that students
concepts is valuable for every child, regard- coordinated with attend to those aspects of the texts that
less of the language in which it is done; early parenthood pose difficulties along the way.17
what matters are the ideas and knowledge For primary-grades students, the poten-
that underlie language. Based on the les- education. tial of well-managed partner reading for
sons of cognitive science, writes Hirsch,13 increasing time on text is broadly appreci-
knowledge-centered units in the early ated. 18 While such extra time-on-text
grades should raise reading achievement should be equally valuable for older stu-
for all students even as they should help to dents, they would seem to need some
narrow the language and literacy gaps that additional dynamic—something that will
exist at school entry (p. 30). induce them to read more attentively. One
Indeed, it is primarily this goal, the clos- such possibility follows directly from what
ing of gaps, that drives the universal pre- As so brilliantly assessed through a pro- is known as Zipf’s Law. As I explain19 (p.
school movement. As is, the differences in gram of research by Cunningham and 63), the essence of Zipf’s Law is that every
children’s language and literacy levels at Stanovich,16 the amount of reading that natural language sample is centered on a
school entry are huge and tend to persist school children do is a strong predictor of relatively small set of words that are
and even to grow across the school years. their general knowledge, vocabulary, repeated over and over; these are the words
(p. 49).14 Moreover, as Thomas Sticht has growth in reading comprehension, decod- most closely related to the topic of what the
pointed out,15 children actually spend very ing and spelling facility, and the quantity language sample is about.
little of their time at school; while quality and quality of their writing. And that’s so As an example, consider a history text-
preschool programs are insuperably even when subtracting entry-level reading book. The book can be completed by year’s
important, gap closing necessarily depends skills and general intelligence out of the end by assigning a chapter a week, and you
on improving the educational support and equation. Among college students, the can motivate students’ reading by schedul-
encouragement children receive at home. amount of reading predicts academic ing a quiz each Friday. But alas, the results
Whether gauged by their impact on chil- knowledge, practical knowledge, vocabu- of the Friday quiz inevitably show that this
dren or parents, and whether measured in lary, spelling, and verbal fluency even after incentive is somehow not enough for many
terms of cognitive or noncognitive skills, controlling for differences in their reading students. Indeed, many students seem not
the recurrent finding is that the most effec- comprehension and nonverbal ability. even to have digested the first few pages of
tive early childhood education programs Among senior citizens, the amount of read- the chapter. In fairness, this should prob-
are coordinated with early parenthood ing protects general knowledge and vocab- ably not be surprising; after all, the first few
education. ulary from the cognitive decline of aging. pages of each chapter are typically the
In short, regardless of age or entry ability, hardest because they introduce new terms
3. Lots More Reading reading makes people smarter. and issues. But here equally is the oppor-
If the productivity of students’ reading is so The good news is that a reasonably tunity: As quantified by Zipf’s Law, these
integrally dependent on the relevant modest reading schedule would make a same terms, words, and issues will domi-
knowledge with which they meet the text, huge difference to our students’ literacy nate the chapter as a whole. That is, if you
then the next obvious question is how best growth. If, for example, middle-grade stu- can get the students to process the chal-
lenges that arise in the first few pages, then challenging text just once with a child is comprehension, relevant knowledge is
the rest of the chapter should be far easier seldom enough. With a roomful of kids, even more important that general reading
to read and understand. even less gets through; sometimes, so little ability. When the high- and low-knowledge
Suppose, then, that you devote Monday’s gets through that they do not even want a groups are divided into good and poor
class time to having the students partner- re-reading—ouch. Adults can discern readers, those with little knowledge rele-
read the first few pages of the chapter with speech in noisy environments by filling in vant to the text at hand perform relatively
the primary task of identifying aspects of the the blanks from their own language and poorly, regardless of how well they read in
text—be they difficult words, complex sen- vocabulary. For students who do not yet general. In contrast—and this is impor-
tences, allusions to information that is not own the language and words of the book, tant—the performance of the poor readers
in the chapter, or whatever—that they feel a wireless microphone can make all the with higher background knowledge is
might pose difficulty for at least some stu-
dents. The members of each pair are to take
turns reading aloud and taking notes on
issues of concern while you wander from
pair to pair, sampling and guiding their dis-
cussion and note-taking and, importantly,
praising their perspicuity in identifying
potential difficulties. Bringing the whole
class back together, ask the students to share
and grapple with the issues they have identi-
fied. To close the session, you can lead them
to shape the major questions to be borne in
mind while reading the rest of the chapter
on their own—and they will now be in good
stead to do so.
Of course, the chapters in a textbook
generally offer little more than an introduc-
tion to a topic, rarely managing to convey
well why a topic may be important or inter- difference. Similarly, panning books across generally better than that of the good read-
esting to think about. Think of the glass as the group so that all can see and respond ers with less background knowledge, and
half full: A solid introduction opens the was the best available option not so long nearly as good as the good readers with lots
door for more thoughtful and substantive ago; today, a projection system can make of background knowledge.
exploration of the topic. Textbook chapters the book-sharing sessions far more engag- Prior knowledge about the topic at hand
are always best followed with more specific ing and efficient. These sorts of aids should is like mental velcro. The relevant knowl-
and thought-worthy texts (which can be not be thought of as nice-to-have luxuries. edge gives the words of the text places to
coupled with variations on the same game, They are valuable for all students and argu- stick and make sense, thereby supporting
e.g., look for each side’s arguments, incon- ably indispensable for younger children, comprehension and propelling the reading
sistencies, critical events, and the like). those with low vocabularies, and English process forward. Thus, in a study described
Remember too that, as mentioned in language learners. In addition, they can by Willingham, scientists monitored read-
many of the essays, children’s listening significantly increase the ease, efficiency, ers’ eye movements while reading about
comprehension surpasses their reading and power of your classroom instruction, topics that were more versus less familiar
comprehension roughly until they are able discussion, and management. to them (p.43). Given texts about the less
to cold-read texts of middle-school reading familiar topics, people’s reading slowed
levels with solid fluency. As a result, reading 4. Topical Units down and the progress of their eye move-
aloud and discussing materials that are Across these essays are descriptions of a ments was marked with more pausing and
beyond the students’ current reading capac- number of studies designed to ask how rereading. In other words, it is not just that
ity serve to enrich their understanding of the topic-relevant background knowledge readers with less topic-relevant back-
topic at hand while preparing them to man- affects reading performance. Over and ground knowledge gain less from reading
age more complex language, information, over, studies find better performance from about that topic, it is also that less-knowl-
and modes of thought on their own. The people with ample versus slim background edgeable readers must expend more time
essay by Hall and Moats20 provides a vivid knowledge about the general topic of a and more effort to arrive at what limited
tapestry of the kinds of learning that book text. The studies have found that people understanding they do gain.
reading affords, resulting in “a huge inven- with more topic-relevant knowledge learn What does information have to do with
tory of mental images of life’s experiences … more, read more critically, make more and text complexity? They are closely related in
much more rapidly than the child could better inferences, are more alert to incon- two important ways (p. 60). On one hand,
experience firsthand” (p. 23) and, more, one sistencies within the text, and are better texts that are more complex in vocabulary
that is available forever. able to see and apply the pertinence of and syntax tend also to be more presump-
Even one-on-one, however, reading a what they’ve read to other situations. For tuous of readers’ background knowledge.
On the other, texts that strive to present accelerated vocabulary growth, and deep knowledge affords are part of the lit-
more precise argument or more specific improvements in the spelling, style, organi- erate mind.
information on a topic are unavoidably zation, and ideas in their writing. Because
more complex in vocabulary and syntax. In topical units offer a means of scaffolding 5. Don’t Neglect the Basics or
order for students to become comfortable texts both lexically and conceptually, they Avoid Direct Instruction
and competent with these sorts of texts, allow students to rapidly work their way up
There are some who are (mistakenly) cel-
they must first develop a supportive under- to engage productively with texts that would
ebrating the CCSS as an abandonment of
standing of the broader topic or situation otherwise be beyond their reach. In turn,
basics and a return to whole language.
in discussion. And that’s where topical experience in understanding more sophis-
Similarly, many have come to look askance
units come in. ticated texts brings additional benefits. In
at the value of direct instruction—too often
First, what is a topical unit? In a topical
cast as a the lingering dross of some old-
reading unit, all texts are about some aspect
fashioned notion of children’s minds as
of a single main concept. As the texts
empty jugs to be filled, drop by drop, with
become more sophisticated, their focus
little pellets of knowledge meted out by the
may turn to particular aspects of that con-
teacher. The bottom line, however, is that
cept—for example, a unit on sharks might
unless and until the basics are in place,
include texts on their peculiar anatomy (no
higher-order learning is not possible. Con-
bones), ram ventilation (the inability of
some sharks to breathe unless they are
The bottom line sistently, even while emphasizing the
importance of nurturing students’ lan-
swimming), sensory systems (their awe- is that unless and guage and knowledge, every one of these
some ability locate prey), how their skin
(basically made of teeth) contributes to their until the basics are essays firmly reminds us of the importance
of securing the basics and of the value of
speed, and/or what is known about prehis- in place, higher- direct instruction in so doing.
toric sharks—but the core concept, sharks,
remains the same. Be warned that some order learning is Within the literacy domain, basics are
those core insights or principles that
reading programs mistake what might bet-
ter be called “thematic units” for topical
not possible. undergird systems of knowledge or con-
ventions. Just as with any other kernel of
units. As a quick rule of thumb, if it is a topi-
knowledge, the basics become useful and
cal unit, then the word or words naming the
usable only as they are linked within the
same core concept—in this case “shark”—
student’s mind to specific examples of their
should appear frequently in every text.
application.
(Note: Superficial treatments and texts
Consistently, direct instruction consists
about different concepts labeled with the
of two parts, corresponding to two different
same word don’t count.) particular (p. 63), the mind is structured
meanings of the word “direct.” The first is
In beginning a topical unit, it is wise to such that both the syntax and the sorts of
that the basic in focus is to be explained
choose a text that presents a short, simple relations among concepts that are built
explicitly or directly. The second is that the
overview and to engage students in using through deep reading about one topic are
usability of the lesson depends on directing
its core words and in discussing and won- available in reading many others to the
the students’ attention to concrete exam-
dering about its core concepts, making degree that they are related and so, too, are
ples of the basic that is being taught.
sure they are well anchored. Moving the kinds of arguments that authors offer to
Indeed, the value of direct instruction is
through the unit, as major topical words support their points.22
hastened by establishing (and, as neces-
arise over and over across texts, students In short, an expert oceanographer can
sary, reminding) an explicit contract with
will come to recognize them at a glance. be expected to penetrate an advanced text
the students:
More importantly, as these words will arise in oceanography with remarkable ease and
(1) My job is to explain how this basic
with slightly different linguistic and con- incisiveness. However, people who have
works and walk you through some
ceptual surroundings on each encounter, engaged deeply with complex information
examples;
students will effectively be building and and argument in any scientific field—
(2) Your job is to think—to apply and
refining a network of knowledge about the experts in biogenetics, mineralogy, phys-
generalize the basic to new examples.
concepts that the words name that is ever ics, or marine biology, for example—could
As Cunningham and Stanovich put it,
more richly interconnected and, therefore, be expected to be able to understand the
“We must ensure that students’ decoding
ever more richly receptive and supportive same text far better (even if with signifi-
and word recognition abilities are progress-
of comprehension and refinement. cantly more effort than the oceanographer)
ing solidly,” for “it is difficult to overstate the
The deeper domain knowledge that topi- than the man on the street. The advantage
importance of getting children off to an
cal units help students acquire is of inesti- of the oceanographer is due to the fact that,
early successful start in reading.”24 Thus it is
mable importance in itself, but topical units as Hirsch 23 points out, knowledge is
that the CCSS Foundational Skills for kin-
also bring a number of other benefits along- domain specific. The advantage of the
dergarten and the lower elementary grades
side. Direct benefits that Hirsch21 discusses other well-read scientists is due to the fact
include a number of standards for word
(p. 30) include increases in reading fluency, that the modes of thought and analysis that
recognition and spelling basics, phonemic a relatively stable, identifiable body of (1996) 489–508.
awareness, phonics, and decoding. It is “core” knowledge—knowledge of certain 3. For an educator-friendly review of the neural connections
from letters to meaning, see: M. J. Adams, “The Relation
worth calling out, however, that the CCSS people, places, events, and of certain between Alphabetic Basics, Word Recognition and
Foundational Skills also recommend that all social, natural, and physical principles, Reading,” in What Research Has to Say about Reading
Instruction, 4th edition, eds. S. J. Samuels and A. E. Farstrup
children be able to recognize and write the processes, and phenomena—that the aver- (Newark, DE: International Reading Association, 2011),
4–24.
letters of the alphabet by the end of kinder- age American is broadly expected to pos-
4. E. D. Hirsch, Jr. “Building Knowledge: The Case for
garten. With respect to literacy growth, letter sess. Such “core” knowledge, he argues, is Bringing Content into the Language Arts Block and for a
knowledge is a basic among basics. Unless essential to literacy as it is presumed by— Knowledge-Rich Curriculum Core for all Children,” 30–41
(this volume).
and until the students’ can reliably discern and therefore required for the understand- 5. S. Neuman and T. Wright, “The Magic of Words: Teaching
one letter from another, teaching phonics, Vocabulary in the Early Childhood Classroom,” 11–17 (this
volume).
decoding, or spelling is a waste of time and 6. Archived information can be found at http://www2.ed.
even phonemic awareness remains out of gov/programs/earlyreading/index.html.
reach. Nevertheless, recent data show that 7. For a review, see M. J. Adams, ABC Foundations for
Young Children: A Classroom Curriculum (Baltimore, MD:
only a minority of children is able to name,
sound, or write all the letters of the alphabet
Hirsch’s work Paul H. Brookes Publishing, 2013).
8. S. Neuman, “Sparks Fade, Knowledge Stays: The National
by the end of first grade.25 This is a problem demonstrates Early Literacy Panel’s Report Lacks Staying Power,” American
Educator, v. 34, no. 3 (2010), 17.
that we can and must fix.
Across the essays, you will also find rec- that there is 9. E. D. Hirsch, Building Knowledge; E.D. Hirsch, Jr. “Reading
Comprehension Requires Knowledge—of Words and the
World,” American Educator, v.27 no.1 (2003),
ommendations for direct instruction in indeed an 10–13,16–22,28–29,48.
grammar, spelling, recognizing and under- 10. H. S. Scarborough and W. Dobrich, “On the Efficacy of
standing root words, and manipulating identifiable body of Reading to Preschoolers,” Developmental Review 14, no. 3
(1994), 245–302; A. G. Bus, M. H. van Ijzendoorm, and A.
“core” knowl-
affixes. Goldenberg and colleagues26 remind D. Pelligrini, “Joint Book Reading Makes for Success in
Learning to Read: A Meta-Analysis on Intergenerational
us that that students’ home language can be Transmission of Literacy,” Review of Educational Research
invaluable in anchoring and clarifying les- edge that the 65, no. 1 (1995), 1–21.
11. J. Huttenlocher, M. Marina Vasilyeva, and P. Shimpi,
sons. Meanwhile, with focus on the strong
association between the vocabulary gap average American is “Syntactic Priming in Young Children,” Journal of Memory
and Language 50, no. 2 (2004), 182–195; P. M. Shimpi, P. B.
Gámez, J. Huttenlocher, and M. Vasilyeva, M., “Syntactic
and the fourth grade slump, Biemiller27 (p. expected to possess. Priming in 3- and 4-Year-Old Children: Evidence for Abstract
Representations of Transitive and Dative Forms,”
48) argues passionately for more and better- Developmental Psychology 43, no. 6 (2007), 1334–1346.
planned attention to direct instruction in 12. C. Goldenberg, J. Hicks, and I. Lit, “Dual Language
vocabulary, reminding us of both parts of Learners: Effective Instruction in Early Childhood,” 18–21
(this volume).
the equation: (1) direct explanation of the 13. Hirsch, Building Knowledge
words’ meanings, and (2) ample experience 14. A. Biemiller, “Teaching Vocabulary: Early, Direct, and
ing of—tests, textbooks, and all manner of Sequential,” 48–52 (this volume); and A. Biemiller, “Oral
with each new word in meaningful context,
responsible news and journalism. Comprehension Sets the Ceiling on Reading Comprehen-
especially as gained through reading both sion,” 53–54 (this volume).
If such knowledge is expected of every
by and to the children. 15. T. Sticht, “Getting It Right from the Start: The Case for
adult, then surely it ought to part of the Early Parenthood Education,” American Educator 35 no. 3
(2011), 35–39.
education that our schools provide to
6. Curriculum 16. A. Cunningham and K. Stanovich, “What Reading Does
every student. Moreover, Hirsch argues, it for the Mind,” American Educator, v.22 no. 1–2 (1998),
Finally, there is the question of “what is just plain sensible to organize these top- 8–15.
knowledge?” The CCSS outline how well ics in sequence, grade by grade. Such 17. M. J. Adams, Technology for Developing Children’s
Language and Literacy: Bringing Speech-Recognition to the
students should be able to read, write, and organization would ensure efficient cov- Classroom (New York: Joan Ganz Cooney Center at Sesame
understand at each grade level, even to the Workshop, 2011). http://joanganzcooneycenter.org/
erage across classrooms and grades, and upload_kits/jgcc_tech_for_language_and_literacy.pdf
point of specifying the sophistication or significantly mitigate the educational 18. D. Simmons, L. Fuchs, D. Fuchs, P. Mathes, and J. P.
difficulty of the texts. The CCSS also recog- costs of between-school mobility. “If Hodge, “Effects of Explicit Teaching and Peer-Mediated
Instruction on the Reading Achievement of LD and
nize the importance of knowledge in this states would adopt a common core cur- Low-Performing Students,” Elementary School Journal 95,
challenge, both through emphasizing no. 5 (1995), 387–408.
riculum that builds knowledge grade by 19. M. J. Adams “Advancing our Students’ Language and
informational texts and even the standards’ grade,” concludes Hirsch, 29 “reading Literacy,” 60–69 (this volume).
full title: “The Common Core Standards for achievement would rise for all groups of 20. S. L. Hall and L. C. Moats, “Why Reading to Children Is
English Language Arts and Literacy in His- Important,” 22–29 (this volume).
children.… Equally important, the 21. Hirsch, Building Knowledge
tory/Social Studies, Science, and Technical achievement gap between social groups 22. Adams, Advancing our Students
Subjects.” However, the CCSS provide no would be greatly narrowed and social 23. E.D. Hirsch, “Beyond Comprehension: We Have yet to
guidance with respect to the domains of justice would be served” (p. 59). ☐ Adopt a Common Core Curriculum that Builds Knowledge
Grade by Grade—But We Need To,” 55–59 (this volume).
knowledge that warrant familiarity. Given
24. Cunningham and Stanovich, What Reading Does
the brouhaha about a “nationalized cur- Endnotes 25. M. J. Adams, ABC Foundations for Young Children
riculum,” perhaps this omission was politi- 1.For the Common Core State Standards in English
26. Goldenberg, et al., Dual Language Learners
Language Arts, see http://www.corestandards.org/
cally wise. But is it educationally wise? wp-content/uploads/ELA_Standards.pdf. 27. Biemiller, Teaching Vocabulary
Hirsch28 argues strongly that it is not. 2. D. P. Hayes, L. T. Wolfer, and M. F. Wolfe, “Schoolbook 28. Hirsch, Building Knowledge; and Hirsch, Beyond
Simplification and its Relation to the Decline in SAT-Verbal Comprehension
His work demonstrates that there is indeed Scores,” American Educational Research Journal 33, no. 2 29. Hirsch, Beyond Comprehension
The Magic of Words
Teaching Vocabulary in the Early Childhood Classroom
By Susan B. Neuman and ences across socioeconomic lines, differ-

Tanya S. Wright ences so dramatic that they represent a
30 million word “catastrophe” (i.e., chil-
I
t seems almost intuitive that develop- dren from high-income families experi-
ing a large and rich vocabulary is ence, on average, 30 million more words
central to learning to read. Logically, than children from low-income fami-
children must know the words that lies). Recent analyses indicate that envi-
make up written texts in order to under- ronmental factors associated with
stand them, especially as the vocabulary vocabulary development and emer-
demands of content-related materials gent literacy skills are already pres-
increase in the upper grades. Numerous ent among children as early as 15
studies have documented that the size of a months of age.2
person’s vocabulary is strongly related to By first grade, unfortunately,
how well that person understands what he the repercussions become all
or she reads, not only in the primary too clear: children from high-
grades, but in high school as well.1 income families are likely to
Yet here’s the practical problem. Right know about twice as many
from the beginning of schooling, there are words as children from low-
profound differences in vocabulary knowl- income families, putting these
edge among young learners from different children at a significantly
socioeconomic groups. Just consider the higher risk for school failure.3
following statistics: by age 4, a child’s inter- Even more disturbing, how-
action with his or her family has already ever, is that these statistics are
produced significant vocabulary differ- often treated as inevitable,
more or less a byproduct of
poverty or low-income status.
Susan B. Neuman is a professor and chair of the
Teaching and Learning department at the Stein-
Think of the consequences!
hardt School of Culture, Education, and Human This would mean that these
Development at New York University. Previously, children could be designated
she was a professor of educational studies at the as reading failures before they
University of Michigan, where she directed the ever enter through the school-
Ready to Learn Project. She has authored numer-
ous books on early childhood, including Giving
house doors. delays can go on to achieve grade-level
Our Children a Fighting Chance: Poverty, Lit- Luckily, there is now a rich and accu- expectations in fourth grade and
eracy, and the Development of Information mulated new knowledge base that suggests beyond.5
Capital. Tanya S. Wright is an assistant professor a far different scenario. Consider these
in the Department of Teacher Education at • The quantity, quality, and responsive-
points:
Michigan State University and a former kinder- ness of teacher and parent talk can
garten teacher. This article is adapted, with per- • The highest rate of vocabulary develop- effectively mediate socioeconomic
mission of Teachers College Press, from Susan B. ment occurs during the preschool status, thereby ensuring children’s
Neuman and Tanya S. Wright, All About Words:
Increasing Vocabulary in the Common Core
years; therefore, it represents a crucial growth in receptive and expressive
Classroom, PreK–2. New York: Teachers College time when we can intervene.4 vocabulary.6
Press. Copyright 2013 by Teachers College,
Columbia University. All rights reserved. It
• Effective vocabulary intervention can • Gains in oral vocabulary development
appeared, with permission, in the Summer 2014 ameliorate reading difficulties later on. can predict growth in comprehension
issue of American Educator. Children with resolved vocabulary and later reading performance.7
This means that, in contrast to dire early grades. Here, in a nutshell, are some harder text than before. In the past, we
prognostications, there is much we can do of the design features: used to try to meet children’s needs by
to enable children to read and read well. selecting reading materials according
• A cumulative model of expectations:
Although we certainly have more to learn, to their instructional level; in some
It used to be called “spiraling,” but the
the good news is that we now have an accu- cases, when they have difficulty com-
principle is the same. From grade to
mulated body of evidence on the charac- prehending text, we’ll even choose an
grade, similar standards will increase
teristics of effective vocabulary instruction. easier text and have them gradually
in complexity. For example, in kinder-
And it turns out that this news couldn’t build up speed for more challenging
garten, children will be expected to “ask
come at a better time. materials. The CCSS use a very different
and answer questions about key details
model: children are required to read
in a text, with prompting and support.”
Oral Vocabulary Development grade-level text. A teacher’s job will be
Grade 1 has the same exact standard,
and the Common Core State to help them learn through these more
Standards
You might say that we are entering into a
new age of educational reform: the age of
the Common Core State Standards
(CCSS). In the distant past, education was
a local issue; districts acted on their own
to adopt instructional guidelines and cur-
riculum. In recent years, however, educa-
tion has increasingly become more of a
state and even a federal concern. The No
Child Left Behind Act, the Bush adminis-
tration’s reauthorization of the Elemen-
tary and Secondary Education Act,
increased the role of states in enacting
standards, assessments, and accountabil-
ity. In 2010, state governments took their although the children will now be challenging texts without telling them
turn, becoming more proactive in educa- required to do it on their own. what the texts say. For example, a
tional reform. The Council of Chief State teacher might focus on the organiza-
School Officers and the National Gover- • Informational texts: Right from the
tional features of the text, the headings
nors Association, working with the orga- start, the standards place greater
and subheadings, or the use of the glos-
nization Achieve, set out to develop emphasis on listening to and eventually
sary to unlock the meaning of words in
world-class standards that would essen- reading informational books. In this
context.
tially create a shared vision of what all respect, the standards focus on the
students should know and be able to do in integration of knowledge and ideas • An integrated model of literacy:
all grades, kindergarten through high through text. Further, there is the Although the standards are divided into
school. expectation that children will be able to reading, writing, speaking and listen-
The reason that this is relevant for those cross traditional genre boundaries and ing, and language, there is an expecta-
in early education on up is that 46 states compare and contrast text features; for tion that all of these skills work together.
and the District of Columbia have adopted example, children might listen to an Even kindergartners are expected to
these Common Core State Standards in informational book about insects one engage in rich conversations that place
English language arts and mathematics. day and a story about insects the next a greater emphasis on their abilities to
The standards don’t define how teachers day, and then be asked about the con- build arguments from evidence in the
should teach, but they do tell them what nections between the two. Children will text, whether it is read to them or they
students need to know and be able to do. be expected to learn about key subject read it themselves.
Further, starting in 2014–2015, state tests areas, particularly science and history,
• An integrated media environment:
will be geared toward measuring whether through texts. Certainly, this does not
There is a greater recognition that
or not students are achieving these stan- mean that we are going to abandon the
today’s “texts” don’t come through only
dards. In essence, education is moving children’s literature or stories that we
one medium—print. As all of us know,
toward a more unitary system with a all have come to know and love. Rather,
a high volume of information comes
shared vision of expectations for student it simply means a greater balance
through print and nonprint media
learning. between literary storybooks and infor-
forms, both old and new. The CCSS
These CCSS represent a sea change in mational texts.
encourage teachers to make use of
how we think about early literacy and read- • Challenging materials : There is multimedia, as it’s embedded into
ing, in particular, even before children greater emphasis on stretching stu- every aspect of today’s curriculum.
enter kindergarten and throughout the dents to meet the demands of reading Children will need to be able to gather,
comprehend, evaluate, and synthesize in the cognitive development of an indi- accurately apply these individual color
information and ideas through differ- vidual.8 This conclusion led to designing terms.12 Typically, words such as red or yel-
ent forms of media. new opportunities to engage children in low may appear in their vocabulary; how-
early learning. ever, their application of these words to
In short, these standards focus on Similarly, a number of myths have been their referents may be haphazard and
results rather than on means. They estab- perpetuated about oral vocabulary devel- interchangeable.
lish clear goals and expectations that are opment, and in many ways they have sty- Children, then, may have knowledge of
designed to help children succeed in a mied efforts to promote quality teaching these words, but this knowledge will be far
world in which the development of infor- early on. Recent evidence has called into from complete. Rather, word learning in
mation capital is increasingly important. question these notions, and it suggests that most cases requires many exposures over
And whether they are ultimately successful we not only can improve children’s vocab- an extended period of time.13 With each
in achieving these lofty goals depends on ulary—we can accelerate it with instruc- additional exposure, the word may become
teachers and how well they are supported tion. These new findings have powerful incrementally closer to being fully learned.
in implementing these new standards in
the classroom.
So how do the CCSS relate to oral
vocabulary development? And, for those
who work with preschoolers or even By first grade, children from high-income
younger children, how do K–12 standards
affect what they teach? Here’s why teach- families are likely to know about twice as many
ers need to be informed about these stan- words as children from low-income families.
dards: it is impossible for children to read,
and to understand what they read, with-
out a strong foundation in oral vocabulary
development. Without vocabulary knowl-
edge, words are just words—without implications for further reading develop- Myth 2: There Is a
much meaning. If we are to help children ment and content learning. Vocabulary Explosion
take on seriously challenging texts, then It is often said that word learning starts
we need to give them word and world Myth 1: Children Are Word Sponges rather slowly, then at about 16 months or
knowledge to bring to these texts. Given Children seem to pick up words prodi- when a child learns about 50 words, all of a
that most oral vocabulary development giously and quite effortlessly. It looks natu- sudden things begin to happen.14 Word
grows from a massive immersion in the ral. In one classic study, for example, learning begins in earnest. Variously called
world of language, there is not a moment researchers taught preschoolers a new the “vocabulary explosion” or “word spurt,”
to waste. color word simply by requesting, “You see it reflects the apparent dramatic ability of
The purpose of this article is to explain those trays over there? Bring me the chro- young children to acquire new words—on
our rationale for content-rich oral vocabu- mium tray. Not the red one, the chromium the scale of learning 10 or more new objects
lary instruction in the age of the CCSS, and one.” 9 When their memory for the new and names within a two- or three-week
how to effectively build children’s vocabu- word was assessed one week later, the period. This notion of a vocabulary explo-
lary. But first, we dispel some of the com- majority of children (63 percent) were able sion may suggest that the optimal time for
mon myths about oral vocabular y to correctly identify which color was chro- oral vocabulary development is in these
development, which have often led to a mium. Since this experiment, the term fast toddler years.
lack of attention for this important topic in mapping—the notion that words can be Recent evidence, however, suggests that
school instruction. We then move to a set learned based on a single exposure—has the “spurt” in word learning does not cor-
of instructional principles that should become common parlance to explain the respond to any change in the rate of word
guide teachers’ work. extraordinary rate at which children seem learning, but to a change in the rate of chil-
to pick up words early on. dren’s integrating new vocabulary. 15 In
Common Myths
Today, however, there is ample evi- other words, it suggests that the vocabulary
Like many myths, these notions may dence to suggest that children do not learn explosion is a byproduct of the variation in
contain some partial truths, almost like words through fast mapping.10 Rather, they the time it takes to learn to actually use
folk wisdom. For example, some authori- learn words by predicting relationships words. Although children are accumulat-
ties once claimed that learning was between objects and sounds, which ing words at a constant rate, the written and
based on the “neural ripening” of the become more accurate over time. Word verbal use of the words accelerates. We see,
brain; applied to reading, this reflected a learning is incremental.11 Evidence for this for example, a similar pattern with recep-
philosophy of “wait and see” until the child comes from children’s struggles to under- tive and expressive language, with children
appeared “ready” for instruction. Research stand color words. Although infants can demonstrating far greater capacity to
and writings in the 1950s and 1960s by distinguish between basic color categories, understand meaning before they are able
cognitive psychologists provided powerful it is not until about age 4 that they can to effectively express ideas in words.
evidence that early childhood was crucial
The course of word learning, therefore, effects were reduced to negligible levels school, vocabulary words are likely to be
has little to do with vocabulary explosions, when children were 4 to 5 years old or repeated frequently. The problem is,
bursts, or spurts. To the contrary, word when they were at risk for language and teachers do not have that luxury. In our
learning is cumulative.16 The high-per- literacy impairments. study of 55 kindergarten classrooms, for
forming student who knows many thou- This means that exposure to words example, we found that although teachers
sands of words has learned them not by through storybooks is not likely to be provided more than eight of these word
having received a jolt of oral language early potent enough to narrow the substantial explanations per day, they were rarely, if
on, but by accruing bits of word knowledge gap for children who may be at risk for ever, repeated more than once.22 Further,
for each of the thousands of words encoun- reading difficulties. Rather, to improve words selected for teachable moments
tered every day. By the end of high school, children’s oral vocabulary development, were different across classroom settings.
one estimate is that college-ready students teachers will need to augment the read- Far too predictably, our study reported
that children who attended schools in the
most severely low-income neighborhoods
were likely to hear far fewer explanations,
with those explanations offered at lower
difficulty levels, than children in middle-
and upper-income areas.
With the implementation of the CCSS,
children will be expected to understand
content-related words in science and his-
tory. This means that we cannot rely on
teachable moments alone to help children
develop word meanings. Rather, we will
need to be proactive in selecting words that
have greater application to academic texts
with increasingly complex concepts.
Myth 5: Just Follow the Vocabulary

Scope and Sequence in a Core
Reading Program
will need to acquire about 80,000 words.17 aloud experience with more intentional
This means that we should immerse stu- strategies that require children to process Several years ago, researchers examined
dents for extended periods in oral and words at deeper levels of understanding. the prevalence of oral vocabulary instruc-
written vocabulary experiences through- tion in core reading programs at the pre-K
out their instructional years. Myth 4: We Do It All the Time level.23 We found a dearth of instructional
Most teachers try to consciously engage guidance for teachers, despite some “men-
Myth 3: Storybook Reading Is children in active experiences that involve tioning” of words. Since then, we have
Sufficient for Oral Vocabulary lots of conversation throughout the day. turned our attention to kindergarten and
Development In the course of a science activity, for first-grade materials, focusing on the four
Reading books aloud to children is a pow- example, a teacher may explain a word to most commonly used core curricula, to
erful and motivating source for vocabu- help children understand the context. She examine the breadth and depth of oral
lary development.18 We now have a large might pause during the lesson and say, vocabulary instruction—the pedagogical
corpus of research showing that children “That’s the predator. That means he wants features of instruction and how these fea-
learn words through listening to and to eat the frog,” providing a brief explana- tures might align with research-based
interacting with storybooks. Nevertheless, tion that fits the context of the story. Or evidence on vocabulary development.
recent studies have begun to question during a classroom discussion, a teacher Despite greater attention to words in
whether incidental instruction through might use the word celebrate when elementary curricula, our results indicated
book reading may be substantial enough describing a birthday activity and then tremendous disparity across curricula.24
to significantly boost children’s oral explain, “Celebrate means to do some- For example, one curriculum listed an
vocabulary development.19 Several meta- thing fun.” These events represent impor- average of 20 target vocabulary words per
analyses, for example, have reported only tant teachable moments—informal week to be taught, whereas another listed,
small to moderate effects of book reading opportunities to engage in word learning, on average, only two. Further, the criteria
on vocabulary development.20 One group somewhat parallel to the types of lan- used to select words to teach remained a
of researchers examined the added ben- guage exchanges between parents and mystery. In one curriculum, words were
efits of dialogic reading, an interactive their children. selected based on the weekly stories. In
reading strategy, on children’s vocabulary However, over the course of the 20,000 other curricula, we could find no organiz-
growth and reported only modest gains hours parents and children spend ing principle for the selection of words at
for 2- to 3-year-olds. 21 Further, these together in the home before entering all. Finally, using three different criteria, we
found that many of the vocabulary words
selected for instruction were far too easy to ing and to raise their hands whenever they engage children in rich language instruc-
warrant school-based instruction. hear one.27 Then the teacher might say to tion, have shown impressive results with
This means that until such materials are students, “Oh, good. Some of you raised kindergarten and first-grade children,
developed, teachers are going to have to your hands! What word did you hear? Yes, demonstrating vocabulary gains about
rely on a set of research-based principles the word peculiar. When Anansi said the twice as large as those resulting from read-
to ensure that all students receive the qual- word seven, a peculiar thing happened. aloud studies.30 Given this research-based
ity of oral vocabulary instruction they Peculiar means strange or different.” evidence, the CCSS have adopted this
need. In the age of the CCSS, students will Our syntheses of research reported that heuristic for selecting words to teach.
need a specialized language—some vocabulary gains were significantly higher However, our research suggests that it’s
describe it as academic language—to con- when words were identified explicitly also important to consider content-
vey their ideas, which will facilitate the rather than implicitly (e.g., learning words related words very early on. These are
development of more complex concepts in by listening to a story). However, here’s words that will be critical for developing
multiple disciplines. And our efforts to something to keep in mind: the largest knowledge in key subject areas. For exam-
ple, vocabulary related to living things,
such as habitat, organism, and protection,
can help children talk about and learn
about key science-related concepts;
moreover, science vocabulary words such
Words represent the tip of the iceberg; as compare, contrast, observe, and predict
underlying them is a set of emerging are fundamental inquiry words used not
only in science but in all subject areas. In
interconnections and concepts. our research, we found that Head Start
preschoolers are highly capable of learn-
ing and retaining these and similar words
over time. Introducing students to con-
tent-related vocabulary, therefore, helps
enhance the ability of all children to com- gains were made when teachers provided them to build word knowledge and con-
municate in academic language and aca- both explicit and implicit instruction. One cepts essential for developing knowledge
demic thinking through oral vocabulary study, for example, found that engaging systematically from texts.
development must begin early. children in acting out words after explicitly
defining them enhanced word learning as Principle 3: Build Word Meaning
measured by standardized assessments through Knowledge Networks
Principles of Effective
later on.28 In other words, when teachers It’s fair to say that words represent the tip
Oral Vocabulary Instruction
made children aware of the meaning of the of the iceberg; underlying them is a set of
Although there is certainly more to learn, words and then engaged them in using emerging interconnections and concepts
we now have a growing research consen- those words in a meaningful context, chil- that these words represent. It is the rich
sus about the characteristics of effective dren achieved greater gains than from network of concepts and facts accompany-
vocabulary instruction. Using evidence explicit instruction alone. ing these words that drives children’s com-
from our two recent meta-analyses syn- prehension.31 Thus, helping children to
thesizing research from 75 vocabulary Principle 2: Be Intentional in learn about words in clusters that represent
studies,25 as well as our own studies exam- Word Selection knowledge networks has been shown to
ining some of the mechanisms for word Given that there are only so many words we strongly support children’s inferential rea-
learning, 26 five principles emerge to can teach—for example, one estimate is a soning and comprehension. For example,
enhance oral vocabulary development, as total of about 400 words in a year—we must if you know the word oar, you probably
described below. carefully select the words that we plan to also know something about rowboats and
teach. Some have argued that words for paddling. Teaching words in categories,
Principle 1: Children Need Both vocabulary instruction should be selected such as “healthy foods” (e.g., fruit, vegeta-
Explicit and Implicit Instruction from high-utility sophisticated words ble, protein), also aids in the retention of
Children benefit from explicit instruction. (known as Tier 2 words) that are character- these words.
That is, children who are given child- istic of written language.29 For example, Recent evidence for the support of
friendly definitions of words or other attri- instead of using the words keep going, you teaching words in knowledge networks
butes of the words to be learned are more can use a Tier 2 word such as maintain; comes from two large-scale studies of
likely to remember them. Prior to the instead of the word lucky, you might use vocabulary interventions for low-income
beginning of a story, for example, a teacher the word fortunate. These words are preschoolers. One study, for example, used
might begin by introducing several words domain general and are likely to relate to a number of useful strategies to help chil-
that are integral to the story. The teacher more refined labels for concepts that may dren share semantic similarities between
might encourage children to listen for each enhance children’s verbal functioning. words.32 Strategies such as encouraging
of the “magic words” during the story read- Studies of “Text Talk,” a strategy used to children to look at two picture cards with
words on them and make inferences about tioned in the literature, what is new is that teachers to expose children to additional
how these words work together helped we may have underestimated the fre- contexts in which the word might be used.
them make comparisons of concepts. In quency required to learn words. For Two researchers, in their work with second
our World of Words curriculum, we teach example, in attempting to better under- language learners, suggest that multimedia
words related to a semantic category. For stand how many repetitions might be can be highly effective for enhancing the
example, children learn words associated needed to learn a novel word, researchers meanings of words. 37 Their research
with “parts of the body,” such as abdomen, studied 60 4-year-olds during a word- showed that multimedia-enhanced
lungs, heart, and brain, while focusing on learning task.36 First, the researchers iden- instruction significantly narrowed the gap
the common features of the category (e.g., tified a pseudo-word (e.g., toma) for the between English language learners and
“parts of the body” means these are children, and then they engaged in playing non-ELL children in knowledge of targeted
attached to the body).33 We then engage
children in playful activities called “time
for a challenge” and ask them questions
such as, “Are eyeglasses part of the body?”
or “Is hair part of the body?” (Some chil- Recent evidence indicates that children
dren argue that hair is not part of the body
because their daddies are bald!) need planned, sequenced, and systematic
We found that clustering words within
categories facilitated children’s compre-
vocabulary instruction.
hension and provided promising evidence
of accelerating word learning. For example,
we showed a picture of a word not taught—
in this case, ankle—and asked, “Is an ankle a game involving the word, followed by a words. They found that video could help
a part of the body?” Children who received brief assessment. For each word, 12 chil- children learn by representing words in
instruction reported, “Yes, because it helps dren heard the new word repeated three more than one media format, clarifying the
you walk,” whereas a comparison child not times; another 12 children heard the word instructional dialogue and adding more
receiving instruction just said, “Yes, repeated six times; and so forth, for nine, information to make sense of words that
‘cause.” Similarly, children who received 18, and 24 repetitions. Only 20 percent of they are learning. Our research, as well, has
our vocabulary curriculum were able to the children who heard a new word three shown that the addition of dynamic visuals
apply their categorical information to new times remembered it; in fact, it wasn’t until and sounds in video accompanied by
words, suggesting that they were using the after 24 repetitions that the majority of chil- informational books provides children
semantic information about categories to dren (80 percent) successfully remem- with multiple strategies for acquiring word
make inferences and generalizations. bered the word. knowledge. Together, this research high-
Finally, helping children understand how The point, of course, is not that all words lights that frequency of exposure in a vari-
words build knowledge networks facilitates need 24 repetitions. However, this research ety of meaningful contexts over an
our ability to make teaching them more does suggest that children need many extended period of time enhances word
meaningful. This represents a far cry from more encounters with new words than we learning. Further, children may continue
our analysis of vocabulary in core curricula may have previously suspected. Strategies to benefit from additional exposures to a
in which a teacher might be guided to such as repeated reading have been shown word and its meaning even if they appear
teach the words platypus and around on to be effective in helping children acquire to already understand the word.
the same day.34 Rather, children learn best new words. In addition, children may ben-
efit from rich explanations of newly Principle 5: Ongoing Professional
when words are presented in integrated
encountered words. Rich explanations Development Is Essential
contexts that make sense to them. A set of
words connected to a category such as often include as much information as pos- The results of our meta-analyses suggest
“energy” can help children remember not sible about the new word, including infor- that children’s oral vocabulary develop-
only the words themselves but the linkages mation conveyed through defining, ment is highly malleable and can be signifi-
in meaning between them. providing synonyms, pointing to illustra- cantly improved through intervention.
tions, and using the words in other con- However, these analyses also showed that
Principle 4: Children Need Repeated texts. These explanations can also give teachers who have not received adequate
Exposure to Gain Vocabulary teachers further opportunities to repeat preparation and teachers with limited edu-
Children are most likely to learn the words new words, thereby providing children cational backgrounds were not as effective
they hear the most. Findings from a large with additional exposures. Another way to in helping children make significant gains
number of correlational studies on lan- build repetition actually goes back to our in vocabulary. Similar findings have been
guage have shown that frequency of expo- previous point of teaching knowledge net- reported in other meta-analyses.38 This
sure strongly predicts word learning and works. Categories and semantic clusters research highlights the importance of
seems to have long-range consequences provide a built-in mechanism for repeating ongoing professional development for
for later language and reading levels.35 words in meaningful contexts. teachers and other school staff who regu-
Although this finding is often men- At the same time, it is also important for larly work with children who might need
additional instruction. This means selecting words, concepts, and 30 (1995), 998–1015.
19. C. Juel, G. Biancarosa, D. Coker, and R. Deffes, “Walking
Very recently, we have drawn from our ideas that matter most to children right with Rosie: A Cautionary Tale of Early Reading Instruction,”
work with young children the notion of an from the very beginning of schooling. Educational Leadership 60, no. 7 (April 2003), 12–18.
instructional regime as part of a teacher’s Many children from high-poverty cir- 20. S. E. Mol, A. G. Bus, and M. T. de Jong, “Interactive Book
Reading in Early Education: A Tool to Stimulate Print
ongoing work in the classroom. This pat- cumstances will have had fewer experi- Knowledge as Well as Oral Language,” Review of
Educational Research 79 (2009), 979–1007; S. E. Mol, A. G.
tern of instruction involves several key ences with the academic language that the Bus, M. T. de Jong, and D. J. H. Smeets, “Added Value of
steps: standards require. Children who enter Dialogic Parent-Child Book Readings: A Meta-Analysis,”
Early Education and Development 19 (2008), 7–26; and
school in these situations will need skill- National Early Literacy Panel, Developing Early Literacy:
• Identifying words that need to be Report of the National Early Literacy Panel (Washington, DC:
fully developed instruction that not only
taught; National Institute for Literacy, 2008).
improves their word knowledge and con- 21. S. E. Mol, A. G. Bus, M. T. de Jong, and D. J. H. Smeets,
• Defining these words in a child-friendly
cepts, but actually accelerates their vocab- “Added Value of Dialogic Parent-Child Book Readings: A
way; Meta-Analysis,” Early Education and Development 19
ulary development, maximizing the (2008), 7–26.
• Contextualizing words into varied and
limited time they have in school.  22. T. S. Wright and S. B. Neuman, “Paucity and Disparity in
meaningful formats; Kindergarten Oral Vocabulary Instruction,” Journal of
• Reviewing words to ensure sustainabil- Literacy Research (forthcoming).
Endnotes 23. S. B. Neuman and J. Dwyer, “Missing in Action:
ity over time; and 1. See, for example, I. L. Beck and M. G. McKeown, Vocabulary Instruction in Pre-K,” Reading Teacher 62 (2009),
• Monitoring children’s progress and “Increasing Young Low-Income Children’s Oral Vocabulary 384–392.
Repertoires through Rich and Focused Instruction,”
reteaching if necessary. Elementary School Journal 107 (2007), 251–271; and K. E. 24. T. S. Wright and S. B. Neuman, “Vocabulary Instruction
Stanovich and A. E. Cunningham, “Studying the in Commonly Used Kindergarten Core Reading Curricula,”
Consequences of Literacy within a Literate Society: The Elementary School Journal 113 (2013), 386–408.
This instructional regime, applied at any Cognitive Correlates of Print Exposure,” Memory & 25. L. M. Marulis and S. B. Neuman, “The Effects of
grade level, promotes greater attention to Cognition 20 (1992), 51–68. Vocabulary Intervention on Young Children’s Word Learning:
A Meta-Analysis,” Review of Educational Research 80
the depth of processing words and their 2. E. T. Rodriguez and C. S. Tamis-LeMonda, “Trajectories of
(2010), 300–335; and L. M. Marulis and S. B. Neuman,
the Home Learning Environment across the First 5 Years:
meanings, and can provide a critical road Associations with Children’s Vocabulary and Literacy Skills at “How Vocabulary Interventions Affect Young Children at
Prekindergarten,” Child Development 82 (2011), Risk: A Meta-Analytic Review,” Journal of Research on
map for the future planning of instruction. 1058–1075. Educational Effectiveness 6 (2013), 223–262.
Taken collectively, the five principles of 3. M. F. Graves, The Vocabulary Book: Teaching and 26. T. Kaefer and S. B. Neuman, “A Bi-Directional
Relationship between Conceptual Organization and Word
oral vocabulary development, in effect, Instruction (New York: Teachers College Press, 2006).
Learning” (paper presented at the annual meeting of the
highlight an approach that is designed to 4. G. Farkas and K. Beron, “The Detailed Age Trajectory of Literacy Research Association, Jacksonville, FL, November–
Oral Vocabulary Knowledge: Differences by Class and Race,” December 2011).
help children unlock the complexities of Social Science Research 33 (2004), 464–497.
27. M. D. Coyne, D. B. McCoach, and S. Kapp, “Vocabulary
texts that we see throughout the CCSS. 5. D. V. M. Bishop and C. Adams, “A Prospective Study of Intervention for Kindergarten Students: Comparing
the Relationship between Specific Language Impairment, Extended Instruction to Embedded Instruction and Incidental
Given that these standards place greater Phonological Disorders and Reading Retardation,” Journal of Exposure,” Learning Disability Quarterly 30 (2007), 74–88.
emphasis on students’ abilities to build Child Psychology and Psychiatry 31 (1990), 1027–1050.
28. R. Silverman, “A Comparison of Three Methods of
6. S. E. Mol and S. B. Neuman, “Sharing Information Books Vocabulary Instruction during Read-Alouds in Kindergarten,”
arguments from evidence in texts, these with Kindergartners: The Role of Parents’ Extra-textual Talk Elementary School Journal 108 (2007), 97–113.
instructional principles will give them the and Socioeconomic Status,” Early Childhood Research
29. I. L. Beck and M. G. McKeown, “Increasing Young
Quarterly 29, 4 (2014), 399–410.
tools to engage in academically enriching 7. A. M. Elleman, E. J. Lindo, P. Morphy, and D. L. Compton,
Low-Income Children’s Oral Vocabulary Repertoires through
Rich and Focused Instruction,” Elementary School Journal
conversations that can be fulfilling and “The Impact of Vocabulary Instruction on Passage-Level 107 (2007), 251–271.
Comprehension of School-Age Children: A Meta-Analysis,”
highly rewarding. Journal of Research on Educational Effectiveness 2 (2009), 30. I. L. Beck, M. G. McKeown, and L. Kucan, Bringing
Words to Life: Robust Vocabulary Instruction (New York:
Common myths are often based on 1–44.
Guilford, 2002).
some partial truths that have since been 8. J. S. Bruner, R. Olver, and P. Greenfield, Studies in
Cognitive Growth (New York: Wiley, 1966). 31. S. A. Stahl and W. E. Nagy, Teaching Word Meanings
debunked or at least shown to have serious (Mahwah, NJ: L. Erlbaum Associates, 2006).
9. S. Carey and E. Bartlett, “Acquiring a Single New Word,”
32. S. D. Pollard-Durodola, J. E. Gonzalez, D. C. Simmons,
flaws in their logic. This is the case with oral Papers and Reports on Child Language Development 15
M. J. Davis, L. Simmons, and M. Nava-Walichowski, “Using
(1978), 17–29.
vocabulary development. In the past, we 10. P. Bloom, How Children Learn the Meanings of Words
Knowledge Networks to Develop Preschoolers’ Content
Vocabulary,” Reading Teacher 65 (2011), 265–274.
have often described young children as (Cambirdge, MA: MIT Press, 2000).
33. S. B. Neuman, J. Dwyer, S. Koh, and T. S. Wright, The
“word wizards,” “word sponges,” “lexical 11. W. E. Nagy, R. C. Anderson, and P. A. Herman, “Learning World of Words: A Vocabulary Intervention for Preschool
Word Meanings from Context during Normal Reading,” Children (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan, 2007).
vacuum cleaners”—all denoting the sup- American Educational Research Journal 24 (1987), 237–270.
34. T. S. Wright and S. B. Neuman, “Vocabulary Instruction
posedly easy process of vocabulary devel- 12. M. Rice, Cognition to Language: Categories, Word in Commonly Used Kindergarten Core Reading Curricula,”
Meanings, and Training (Baltimore: University Park Press, Elementary School Journal 113 (2013), 386–408.
opment. Too often, it has been assumed 1980).
35. J. Harris, R. Michnick Golinkoff, and K. Hirsh-Pasek,
that word learning is natural and that the 13. A. Biemiller and C. Boote, “An Effective Method for “Lessons from the Crib for the Classroom: How Children
conditions in classrooms provide sponta- Building Meaning Vocabulary in Primary Grades,” Journal of Really Learn Vocabulary,” in Handbook of Early Literacy
Educational Psychology 98 (2006), 44–62. Research, vol. 3, ed. D. K. Dickinson and S. B. Neuman (New
neous opportunities for vocabulary 14. A. Gopnik, A. N. Meltzoff, and P. K. Kuhl, The Scientist in York: Guilford, 2011), 49–65.
development. the Crib: Minds, Brains, and How Children Learn (New York: 36. A. M. Pinkham, S. B. Neuman, and A. S. Lillard, “You
William Morrow, 1999). Can Say That Again! Preschoolers Need Repeated Exposures
Teachable moments are important; 15. B. McMurray, “Defusing the Childhood Vocabulary to Gain Expressive Vocabulary” (paper presented at the
however, they will not be sufficient for stu- Explosion,” Science 317, no. 5838 (August 3, 2007), 631. annual meeting of the Literacy Research Association,
Jacksonville, FL, November–December 2011).
dents to engage in complex texts. Rather, 16. W. E. Nagy and J. A. Scott, “Vocabulary Processes,” in
37. R. Silverman and S. Hines, “The Effects of Multimedia-
Handbook of Reaching Research, vol. 3, ed. M. L. Kamil, P. B.
we will have to be much more strategic Mosenthal, P. D. Pearson, and R. Barr (Mahwah, NJ: L. Enhanced Instruction on the Vocabulary of English-Language
Erlbaum Associates, 2000), 269–284. Learners and Non-English-Language Learners in Pre-
about word learning than our previous Kindergarten through Second Grade,” Journal of
17. E. D. Hirsch Jr., “Reading Comprehension Requires
standards or instructional guidelines have Knowledge—of Words and the World,” American Educator
Educational Psychology 101 (2009), 305–314.
acknowledged. Recent evidence indicates 27, no. 1 (Spring 2003), 10–29, 48. 38. S. E. Mol, A. G. Bus, M. T. de Jong, and D. J. H. Smeets,
“Added Value of Dialogic Parent-Child Book Readings: A
that children need planned, sequenced, 18. A. G. Bus and M. H. van Ijzendoorn, “Mothers Reading Meta-Analysis,” Early Education and Development 19
to Their 3-Year-Olds: The Role of Mother-Child Attachment (2008), 7–26.
and systematic vocabulary instruction. Security in Becoming Literate,” Reading Research Quarterly
Dual Language Learners
Effective Instruction in Early Childhood
By Claude Goldenberg,
Judy Hicks, and Ira Lit
A
s the number of English learners
in K–12 public schools has
increased, so too has the popu-
lation of preschool dual lan-
guage learners, or DLLs. For preschoolers,
the term dual language learners is pre-
ferred since young children are still in the
midst of acquiring their first language.*
More than 4 million DLLs are enrolled in
early childhood programs nationally.
Thirty percent of the children in Head Start
and Early Head Start are DLLs.1
Although a large majority of preschool-
age children in the United States attend
Claude Goldenberg is a professor of education at

Stanford University. Previously, at California
State University, Long Beach, he was a professor
of teacher education, an associate dean of the
College of Education, and the executive director
of the Center for Language Minority Education
and Research. Early in his career, he taught
junior high school in Texas and first grade in a
bilingual elementary school in California. He is some type of early education setting, childhood care or education setting, early
the recipient of the Albert J. Harris Award from Latino children and children of immigrants educators must be informed by what
the International Reading Association, among attend at a lower rate than do children of research has to say about creating optimal
other honors. Judy Hicks (now Judy Hicks Pau- nonimmigrant parents.2 This is unfortu- learning environments. Concern over the
lick) is a post-doctoral scholar in Stanford Uni-
nate, since children who attend preschool achievement of this population of students
versity’s Teacher Education program. Previously,
she was an elementary school teacher in Comp- during the year before kindergarten have has led to a large number of recent research
ton, CA, and a teacher educator in Tonga. Ira Lit an advantage in reading and math over reviews and professional publications
is an associate professor of teaching at Stanford their peers who are not enrolled in center- aimed at improving preschool DLLs’ edu-
and the director of the Stanford Elementary based care.3 Many children who are learn- cational opportunities.5 In this article, we
Teacher Education Program. Previously, he was
ing English as a second language while survey this growing body of research to
an elementary school teacher and the executive
director for the Teachers for a New Era initiative they are gaining early proficiency in their help inform educators responsible for cre-
at Bank Street College of Education. This article home language are therefore dispropor- ating settings for our young DLLs.
is adapted with permission from Claude Gold- tionately missing academic benefits that We organize our review of the research
enberg, Judy Hicks, and Ira Lit, “Teaching Young attending preschool provides.4 by addressing four key topics:
English Learners,” in Handbook of Research-
For those DLLs who do attend an early
Based Practice in Early Education, edited by D. 1. Employing children’s home language in
Ray Reutzel (Guilford Press, 2013). It appeared, the early childhood curriculum;
with permission, in the Summer 2013 issue of *For discussions of terms, see the CECER-DLL’s website
American Educator. and the NCELA’s glossary of terms.
2. Comparing effective practices for DLLs
and English speakers in English-only tended to rate their students more posi- English-speaking homes;11 this might be
programs; tively in terms of the students’ frustration explained by the fact that the Spanish-
tolerance, assertiveness, and peer social speaking students began with far lower
3. Promoting language development in
skills. English levels than the English-speaking
English and the home language; and
Teachers can also use the students’ students.
4. Involving families in supporting chil- home language in various ways that sup- Studies also illustrate the value for
dren’s language learning. port children’s learning, even when young DLLs of well-known elements of
instruction is essentially in English. For effective teaching, such as explaining
1. Employing children’s home example, teachers could supplement a vocabulary words encountered during
language in the early childhood book they are reading aloud with explana-
curriculum tions or brief clarifications in the home
The debate over bilingual education has language or by pointing out a cognate (e.g.,
been the most controversial aspect of the “Do you know what a market is? It sounds
education of English learners for more like mercado, right?”), which can make
than a half century and continues to be texts in English more accessible to DLLs
politically charged.6 Bilingual education’s and possibly make them aware of linkages
basic premise is that students should be across languages.
taught academic skills in their home lan-
2. Comparing effective practices
Pictures help DLL
guage as they learn and acquire skills in
English. According to this view, instruction for DLLs and English speakers in preschoolers with
English-only programs
in the home language strengthens the low levels of oral
home language and creates a more solid Studies of effective early childhood curri-
foundation for cognitive and academic cula have shown cognitive and social ben- English learn story
growth in English; moreover, promoting
bilingual competence is valuable in its own
efits for DLLs that may be comparable to
or greater than those for native English
vocabulary.
right. Opponents of bilingual education speakers. Researchers in Nebraska, for
argue that instruction in students’ home example, found that a professional devel-
language both delays English learners’ opment literacy workshop series (Head-
entrance into the academic and social sUp! Reading) for early childhood
mainstream and depresses English educators was equally effective in promot-
achievement; bilingualism might be fine, ing early literacy skills for children from
but the school should focus on rapid and English-speaking and Spanish-speaking
effective English learning. Others have also homes.10 In Oklahoma, one of the pioneers reading and using them in different con-
raised concerns about the resources of universal high-quality pre-K education, texts.12 In other words, successful teaching
required to fund bilingual programs and preschools produce developmental gains and curricula seem to be successful for
whether the benefits justify the costs.7 across various demographic groups, most children, suggesting that there is
Preschool studies tend to find that at including Latinos, approximately 70 per- probably considerable overlap between
best, instruction in the home language cent of whom come from predominantly what is effective practice for DLLs and for
contributes to growth in both English and Spanish-speaking homes. Gains for these students already proficient in English.13
home language skills; at worst, there is no students (in Eng- Regardless of their level of English
difference in English achievement but an lish) were stron- development, young DLLs who are
advantage in home language achieve- g e r t ha n f o r working to master the rudiments of
ment.8 In addition to promoting bilingual students from English probably need additional
language and literacy skills, uti- supports to help them participate fully
lization of the home language in classroom learning activities if the
can also have psychological and activities are in English. Although pre-
social benefits that immersion in school DLLs benefit from explanations
a second language cannot offer. about the meaning of words (just as Eng-
One study9 found that Spanish- lish speakers do), one study found that
speaking children who experi- children who began with lower English
enced Spanish interactions with scores learned fewer words than children
their teachers were more likely with higher English scores.14 Pictures help
to engage in more complex lin- DLL preschoolers with low levels of oral
guistic interactions than chil- English learn story vocabulary (e.g., den-
dren who experienced only tist, mouse, cap), suggesting that visual
English interactions with their representations, not just explanations,
teachers. Teachers in classrooms provide these children with additional
where Spanish was used also
support for learning.15 Video resources also lish language development is critically
have proven useful.16 important, but so is promoting devel-
Attempts to incorporate additional sup- opment of the home language.
ports such as these into comprehensive Developing the home language is
programs and curricula have had mixed important in its own right and as
success. For example, a professional devel- a means of promoting other
opment program that succeeded in having important cognitive and social
early childhood educators add scaffolding outcomes.18
strategies for DLLs into their core practices In her volume, One Child, Two
found that the improvements in child out- Languages, dual language
comes were limited to some phonological r e s e a r c h e r Pa t t o n Ta b o r s
awareness measures.17 describes the sequence that most
young children follow as they
begin learning a second language
in preschool.19 First, young children
often attempt to use their home lan-
guage. Then, when they realize their
home language is not working in
What we know this context, they tend to become
silent. DLLs listen and observe,
about effective gaining an understanding of the
classroom language. Next, they
instruction in general begin to “go public,” testing out
is thefoundation of some new words and phrases.
Finally, they begin to produce
effective instruction the new language, using phrases and then however, about the relative effects, bene-
for English learn- sentences.
Children may approach English learn-
fits, and disadvantages of different
approaches to promoting English language
ers of all ages. ing differently, so this developmental development for DLLs in early childhood
sequence is not universal and invariant. settings (or K–12 schools).
But when teachers are aware of the general In early elementary settings, research-
sequence, they have the opportunity to ers 20 have found that a separate block of
support DLLs most effectively. For exam- English language development instruction
ple, it is important to be able to recognize during the school day was somewhat more
and respond to children’s nonverbal effective than only integrating English lan-
The key message is that what we know requests and protests—a silent child has guage development into other instruction
about effective instruction in general is the needs that must be met, and the teacher throughout the day, although there cer-
foundation of effective instruction for Eng- can couple meeting those needs with tainly should be English language learning
lish learners of all ages. “Generic” effective introducing new phrases. Additionally, opportunities throughout the day as well.
instruction, however, is probably not suf- children who are not yet communicating There is also evidence in the preschool
ficient to promote accelerated learning verbally can be encouraged to build rela- context for a separate block of language
among ELs, although it is almost certainly tionships through shared interests (e.g., development in the home language: for
a necessary base. While we have some working with a partner on a puzzle or Spanish-speaking children in an English-
intriguing clues about what else is needed dressing dolls) and through humor. Chil- immersion preschool, researchers found
to make programs effective for English dren can also be provided with the space that a 30-minute block of Spanish-lan-
learners (as described in the related arti- and time both to act as spectators and to guage development led to significant gains
cles in the Summer 2013 issue of American rehearse what they hear and want to in children’s oral proficiency in Spanish.21
Educator, “Unlocking the Research on repeat. Furthermore, models of pragmati- Second-language instruction should
English Learners” and “English Language cally appropriate phrases—that is, appro- provide an appropriate balance of oppor-
Development”), there is little certainty about priate to the particular situation in which tunities for meaningful, authentic com-
how to incorporate these supports into pro- the word or phrase is used—can be very munication and for more organized
grams that optimize developmental out- useful for children who are just starting to instruction and specific feedback on the
comes for DLLs. “go public” with their new language. proper use of conventional forms.22
As discussed in the article “English Lan-
3. Promoting language development guage Development” (in the Summer 2013 4. Involving families in supporting
in English and the home language issue of American Educator), explicit Eng- children’s language learning
Language development is, of course, a high lish language development instruction is Families play an important role in helping
priority in early childhood programs. Eng- also important. We know surprisingly little, to make children’s preschool experiences
successful. DLLs’ parents consistently Endnotes Children and Youth (New York: Routledge, 2008); and C.
Goldenberg and R. Coleman, Promoting Academic
show interest in their children’s education 1. N. Aikens, S. Atkins-Burnett, and E. Bandel, Approaches Achievement among English Learners: A Guide to the
to Assessing the Language and Literacy Skills of Young Dual Research (Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin, 2010).
and are highly motivated to provide their Language Learners: A Review of the Research, Research Brief
#10 (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina, FPG Child 14. M. Fuller Collins, “ESL Preschoolers’ English Vocabulary
support.23 Unfortunately, teachers often Development Institute, Center for Early Care and Education Acquisition from Storybook Reading,” Reading Research
underestimate language-minority parents’ Research—Dual Language Learners, 2012). Quarterly 40, no. 4 (2005), 406–408.
15. T. Roberts and H. Neal, “Relationships among Preschool
ability to help their children succeed in 2. K. Turney and G. Kao, “Pre-Kindergarten Child Care and
English Language Learners’ Oral Proficiency in English,
Behavioral Outcomes among Children of Immigrants,” Early
school.24 Most parents are responsive to Childhood Research Quarterly 24, no. 4 (2009), 432–444. Instructional Experience and Literacy Development,”
Contemporary Educational Psychology 29, no. 3 (2004),
focused and sensitive efforts to help them 3. K. Magnuson, C. Lahaie, and J. Waldfogel, “Preschool 283–311.
and School Readiness of Children of Immigrants,” Social
play an active role in supporting their chil- Science Quarterly 87, no. 5 (2006), 1241–1262; and R. W. 16. R. Silverman and S. Hines, “The Effects of Multimedia-
Enhanced Instruction on the Vocabulary of English-Language
dren’s earliest school success. However, Rumberger and L. Tran, Preschool Participation and the
Learners and Non-English-Language Learners in Pre-
Cognitive and Social Development of Language-Minority
researchers have found variability on the Students (Los Angeles: National Center for Research on Kindergarten through Second Grade,” Journal of
Evaluation, Standards, and Student Testing, UCLA, 2006). Educational Psychology 101, no. 2 (2009), 305–314.
impact of home intervention programs on 17. V. Buysse, D. C. Castro, and E. Peisner-Feinberg, “Effects
4. L. A. Karoly and G. C. Gonzalez, “Early Care and
children’s academic learning, perhaps due Education for Children in Immigrant Families,” Future of of a Professional Development Program on Classroom
Practices and Outcomes for Latino Dual Language Learners,”
to the range of design and implementation Children 21, no. 1 (2011), 71–101.
Early Childhood Research Quarterly 25, no. 2 (2010),
features of various programs. 5. See, for example, Center for Early Care and Education 194–206.
Research—Dual Language Learners, research briefs #1–#8
An important issue that parents and (2011), available at http://cecerdll.fpg.unc.edu/document- 18. F. Genesee, J. Paradis, and M. B. Crago, Dual Language
library; and L. M. Espinosa, Getting It Right for Young Development and Disorders: A Handbook on Bilingualism
teachers ask about is whether parents of Children from Diverse Backgrounds: Applying Research to and Second Language Learning (Baltimore, MD: Brookes,
2004).
DLLs should use the home language with Improve Practice (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson, 2010).
6. See, for example, P. Gándara and M. Hopkins, eds., 19. P. O. Tabors, One Child, Two Languages: A Guide for
children exclusively or try to encourage Forbidden Language: English Learners and Restrictive Early Childhood Educators of Children Learning English as a
more English use. Research and experi- Language Policies (New York: Teachers College Press, 2010). Second Language (Baltimore, MD: Brookes, 2008).
20. W. M. Saunders, B. R. Foorman, and C. D. Carlson, “Is a
ence have established that children can 7. O. Jimenez-Castellanos and A. M. Topper, “The Cost of
Separate Block of Time for Oral English Language
Providing an Adequate Education to English Language
learn more than one language, either Learners: A Review of the Literature,” Review of Educational Development in Programs for English Learners Needed?,”
Research 82, no. 2 (2012), 179–232; and T. B. Parrish, “A The Elementary School Journal 107, no. 2 (2006), 181–197.
simultaneously or sequentially, with no Cost Analysis of Alternative Instructional Models for Limited 21. M. A. Restrepo, A. P. Castilla, P. J. Schwanenflugel, S.
adverse effects.25 In fact, in addition to the English Proficient Students in California,” Journal of Neuharth-Pritchett, C. E. Hamilton, and A. Arboleda,
Education Finance 19, no. 3 (1994), 256–278. “Effects of Supplemental Spanish Oral Language Program on
social and cultural benefits, there are Sentence Length, Complexity, and Grammaticality in
8. W. S. Barnett, D. J. Yarosz, J. Thomas, K. Jung, and D.
potential cognitive advantages to growing Blanco, Two-Way and Monolingual English Immersion in Spanish-Speaking Children Attending English-Only
Preschool Education: An Experimental Comparison (New Preschools,” Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in
up bilingual. 26 Yet many parents—and Brunswick, NJ: National Institute for Early Education Schools 41, no. 1 (2010), 3–13.
teachers—assume it is common sense that Research, 2007); J. K. Bernhard, J. Cummins, F. I. Campoy, A. 22. W. M. Saunders and C. Goldenberg, “Research to Guide
F. Ada, A. Winsler, and C. Bleiker, “Identity Texts and Literacy English Language Development Instruction,” in Improving
speaking more English at home will pro- Development among Preschool English Language Learners: Education for English Learners: Research-Based Approaches,
mote higher levels of English proficiency Enhancing Learning Opportunities for Children at Risk for ed. D. Dolson and L. Burnham-Massey (Sacramento: CDE
Learning Disabilities,” Teachers College Record 108, no. 11 Press, 2010), 21–81; and P. M. Lightbown and N. Spada,
for children. Correlational studies do tend (2006), 2380–2405; S. J. Campos, “The Carpinteria How Languages Are Learned, 3rd ed. (Oxford: Oxford
to corroborate these intuitions; use of any Preschool Program: A Long-Term Effects Study,” in Meeting University Press, 2006).
the Challenge of Linguistic and Cultural Diversity in Early 23. C. Goldenberg and R. Gallimore, “Immigrant Latino
language at home is positively associated Childhood Education, ed. E. E. Garcia and B. McLaughlin Parents’ Values and Beliefs about Their Children’s Education:
(New York: Teachers College Press, 1995), 34–48; L. K.
with children’s learning outcomes in that Durán, C. J. Roseth, and P. Hoffman, “An Experimental
Continuities and Discontinuities across Cultures and
Generations,” in Advances in Motivation and Achievement:
language and negatively associated with Study Comparing English-Only and Transitional Bilingual Culture, Ethnicity, and Motivation, vol. 9, ed. P. R. Pintrich
Education on Spanish-Speaking Preschoolers’ Early Literacy and M. L. Maehr (Greenwich, CT: JAI Press, 1995), 183–228;
outcomes in the other language. But find- Development,” Early Childhood Research Quarterly 25, no. 2 N. J. Perry, S. Mitchell Kay, and A. Brown, “Continuity and
ings are mixed: one study 27 found that (2010), 207–217; J. M. Farver, C. J. Lonigan, and S. Eppe, Change in Home Literacy Practices of Hispanic Families with
“Effective Early Literacy Skill Development for Young Preschool Children,” Early Child Development and Care 178,
increased use of English by Spanish-speak- Spanish-Speaking English Language Learners: An no. 1 (2008), 99–113; and A. Schaller, L. Oglesby Rocha, and
Experimental Study of Two Methods,” Child Development
ing mothers did not accelerate English 80, no. 3 (2009), 703–719; and A. Winsler, R. M. Díaz, L.
D. Barshinger, “Maternal Attitudes and Parent Education:
How Immigrant Mothers Support Their Child’s Education
growth by children—but it did decelerate Espinosa, and J. L. Rodríguez, “When Learning a Second Despite Their Own Low Levels of Education,” Early
Language Does Not Mean Losing the First: Bilingual Childhood Education Journal 34, no. 5 (2007), 351–356.
Spanish vocabulary growth. Language Development in Low-Income, Spanish-Speaking
Children Attending Bilingual Preschool,” Child Development 24. L. Brooker, “’Five on the First of December!’: What Can
Bilingual language development need 70, no. 2 (1999), 349–362. We Learn from Case Studies of Early Childhood Literacy?,”
not be a zero-sum game, and parents 9. F. Chang, G. Crawford, D. Early, D. Bryant, C. Howes, M.
Journal of Early Childhood Literacy 2, no. 3 (2002), 291–313;
and C. Goldenberg, “Low-Income Hispanic Parents’
should be reassured that use of the home Burchinal, O. Barbarin, R. Clifford, and R. Pianta, Contributions to Their First-Grade Children’s Word-Recogni-
“Spanish-Speaking Children’s Social and Language tion Skills,” Anthropology and Education Quarterly 18, no. 3
language will not undermine children’s Development in Pre-Kindergarten Classrooms,” Early (1987), 149–179.
English language development. Continu- Education and Development 18, no. 2 (2007), 243–269.
25. F. Genesee, J. Paradis, and M. B. Crago, Dual Language
10. B. Jackson, R. Larzelere, L. St. Clair, M. Corr, C. Fichter,
ing to speak the native language can also and H. Egertson, “The Impact of ‘HeadsUp! Reading’ on
Development and Disorders: A Handbook on Bilingualism
and Second Language Learning (Baltimore, MD: Brookes,
be important for other reasons in addition Early Childhood Educators’ Literacy Practices and Preschool 2004).
Children’s Literacy Skills,” Early Childhood Research
to the cognitive and linguistic benefits, Quarterly 21, no. 2 (2006), 213–226. 26. E. Bialystok, Bilingualism in Development: Language,
Literacy, and Cognition (Cambridge: Cambridge University
such as maintaining cultural and family 11. W. T. Gormley Jr., The Effects of Oklahoma’s Universal Press, 2001); and P. K. Kuhl, “Early Language Acquisition:
Pre-Kindergarten Program on Hispanic Children (Washing-
values and communication. In sum, ton, D.C.: Center for Research on Children in the United
Cracking the Speech Code,” Nature Reviews Neuroscience
5, no. 11 (2004), 831–843.
although more research is needed in this States, 2008); and W. T. Gormley Jr. and D. Phillips, “The
27. C. Scheffner Hammer, M. Dunn Davison, F. R. Lawrence,
Effects of Universal Pre-K in Oklahoma: Research Highlights
area, current research suggests that pre- and Policy Implications,” Policy Studies Journal 33, no. 1 and A. W. Miccio, “The Effect of Maternal Language on
(2005), 65–82. Bilingual Children’s Vocabulary and Emergent Literacy
school educators should use children’s Development during Head Start and Kindergarten,”
12. M. Fuller Collins, “ESL Preschoolers’ English Vocabulary
native language where possible, apply Acquisition from Storybook Reading,” Reading Research
Scientific Studies of Reading 13, no. 2 (2009), 99–121.
specific strategies for building English lan- Quarterly 40, no. 4 (2005), 406–408.
guage skills, and build bridges with fami- 13. D. August and T. Shanahan, eds., Developing Reading
and Writing in Second-Language Learners: Lessons from the
lies to support children’s learning. ☐ Report of the National Literacy Panel on Language-Minority
Why Reading to Children
Is Important
By Susan L. Hall and

Louisa C. Moats
“The single most important activity for
building the knowledge required for even-
tual success in reading is reading aloud to
children. This is especially so during the
preschool years.”1
–From Becoming a Nation of Readers
T
his conclusion, from an influen-
tial report entitled, Becoming a
Nation of Readers: The Report of
the Commission on Reading,
resulted from a study sponsored by the
National Institute of Education. The pur-
pose of this review was to summarize the
findings from research about reading and
to make recommendations for instruction.
This report, which was published in 1984,
is still recognized as a landmark summary
Susan L. Hall is the founder and president of 95

Percent Group, Inc., and a nationally certified
trainer in the use of DIBELS and LETRS. Louisa
C. Moats has extensive experience in the field of
reading and language acquisition as a teacher
trainer, diagnostician, researcher, consultant,
and writer; she developed the landmark profes-
sional development program LETRS for teachers
and reading specialists. She is the former director
of the National Institute of Child Health and
Human Development’s Early Interventions Proj-
ect in Washington, DC, and served as an adjunct
professor of psychiatry at Dartmouth Medical
School and a clinical associate professor of pedi-
atrics at the University of Texas, Houston. This of research in reading and is frequently working fulltime and feeling very overex-
article is excerpted from Susan L. Hall and Lou- quoted in educators’ books. tended. I read many popular parenting
isa C. Moats’s book, Straight Talk About Reading: The fact that the Commission on Read- books and worried about what my child
How Parents Can Make a Difference During the ing proclaimed the importance of reading ate, how to childproof the house, how to
Early Years. Copyright 1999. Used with permis-
to children may not surprise many parents; evaluate child-care options, and so forth.
sion of NTC/Contemporary Publishing Group,
Inc. (ISBN #0-8092-2857-2). Excerpts from Curi- most parents have been told in many ways After a few months of feeling overwhelmed
ous George Gets a Medal by H.A. Rey. Copyright to read to their children. As a first-time par- with how much there was to learn and do
1957 and renewed 1985 by Margret E. Rey. Copy- ent, however, I became aware that although
right assigned to Houghton Mifflin Company in I had been repeatedly advised to read to my *Whenever you see a personal segment that uses “I,” it
1993. Reprinted by permission of Houghton
child, no one had ever explained why it was is a story told by Susan Hall. We wrote these stories in
Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. This article her personal voice because we knew that other parents
appeared, with permission, in the Spring 2000 important.* would readily identify with her puzzlement and her
issue of American Educator. When my first child was born, I was worry when her own son developed reading difficulties.
as a new parent, I decided to choose a
couple of things that were important to
me and do those really well. I chose two
areas to concentrate on in my parenting,
knowing I could not be an expert on every
aspect of child rearing. Driven by interest,
I made a commitment to do a particularly
diligent job with building self-esteem and
getting my child ready to read. My goal
was to raise a child who loved to read and
who had strong self-esteem. Little did I
know at the time how connected these
two goals are.
My choice of parenting goals may be of
interest because one is a gift my parents
gave to me and the other is a gift I discov-
ered myself. My parents were amazingly
intuitive about how to parent in order to
raise a child with strong self-esteem.
However, my parents didn’t read to me as Six Reasons Why the fact that I had never seen an explana-
a child, and our home contained very few Reading Aloud Helps tion of how this activity benefits children’s
books. If they had been advised that read- subsequent reading ability.
Having decided that I wanted my children
ing aloud was critical for success in school, It was during my first course in a mas-
to be readers, I began paying close atten-
I have no doubt that my parents would ter’s program in education called “Survey
tion to anything written about how chil-
have read to me and my siblings in spite of of Reading Methods and Materials” that
dren learn to read. In my journey through
the fact that neither parent read for plea- the answers emerged. One summer as I sat
all the parenting books, I was on the look-
sure. In the 1950s, the importance of read- on my deck reading the textbook for this
out for anything about reading. The recom-
ing aloud to children wasn’t widely known course, it all began to make sense. The
mendation that parents should read to
or communicated to parents. Because information about what reading aloud to a
their children came through loud and
reading was not emphasized or modeled child accomplishes was there in the text-
clear, so I began to purchase children’s
at home, I did not discover reading for books for educators. But why wasn’t this
books and read aloud to my children. How-
pleasure until my late teen years. I missed information in parenting books? That was
ever, being an overly analytical person, I
the pleasure of many classic children’s probably the moment of conception for
began to wonder about why I should read
stories in my own childhood; therefore, the this book.
to my child and what proof there is that it
prospect of sharing them with my own really makes a difference. Although regu- Benefit: Builds
children was doubly inviting. I’d get what larly reading aloud to our children was a Background Knowledge
I’d missed; they’d get acquainted with the habit my husband and I embraced, I was
wonderful world of books. Probably the most critical benefit of all
nagged with these questions and struck by
those hours of reading stories to our chil-
dren is that the child gains knowledge of
things, people, and places that he is less
likely to acquire from any other source.
How Does Reading Stories Aloud Benefit My Child? Every story a parent reads to a child gives
There are some well-researched benefits to a child whose parents read aloud information about an environment and
to him. images of things that happen in that envi-
ronment. It is almost as if we are creating a
Benefits from Reading Aloud huge inventory of mental images of life’s
The child experiences and doing so much more rap-
• develops background knowledge about a variety of topics. idly than the child could experience first-
• builds his vocabulary. hand, even in families that emphasize
• becomes familiar with rich language patterns. travel and conversation. Later, when the
• develops familiarity with story structure. child reads a sentence or passage about a
• acquires familiarity with the reading process. topic he is at least somewhat familiar with,
• identifies reading as a pleasurable activity. it is so much easier for him to determine
unknown words and comprehend what he
Each of these benefits is explored in this article, along with evidence that is reading. Having background, or prior
reading aloud to our children will encourage them to be readers. knowledge, about the topic when reading
a new book is a critical component of later
comprehension after the child has learned yellow hat” (who had brought him from The book provides illustrations of the
to read the words. Africa in the first book) arrives just in time several rooms of stuffed animals, including
After reading about background knowl- to save him from being taken to the zoo. the dinosaur exhibits. For a very young
edge in my education textbook, I began George’s friend is carrying the letter that child, this may be his first exposure to a
examining children’s stories to see what had been delivered by the mailman at the museum of this sort.
kind of information is contained in them. beginning of the story. The letter was writ- As the story continues through the
Let’s take a popular children’s story and ten by “Professor Wiseman,” the director of spaceship scenes, there is some additional
assess it from the perspective of what it the museum, to invite George to ride in a background provided. George is dressed in
provides the child. My oldest child loved spaceship which has been built as an a space suit with a helmet, air tank, gloves,
Curious George stories written by H. A. experiment. In order to be forgiven for the and shoes. A satellite dish and monitor
Rey. Because I have fond memories of how mess he made at the dinosaur exhibit, screen are shown in the illustrations to
much we enjoyed reading these stories, George agrees. George blasts off in a tiny explain how the people on earth commu-
I’ve chosen one for an analysis of the back-
ground information provided in it.
Overview of the Story—

Curious George Gets a Medal
Probably the most critical benefit of reading
In this classic children’s book, a monkey
named George is the center of the story. He stories to our children is that the child gains
is very curious and causes some difficulty
each time he pursues his curiosity by
knowledge of things, people, and places.
exploring something. In this 47-page illus-
trated book, George, who is home alone,
receives a letter. While trying to write a
response, he spills ink which he is trying to
spaceship and must bail out by pulling a nicate with the monkey in the spaceship.
pour from a bottle into a fountain pen. The
lever when a light is illuminated inside the The blastoff scene is complete with a
mess becomes much worse as he tries to
ship by remote control from Earth. He countdown before the rocket engine is
clean up the ink with soap flakes and water
parachutes out just in the nick of time and ignited and the ship blasts off. The descrip-
from a garden hose. Having partially filled
receives a medal for being the First Space tion of the ship continues:
a room with lather and water, he runs to a
Monkey.
nearby farm where he remembers seeing a He pressed the button and the ship
portable pump. rose into the air, slowly first, and then
The events at the farm continue with Background Information from the Story faster and faster and higher and
difficulties. Because the pump is too heavy There is an amazing amount of background higher, until they could no longer see
for him, he decides that he can get a farm information in this story. Our lovable, curi- it in the sky. But on the screen they
animal to pull the pump back to his house. ous monkey demonstrates practical things, saw George clearly all the time.3
However, his first effort to get a pig to pull such as how fountain pens are filled with
A young child hearing this story retains
the pump results in all the pigs rushing out ink and what happens when soap flakes are
an impression of the blasting off of a space-
of the fence once he lifts the latch. He sprayed with water from a garden hose.
ship and continued communications with
finally realizes that a cow is a better choice While George goes to the farm, he observes
Earth.
and begins the journey home on the cow’s the pigs squealing and grunting and run-
This classic children’s story was written
back with the pump pulled behind them. ning away as fast as they can. He also con-
in 1957 and offers the opportunity for a
However, the farmers see them and a chase trasts the pigs’ behavior to that of the cows,
parent to explain that there were no
begins. George hides in some laundry on a who were gentle and strong and far better
manned space flights then, yet we have
clothesline and then jumps in the back of candidates to pull the pump for him. All
achieved enormous progress in space
a passing pickup truck. these observations provide background
flight during the last 40 years. Other scenes
The truck happens to be on its way to information for the child about the behav-
that date the book include the use of a
the Museum of Science to deliver a large ior of different farm animals.
fountain pen with a blotter and the laundry
box. George, who does not know what a George, who had never been to a
hanging on the outdoor clothesline. These
museum is, goes inside to satisfy his curi- museum before, makes observations about
nuances provide an experience from which
osity. He explores the rooms with stuffed this unfamiliar environment. George
to launch a discussion about the differ-
prehistoric animals and eventually spots observes that the large animals he sees do
ences in technology and life in the 1950s
some nuts on a tree in the dinosaur exhibit. not move. The author writes:
versus today.
Since he is hungry he climbs onto the dino-
saur’s head and accidentally pulls the They were not alive. They were Benefit: Builds Vocabulary
artificial tree over, knocking down the stuffed animals, put into the Museum
A child with a large listening and speaking
dinosaur. The guards catch him and lock so that everybody could get a look at
vocabulary has an enormous advantage in
him in a cage. His friend, “the man with the them.2
formally taught. They learn from listening
Sample Vocabulary Words in Curious George Gets a Medal to the patterns spoken around them and
modeling their own language patterns after
Scenes at the those of other speakers. The brain is hard-
Scenes at the House Scenes at the Farm
Spaceship wired to learn the rules and organization
of a language system; all that is required is
professor
curious shed sufficient input for the brain to sort out the
flash way words can be ordered to make sen-
fountain pen loop
signal tences. As a child listens to sentence after
funnel grunting
bail out sentence, he develops a familiarity with a
blotter hurled range of possible sentence patterns and
emergency rockets
garden hose latch grunting how ideas are communicated. The patterns
permit become part of his internal rule system for
tap squealing
space suit putting words together. For example, he
lather grazing
launching learns that questions can be made in dif-
escape rattling ferent ways:
site groping
portable pump lever
parachute What did George do when he could
not carry the pump?
learning to read. Reading comprehension ing books read to them. Did George carry the pump?
depends more than any other single skill Continuing with our Curious George
(With a rising voice): George didn’t
on knowing the meanings of the individual example, let’s examine the vocabulary
carry the pump?
words in the passage. When a child is trying words that appear in this children’s story.
to read an unfamiliar word after he has During the beginning scenes at the house He learns as well that some words have
learned some phonics and word attack involving the letter writing and attempted to go in a certain order to fill “slots” in a
skills, he should begin to sound out the cleanup of the spilled ink, lots of rich sentence, and others are not bound by
word. The process of relating the print to a vocabulary is used. Then while George is such rules. For example, he learns where
spoken word is faster and more accurate on the farm, completely different words are to put an adjective that modifies a noun:
when that word is already in the child’s included. The story continues with more before the noun, unless it is part of the verb
speaking vocabulary. For example, if a rich experiences and vocabulary as George phrase. In English we say the curious mon-
child encounters the word museum for the is asked to go up in a spaceship and bail out key, not the monkey curious, although we
first time in print, he is likely to say the using a parachute to land safely. can say the monkey was curious. This part
word correctly if he recognizes that it is a Below is a list of 28 sample words from of language “learning,” again, is not con-
word he has heard and can interpret. And this book. Although some of these words scious or deliberately practiced in the
not only can the child figure out the new may be spoken in our daily interaction with preschool years; it will take place with
word faster, but because word recognition our children, many are words we would not exposure to language. What is different
has required less time and effort, he has use regularly, and so the child’s vocabulary about the language in books and the lan-
more attention to devote to comprehend- expands. It has been proven that children guage of speech? Plenty. The language of
ing the passage. do not typically learn such words from books is much more complex. Sentences
Imagine that a child who is an early television, from each other, or simply from are complete in book language but tend to
reader doesn’t know the word rocket and is talking with adults. Reading books is the be incomplete and run-on in less formal
reading the following sentence: key to knowing words. conversations between people who are
talking to each other face-to-face. Sen-
When we flash you a signal you will Benefit: Develops Familiarity tences tend to be longer and more complex
have to open the door and bail out with Rich Language Patterns in books—that is, they have clauses built
with the help of emergency rockets.4
Not only is exposure to the background into them, or they are joined by conjunc-
As he sounds out rock-ets he will more information and specific words in books tions that are carefully chosen to express
quickly recognize that he has read this important for children, but so is exposure an idea. They tend to be loaded with more
unknown word correctly if this word is to sentence patterns and special uses of modifiers—adjectives and adverbs—and
already part of his speaking vocabulary, language that are found only in books. The to use correct grammar more than we do
and he knows what it means. The context more exposure to complex and well-struc- in casual speech. Printed language uses
will help him know that he has deciphered tured sentences, the more likely it is that phrases and expressions in special ways
the word correctly, and he will have a sense the child will use such sentence patterns that are peculiar to writing but uncommon
that the word fits the meaning of the sen- himself. Thus, the exposure helps not only in speech, such as the greetings and clos-
tence. Having a big mental dictionary of comprehension but also speaking and ings in letters. Finally, the way that sen-
words facilitates reading comprehension writing ability as the child matures. tences are ordered and strung together in
and reading fluency, and young children In the preschool years, children do not writing is usually much more organized
acquire a big mental dictionary from hav- learn about sentence structure from being and less repetitious than the way we speak.
An example of well-written sentences
from our Curious George book is the letter Common Characteritics of Stories
from the Professor to George, which is
printed in the book, as follows: • The story has a title.
• There are characters, including a main character.
Dear George,
• The story takes places in a setting (time, place).
A small space ship has been built by • The characters usually have a problem to solve.
our experimental station. It is too
• The action hinges on how the problem is solved.
small for a man, but could carry a
• There is a resolution (climax) in the story, before it ends.
little monkey. Would you be willing
to go up in it? • Language is used to create the effect of surprise, sadness, climax, or humor.
I have never met you, but I hear that

you are a bright little monkey who Out of the blue an open parachute I’ll blow your house down” becomes
can do all sorts of things and that is came floating down to earth. The a language event of a particular kind.7
just what we need. truck raced over to the spot where
George would land. Benefit: Develops Familiarity
We want you to do something
with Story Structure
nobody has ever done before: bail What a welcome for George!
out of a spaceship in flight. Children absorb a great deal about story
Professor Wiseman hung a big structure from hearing many stories during
When we flash you a signal you will golden medal around his neck. their preschool years. This knowledge is
have to open the door and bail out “Because,” he said, “you are the first helpful once the child begins to read and
with the help of emergency rockets. living being to come back to earth write his own stories. It helps with reading
We hope that you are willing and that from a space flight.” And on the because, knowing what to expect, children
your friend will permit you to go. medal it said: TO GEORGE, THE form a mental outline of the events and
FIRST SPACE MONKEY. remember the details much more easily. It
Gratefully yours, helps with writing because, knowing what
Then a newspaperman took his pic-
Professor Wiseman the pieces are and where a story should go,
ture and everybody shouted and
Director of the Science Museum5 the child has a mold to put his words into.
cheered, even the farmer and his son,
Preschoolers who have been read hun-
This passage also demonstrates some and the kind woman from next door
dreds of stories begin to understand that
fundamentals of good letter composition. (who had worked for hours to get the
stories have common characteristics.
The first paragraph introduces the topic water out of the room).6
and tells why the Professor is writing to the In summary, children who have been Benefit: Acquires Familiarity
monkey. The remainder of the letter clearly read to have learned that there is a different with the Reading Process
explains why a man can’t go in the space- language, or a different way of expressing Children learn about what reading is from
ship and why George has been invited to ideas, in books from the way we speak. observing others read to them. For young
do this job. In addition the Professor They begin to develop an “ear” for written children, early experiences of having
describes what George would be asked to English versus spoken English. As someone read to them gives them an expe-
do. The last paragraph politely expresses described by Canadian edu- rience and impression
the Professor’s recognition that George will cator M. Spencer: about how people read.
need his friend’s permission to go. Children gain an impres-
Another example of the descriptive Being read to offers
sion about what a person
language appropriate for preschoolers is them [children]
does when he or
from the scene where they are waiting for longer stretches
she reads. Since
George to react to the illuminated light and of written lan-
we cannot see
pull the lever to parachute from the space- guage than at
inside the mind,
ship. The author’s writing is demonstrated any other time,
which is where
in the following passage: and moreover,
the process is
this is language
They waited anxiously...At last occurring, a
put together by
George began to move. child must guess
someone that isn’t
about what the adult is
there to be seen. The
Slowly, as if in a daze, he was groping doing. The child begins
re a d e r, a d u l t o r
for the lever. Would he reach it in to form hypotheses
child, lends the text
time? There—he had grabbed it! about the print on
a different voice,
t h e p a g e c o r re -
The door opened—hurrah—George so that “I’ll huff
sponding to words
was on his way! and I’ll puff and
that are the same
as those the child hears in speaking and ing early in life and hopefully begin a life- centuries.
listening. This correlation between print long love of reading. Choose a time when you can read for an
and spoken words is an important step in Probably the most important thing uninterrupted period. My children are very
learning about reading. about reading aloud to a child is to allow vocal about how much they dislike it when
A study that was completed by educator the child to experience reading as an I answer a phone call and leave them
E.H. Hiebert examined what preschool enjoyable activity. If the child associates “hanging” in the middle of a key passage of
children believe an adult is reading on the reading with pleasure, the child will have a a story we are reading. Get involved and be
page. Children were shown a book with greater desire to learn to read. As Jim dramatic: Make the story more fun for you
pictures and print and asked to point to Trelease wrote in the first chapter of his and your children by accentuating the ani-
what a reader should read. In this study it book, The Read-Aloud Handbook: mation of your voice for key lines.
was found that three-year-old children It’s important that parents allow their
Every time we read to a child, we’re
believed that it was the pictures that were children to see them enjoying reading.
sending a “pleasure” message to the
being read.8 When I was growing up the only thing I
child’s brain. You could even call it a
There is a set of other things a pre- remember seeing my parents read was the
commercial, conditioning the child
reading child must learn that educators daily newspaper. In fact I can vividly recall
to associate books and print with
refer to as “print awareness” or “learning that my father always read the paper in his
pleasure.9
about print.” These concepts are learned easy chair each evening after family dinner.
Modeling that reading is pleasurable sends
strong messages to our children.
Practical Tips about

Probably the most important thing about How to Make Reading
reading aloud to a child is to allow the child to Aloud Enjoyable
experience reading as an enjoyable activity. When Do I Start Reading
to My Child?
Although Jim Trelease, in his book, The
Read-Aloud Handbook, advises that read-
from being read to by an adult who shows There are many things parents can do to ing to a child should start as soon as the
the child the book and interacts with the make reading pleasurable. Choose a loca- baby is born, my personal experience was
child as the story is being read aloud. tion in the home that your children espe- different. Although I occasionally read to
cially enjoy. My children love to read on the my infants when they were less than 6
Benefit: Identifies Reading front porch swing during the summer; they months old, I found it awkward to cradle
as a Pleasurable Activity have reminded me that we read Charlotte’s my infant and try to turn the pages of a
I can vividly remember the first time that I Web one summer while waiting for the picture book. Read to your infant if it pro-
realized that reading was a great pleasure. camp bus to pick them up each day. Espe- vides stimulation for you during the some-
It was during spring break of my senior cially in the winter my children love to times tedious hours you spend holding and
year in high school, which my best friend cuddle up next to me while listening to a rocking your baby. However, don’t feel
and I spent in Florida visiting my grandpar- story. At an educators’ conference that I compelled to read at this stage if you find it
ents. My friend, whose name was Made- attended, a European speaker showed more rewarding to look into the child’s eyes
line, tossed me her copy of Ayn Rand’s slides of historical paintings depicting and talk to him instead. There’s plenty of
Atlas Shrugged after she finished it. I scenes about reading. His point in showing time to read later.
devoured it during that week, reading late over a hundred slides of paintings was that
into the night several nights. Although this the overwhelming majority of the paintings 6–9 Months
first “aha” experience came late for me, showed the child sitting on the adult’s lap Beginning to read to a child around 6–9
reading for pleasure has been a part of my while reading a story. The proximity of months of age is ideal. The child is sitting
life ever since. As a parent, it is my goal for closeness between parent and child while up and can hold small board books at this
my children to experience the joy of read- reading has been captured in art over many stage. It is great to allow a child to begin
exploring books by himself during quiet
Concepts a Child Must Learn about Print moments in the crib or on the floor. Won-
• How the book is turned when it is “right side up” derful vinyl books are available, which are
• That the print is read, not the pictures more durable when the child is slobbering
• Where the beginning of the book is during the teething stage. Place the more
• The order of reading the print on a page— top to bottom—left to right fragile board books with pop-out sections
• What to do at the end of a line on the bookshelf to be saved for reading
• What to do at the end of a page together. Keep several small books among
your child’s toys that are the right size and
shape for him to turn the pages and carry for bedtime reading was in a rocking chair our regular reading time. He was a very
without help from you. Rotate the books so in his room with the door closed to avoid active child who frequently squirmed to get
that he doesn’t grow bored with them. interruption. In our family the routine of a down from my lap because he had a greater
bedtime story has continued to this day, interest in gross motor activities than in
12–18 Months and our children are 11 and 8 years old. sitting. If your child isn’t interested in hear-
By the age of 12–18 months your goal is to Our pattern is that on nights when both ing a story, abandon the effort and try
have your child bring books to you, signal- parents are home at bedtime, one parent again at another time. Do not push the
ing he wants you to read him a story. It’s a reads to one child. The pair then is swapped issue, and he will eventually come back to
thrill to see your child with book in hand on the following night so that Dad reads to reading. Choose when to offer to read him
and arms lifted telling you that he wants to daughter one night and to son the next a story, and select very short stories ini-
come up on your lap to hear the story he night, and Mom does vice versa. Bedtime tially, thereby matching the child’s atten-
tion span. Select books on topics about
which your child is keenly interested. Ease
your child into longer and longer stretches
of reading time.
The children of parents trained for only one When Do I Stop Reading Aloud?
hour in interactive story reading improved Many parents believe that once their child
begins to read himself, the days of reading
dramatically in verbal expression storybooks aloud are over. However, there
and vocabulary. are some very important reasons for con-
tinuing to read to your child as he begins to
learn to read. Especially in first and second
grade while the child is learning to read, his
listening level far exceeds his reading level;
has chosen. This event signals that he stories will hopefully continue in our house that is, he can understand passages read to
enjoys listening to a story. until as long beyond age 10 as possible. him that far exceed what he is capable of
It is important to make reading times After that age, the child may prefer to read reading himself. Continue to expose your
enjoyable ones; therefore, like so many to himself before bed. child to good literature that mentally chal-
other things in parenting, choosing the lenges him and enables his vocabulary and
appropriate time and occasionally waiting 6–8 Years of Age knowledge to continue growing. Do this as
for the child to be ready can be critical. long as it is fun. Once children prefer to
Once the child is able to read himself,
When my active toddler son squirmed to read silently, everyone can share a “Drop
change the routine by having the child read
get off my lap, I decided not to force it. Everything And Read” (DEAR) time in the
for 15 minutes, followed by the parent
Although I was anxious to begin reading to evening.
reading to the child for 15 minutes. A child
him, I decided to wait to avoid risking that needs to practice to learn to be a good What Do I Do If My Child Wants
his experience of reading would be nega- reader. If your child is a reluctant reader, To Look Ahead at the Pictures
tive. If your child wants to turn the pages have him read from a book on his reading Before We Read?
faster than the words can be read, abandon level before you read to him from a book As frustrating as looking ahead may be to
reading the story as written and make up a that is somewhat above his own reading the parent, most educators would encour-
story that corresponds with the pictures. level. When children are first learning to age you to allow looking ahead at the pic-
Even with the very simple small board decode the words, there will be a gap tures. This exercise helps the child to
books of about a dozen pages with few between what they are able to read them- activate background knowledge about the
words, discuss the pictures and talk about selves and what they enjoy hearing read setting and topic of the story. In first-grade
all the things your child sees on each page. aloud. Encourage your child to practice reading instruction, teachers usually take
Your dialogue about each page should take reading books he can read comfortably. time to introduce a story before they begin
longer than the actual time to read the Then, it is important for the parent to con- reading it. Children are taught to think
words on the page. tinue reading to the child from books above about the title of the book and anticipate
the child’s reading level in order to expand what the story might be about. Typically a
2 Years of Age his background knowledge and enjoyment discussion is initiated about the topic of the
of literature. book. If the story is about going to the zoo,
Establish a routine by the time your child
is two years old that you always read a story the teacher leads a discussion about what
at bedtime. This routine is important What If My Child you are likely to see at the zoo. Children will
because even if you spend no other time Resists Being Read To? name the animals found at a zoo, as well as
reading during the day, at least this 15 min- The intimacy of shared reading is not discussing the activities one might see,
utes per day occurs religiously. While our always easy to capture. When my son was such as zookeepers feeding the animals.
child still slept in a crib, our favorite spot a toddler it was difficult to feel close during The purpose of this discussion is to activate
prior knowledge for the children who have The benefits are greatest when the the child’s capability in expressing ideas
visited the zoo and to provide information child is an active participant, engag- verbally. These are staggering results for
to any child who has no prior information ing in discussions about stories, children who have an average age of 30
about this experience. learning to identify letters and words, months! Think what effect using an interac-
and talking about the meanings of tive story reading approach might have
What Comes After Picture Books? words. One researcher who observed over several years, versus the one month of
Before your child reaches age seven you parents reading books to their chil- this study.
will begin reading aloud chapter books that dren discovered differences in the Reading aloud to a child is a critical
don’t have pictures. Charlotte’s Web, a story quality and quantity of informal activity in helping a child gain the knowl-
written by E.B. White about the friendship i n s t r u c t i o n t h a t t h e p a re n t s edge and language skill that will enable
between a spider and a pig, is a wonderful provided.10 good comprehension later on. Reading
example of a chapter book appropriate for aloud increases background knowledge,
The importance of engaging the child as
this age. The vocabulary is challenging and builds vocabulary, and familiarizes chil-
an active listener, rather than the parent
interesting, and the story is captivating for dren with the language in books. The
reading the story from beginning to end
the child. There is plenty of background Commission on Reading has advised that
without pause, has been researched by
knowledge presented while the child is not only does reading aloud to a child
other educators. The most interesting of
thoroughly entertained. Other books we make a difference, but the way parents
these was a study completed by G. White-
enjoyed included Mr. Popper’s Penguins, read aloud matters. A book becomes a
hurst and his colleagues in 1988, which
The Indian in the Cupboard, and The vehicle for using language—before, dur-
demonstrated the impact of active engage-
American Girl Collection books. ing, and after reading. In addition to
ment. In their study they provided training
After your child can read himself, reading aloud, engaging in probing con-
to the parents of 15 middle-class preschool
continue to look for opportunities to read versations at home can help the child
children from two to three years old. The
aloud to your child. This can be done acquire the language skills needed to
parents received a one hour training ses-
through round-robin reading of a classic become a good reader. ☐
sion in interactive story reading in which
book in front of the fireplace or through
they were shown how to engage in this Endnotes
alternate oral reading—first the parent,
technique. They were instructed to: 1. R. C. Andersen, E. H. Hiebert, J. A. Scott, and I. A. G.
then the child, switching every page or Wilkinson, Becoming a Nation of Readers: The Report of the
• pause periodically and ask open-
two—to foster better comprehension. It Commission on Reading (Champaign, IL: Illinois University,
ended questions. Center for the Study of Reading, 1984), 23.
will also enable the family to have active
• suggest alternative possibilities. 2. H. A. Rey and M. Rey, Curious George Gets a Medal (New
discussions about the characters and the York: Scholastic, 1957), 31.
• pose progressively more challenging
author’s intended meaning. Your own love 3. H. A. Rey and M. Rey, Curious George Gets a Medal (New
questions. York: Scholastic, 1957), 43-44.
of literature will continue to be communi-
An example of an open-ended question 4. H. A. Rey and M. Rey, Curious George Gets a Medal (New
cated through shared reading activities. York: Scholastic, 1957), 39.
is “What is Curious George doing?” or
Remember and find the books you loved as 5. H. A. Rey and M. Rey, Curious George Gets a Medal (New
“Why do you think he is doing that?” The York: Scholastic, 1957). 39.
a child. Enjoy them again as you share
key is to ask questions that cannot be 6. H. A. Rey and M. Rey, Curious George Gets a Medal (New
them with your child. York: Scholastic, 1957), 44-46.
answered with a yes/no response. A con- 7. M. M. Clay, Becoming Literate: The Construction of Inner
Interactive Story Reading trol group was identified with children of Control (Auckland, New Zealand: Heinemann Education,
1991), 28.
approximately the same age and language
Have you ever felt frustrated when your 8. E. H. Hiebert, “Developmental Patterns and Interrelation-
development. The parents of both groups ships of Preschool Children’s Print Awareness,” Reading
child wants to stop you to ask questions Research Quarterly 16, no. 2 (1981), 236-260.
tape-recorded their reading sessions for
while you are reading a story to him? When 9. J. Trelease, The Read-Aloud Handbook, 4th edition (New
one month. York: Penguin, 1995), 9.
my children were preschoolers, I found it
The tapes confirmed that both groups 10. R. C. Andersen, E. H. Hiebert, J. A. Scott, and I. A. G.
frustrating to be constantly interrupted by Wilkinson, Becoming a Nation of Readers: The Report of the
read equally often (about eight times per
all their comments about the pictures and Commission on Reading (Champaign, IL: Illinois University,
week) and that the trained parents fol- Center for the Study of Reading, 1984), 23.
questions about the story. I decided that
lowed the instructions for interactive story 11. G. J. Whitehurst, F. L. Falco, C. J. Lonigan, J. E. Fischel, B.
limiting the interruptions was a good thing, D. DeBaryshe, M. C. Valdez-Menchaca, and M. Caulfield,
reading. The children in both groups were “Accelerating Language Development Through Picture Book
because when the child starts school his Reading,” Developmental Psychology 24 (1988), 552-559.
tested before and after the experimental
teacher wouldn’t want to be stopped by
month. The results showed that at the end
incessant questions from 25 children. It
of one month of interactive story reading
also seemed that staying “on task” was an
the children in this group versus the con-
admirable skill to be learned.
trol group:
However, this dialogue during the story
reading is actually very positive and is • improved 8.5 months in verbal
something to be encouraged and devel- expression, and
oped. As described in Becoming a Nation • were six months ahead on a vocabu-
of Readers, active discussion during read-
lary test.11
ing is important:
The verbal expression measure assessed
Building Knowledge
The Case for Bringing Content into the Language Arts Block and
for a Knowledge-Rich Curriculum Core for all Children
“I am sure that the power of vested inter-
ests is vastly exaggerated compared with
the gradual encroachment of ideas.... Soon
or late, it is ideas, not vested interests,
which are dangerous for good or evil.”
–J. M. Keynes, The General Theory of
Employment, Interest, and Money
C
onsider the following sentence,
which is one that most literate
Americans can understand, but
most literate British people can-
not, even when they have a wide vocabu-
lary and know the conventions of the
standard language:
Jones sacrificed and knocked in a
run.
Typically, a literate British person

English person to make this sentence upwards either. Yet, content is not ade-
would know all the words in the sentence
comprehensible. quately addressed in American schools,
yet wouldn’t comprehend it. (In fairness,
First, we would have to explain that especially in the early grades. None of our
most Americans would be equally baffled
Jones was at bat. That would entail an current methods attempt to steadily build
by a sentence about the sport of cricket.)
explanation of the inning system and the up children’s knowledge; not the empty
To understand this sentence about Jones
three-outs system. It would entail an expla- state and district language arts standards,
and his sacrifice, you need a wealth of rel-
nation of the size and shape of the baseball which rarely mention a specific text or
evant background knowledge that goes
field (necessary to the concept of a sacrifice piece of information; not the reading text-
beyond vocabulary and syntax—relevant
fly or bunt) and a digression on what a fly books, which jump from one trivial piece
knowledge that is far broader than the
or a bunt is. The reader would also have to to another; and not the comprehension
words of the sentence. Let’s consider what
have some vague sense of the layout of the drills conducted in schools in the long
we as writers would have to convey to an
bases and what a run is. By the time our periods of 90–120 minutes devoted to lan-
English reader had begun to assimilate all guage arts. These all promote the view that
E. D. Hirsch, Jr., is founder of the Core Knowledge this relevant background knowledge, he or comprehension depends on having formal
Foundation and professor emeritus of education
and humanities at the University of Virginia. He she may have lost track of the whole point skills rather than broad knowledge.
is a fellow of the Academy of Arts and Sciences. of the explanation. What was the original This may sound like an academic point.
He has written several acclaimed books, includ- sentence? It will have been submerged in It is, in fact, an important argument about
ing the bestseller Cultural Literacy: What Every a flurry of additional sentences branching the science that underlies learning. I
American Needs to Know and The Schools We out in different directions. believe inadequate attention to building
Need and Why We Don’t Have Them, and served
as editor of the eight-volume Core Knowledge The point of this example is that knowl- students’ knowledge is the main reason
series for parents, which ranges from What Your edge of content and of the vocabulary why the reading scores of 13- and 17-year-
Preschooler Needs to Know to What Your 6th- acquired through learning about content olds on the National Assessment of Educa-
Grader Needs to Know. This article is adapted are fundamental to successful reading tional Progress have not budged in years. I
with permission from his book, The Knowledge comprehension; without broad knowl- believe this neglect of knowledge is a major
Deficit: Closing the Shocking Education Gap for
American Children (New York: Houghton Miff- edge, children’s reading comprehension source of inequity, at the heart of the
lin, 2006). It appeared, with permission, in the will not improve and their scores on read- achievement gap between America’s poor
Spring 2006 issue of American Educator. ing comprehension tests will not budge and non-poor. I also believe that if this idea
about what is limiting students’ compre- mative years. It is thanks to the Romantics rich curriculum to become proficient read-
hension isn’t understood and aggressively (also known as transcendentalists, prag- ers. The word reading, of course, has two
addressed, reading scores won’t move up, matists, and, in education, progressives) senses. The first means the process of turn-
no matter how hard teachers try. And the that the word “natural” has been a term of ing printed marks into sounds and these
public debate will wrongly continue to pil- honor in our country and that the ideas of sounds into words. But the second sense
lory teachers and public schools for stag- “nature” and “natural” were elevated to a means the very different process of under-
nant achievement scores. status that previously had been occupied standing those words. Learning how to
In the pages that follow, I want to make only by divine law. We can hear these read in the first sense, as vital as it is, does
the following argument: First, that the romantic beliefs in John Dewey’s writings, not guarantee learning how to read in the
implicit model currently used to improve which continually use the terms “develop- second sense, comprehending the mean-
reading comprehension is based on faulty,
but commonplace, ideas. Second, that a
more scientifically accurate picture of
reading comprehension exists—and it puts
background knowledge and vocabulary,
along with fluent decoding ability, at the
center of reading comprehension. Third,
we can identify the knowledge that is most
useful to reading comprehension. Fourth,
if we accept these premises, we are obliged
to revise the early grades curriculum so
that we can impart to all students, in lan-
guage arts classes and throughout the day,
the knowledge that will enable them to ment” and “growth”—terms that came as ing of what is read. To become a good
read with strong comprehension. And, naturally to him as they do to us. comprehender, a child needs a great deal
finally, if we do this, we will help all stu- Being trained in the history of ideas, I of knowledge. A Romantically inspired
dents become strong comprehenders of had become familiar with the way in which long delay in beginning to teach that
high-level texts, and we will disproportion- unnoticed metaphors like “growth” and knowledge is socially and economically
ately help our most at-risk students. “development” unconsciously govern our harmful to our students—especially our
thought—and continue to do so, even most disadvantaged students.
I. The Wrong Ideas That when scientific evidence clearly shows that Disparagement of factual knowledge, as
Underlie Our Approach to one of the primary goals of education, found in books, has long been a strong cur-
reading, is not a natural development at all. rent in American thought. Henry Ford’s
Teaching Reading
Let’s ponder “development” for a famous dictum, “History is bunk,” is a suc-
Comprehension moment. When a fertilized egg turns into cinct example. Since the 19th century, such
When I began college teaching in the an embryo, that development is indeed anti-intellectualism has been as American
1950s, my academic specialty was the his- something that unfolds naturally. Simi- as apple pie, as the great historian Richard
tory of ideas. I also specialized in the theory larly, in the first two years of life, when a Hofstadter has pointed out, and it came
of textual interpretation, which, reduced to child learns to walk and talk, those are straight out of the Romantic movement
its essence, is the theory of reading. So I natural developments. Since the child into our schools.1
became well-versed in the scientific litera- acquires these extremely difficult skills Instead of a respect for the importance
ture on language comprehension and in often without conscious adult instruction, of knowledge, Romanticism gave us faith
American and British intellectual history we might mistakenly extend trust in natu- in the half-truth that the most important
of the 19th century. This double research ral unfolding to the next stage of life— thing for students to learn is “how to learn.”
interest prepared my mind for disturbing when a child enters school. And we might It bequeathed to us a tendency to dismiss
insights about American schooling. I saw expect that given loving exposure to lots of the acquisition of broad knowledge as
that John Maynard Keynes’s remark about books, a child might learn to read with little “rote learning” of “mere facts,” to subtly
the power of ideas over vested interests was explicit instruction in reading mechanics. disparage “merely verbal” presentations in
profoundly right. Root ideas are much Hence, the whole language movement, books and by teachers, and to criticize
more important in practical affairs than we which for so many years led many teach- school knowledge unless it is connected to
usually realize, especially when they are so ers, teacher educators, textbook publish- “real life” in a “hands-on” way. These ideas
much taken for granted that they are hid- ers, and administrators to neglect decoding are now so commonplace that we don’t
den from our view. and other early reading mechanics. think twice about them; we don’t scientifi-
In American education, the ideas that A naturalistic approach to teaching cally scrutinize them. Yet, these ideas
influence us, though often hidden from decoding is not, however, the most delete- underlie what we as a nation think about
view, come to us from the intellectual rious Romantic idea influencing the teach- reading comprehension.
movement known as Romanticism, which ing of reading. The most harmful idea is Pick up a typical basal reader and the
held great sway during our country’s for- that children do not need a knowledge- clear implication is that comprehension
skill depends on formal “comprehension hension ability.4 activities is that learning comprehension
strategies,” such as predicting, summariz- Here’s an example of how these ideas strategies will give students a shortcut to
ing, questioning, and clarifying.2 Look in and practices affect real children in real gaining greater expertise in reading. Sup-
them fruitlessly to find evidence that the classrooms. In May 2004, a front-page story posedly, learning such strategies will
publishers believe reading depends on in the Washington Post described the quickly provide the skills they need to
imbibing a body of knowledge. I call this activities in a third-grade classroom at a comprehend unfamiliar texts. But as the
Romantic idea “formalism”—a belief that public school in Maryland, which the teachers in the school pointed out to the
reading comprehension can best be reporter, Linda Perlstein, identified as reporter, the methods did not seem to be
improved by acquiring formal comprehen- being typical of activities “across the working. Reading scores were not going up
sion strategies, not by building children’s nation.” Perlstein had been sitting in class- significantly. Perlstein reports that “staff
knowledge base. rooms at the school, observing what went members said they aren’t sure what they
This idea is ruinous to reading instruc- on and talking to students, teachers, and might be doing wrong.”
tion. It is sabotaging efforts to raise reading administrators. The piece begins with a The idea that reading skill is largely a set
comprehension scores. It is causing citi-
zens to question the quality of their schools
and is leading policymakers to blame
school staff for reading failures. It is time to
fault the idea, not the teachers and the It is time to fault the idea, not the teachers
students who are doing their best.
and students.
These Wrong Ideas Underlie
Reading Textbooks and Distort
the Use of Classroom Time
Publishers now spend tens of millions of comment by one of the students: of general-purpose maneuvers that can be
dollars to produce—and schools hundreds applied to any and all texts is one of the
of millions to buy—reading programs that Here is 9-year-old Zulma Berrios’s
main barriers to our students’ achievement
are constantly being upgraded and revised. take on the school day: “In the morn-
in reading. It is true that students benefit
But the guiding ideas behind these pro- ing we read. Then we go to Mrs. Wit-
from learning and practicing reading com-
grams are typically formalistic and almost thaus and read. Then after lunch we
prehension skills, but a key point has got-
indistinguishable from one another. read. Then we read some more.”
ten lost: More training in these skills is not
Although the editors of several of these These reading periods, Perlstein points necessarily better. A meta-analysis has
programs have strong credentials in educa- out, come at the expense of classes in his- shown that six classes of comprehension
tion or psychology, the programs are far tory, science, and art. The reading materi- skill instruction has the same effect as 25
from up-to-date with regard to the relevant als themselves are quite vapid. In this classes.5 (This is emphatically not to sug-
consensus in cognitive science. For particular class, the children were reading gest that some of the methods, such as
instance, cognitive scientists agree that a book about a grasshopper storm. But the asking students questions about important
reading comprehension requires prior point of the class was not to learn anything content they have read, would be a bad
“domain-specific” knowledge about the in depth about grasshoppers; the point was idea. Of course teachers do and should ask
things that a text refers to, and that under- to learn how to ferret meaning out of a text students to engage with reading material
standing the text consists of integrating this by using formal “strategies.” Perlstein in a variety of ways, including questioning
prior knowledge with the words in order to writes: students about the author’s intent, sum-
form a “situation model.”3 Constructing marizing what they’ve read, and so forth.
this mental situation model is what reading For 50 minutes, Tracey Witthaus
The ineffectiveness of an emphasis on
comprehension is. But, existing reading pulls out a small group of third-
strategy arises from two sources: first, con-
programs, while they may pay lip service to graders—including Zulma—for Soar
scious strategizing takes up limited mental
this finding about the need for relevant to Success, an intensive reading-
space that otherwise could be devoted to
background knowledge, fail to systemati- comprehension program used at
meaning; second, the skills are being prac-
cally exploit this fundamental insight into many county schools. Instead of
ticed apart from important content. When
the nature of reading. (See “How We studying school desegregation and
the questions are asked about trivial con-
Neglect Knowledge—and Why” in the the anniversary of Brown v. Board of
tent, when learning these strategy skills
Spring 2006 issue of American Educator.) Education, Zulma’s group finishes a
becomes the end—not the means—for
Hundreds of pages of basal text offer up book about a grasshopper storm and
engaging content, and when the time
trivial stories that provide little opportunity practices reading strategies: predict,
devoted to skills training drives needed
for children to build their store of knowl- summarize, question, clarify. “Clar-
content out of the classroom, then reading
edge. They persist, unit after unit, in asking ify,” said Zulma, who began the year
c o m p re h e n s i o n i s n o t e f f e c t i v e l y
students to “predict,” “summarize,” “infer,” reading at the late first-grade level.
advanced.) Formal comprehension skills
etc.—as if endless use of these strategies The theory behind these deadening can only take students so far; knowledge is
will increase students’ reading compre-
what enables their comprehension to keep language understanding will gain still “situation model” based on domain-spe-
increasing. The staff and children at the more language proficiency, while those cific knowledge.10 This situation model
school Perlstein visited do not need more who lack initial understanding will fall constitutes the understood meaning of the
skills training. They need a revolution in further and further behind.8 text. Take, for example, this passage from
the ideas that now drive reading compre- my book What Your Second-Grader Needs
hension instruction. “Filling in the Blanks”: Why Reading to Know:
Comprehension—and Reading
Comprehension Tests—Require In 1861, the Civil War started. It lasted
II. Reading Comprehension
Broad General Knowledge until 1865. It was American against
Depends Mainly on Knowl- American, North against South. The
As scientists have probed more deeply into
edge and Knowledge-Related Southerners called Northerners
Vocabulary
Recently, schools have begun to do a much
better job of teaching all children to
become good first-step readers who can
turn printed symbols into sounds and
words quickly and accurately, a process
called decoding. The importance of sys-
tematically and effectively teaching decod-
ing cannot be overstated (and the role
played by AFT members in making such
instruction better understood and more
commonplace can hardly be overstated
either). But becoming a skilled decoder
does not ensure that one will become a
skilled reader. There are students who, after
mastering decoding, and reading widely
can, under the right circumstances, gain
greater knowledge and thence better read-
ing comprehension. But such gains will
occur only if the student already knows
enough to comprehend the meaning of
what he or she is decoding. Many special-
ists estimate that a child (or an adult) needs the nature of language comprehension, “Yankees.” Northerners called South-
to understand a minimum of 90 percent of they have discovered that what the text erners “Rebels,” or “Rebs” for short.
the words in a passage in order to under- implies but doesn’t say is a necessary part General Robert E. Lee was in charge
stand the passage and thus begin to learn of its understood meaning. In fact, what of the Southern army. General
the other 10 percent of the words.6 More- the text doesn’t say often far exceeds what Ulysses S. Grant was in charge of the
over, it’s not just the words that the student it says. Just as with “Jones sacrificed and Northern army.
has to grasp the meaning of—it’s also the knocked in a run,” the reader or listener has
kind of reality that the words are referring to fill in the blanks and make the unstated Potentially, this passage is usefully
to (think of our baseball example).7 When connections. This is hardly a new observa- informative to a second-grader learning
a child doesn’t understand those word tion. The ancient Greeks knew it, and Aris- about the Civil War—but only if he or she
meanings and those referred-to realities, totle even gave the phenomenon a already understands much of what’s
being good at sounding out words is a dead name—enthymeme—which is technically addressed in it. Take the phrase “North
end. Reading becomes a kind of Catch-22: a syllogism with some of the logically nec- against South.” A wealth of preexisting
In order to become better at reading with essary steps left out.9 For instance, if I say, background information is needed to
understanding, you already have to be able “All men are mortal, so Socrates is mortal,” understand that simple phrase—going far
to read with understanding. everyone will understand what I say. But beyond the root idea of compass direc-
Long before Joseph Heller’s Catch-22, that is because their relevant knowledge tions, which is simply the necessary first
this idea was implied in the Gospel of Mat- enables them to supply the missing infer- step. The child needs a general idea of the
thew, which stated that those who already ence: “Socrates is a man.” geography of the U.S. and needs to infer
have shall gain more, while those who have To different extents, all speech has these that the named compass directions stand
not shall be taken away even what they blank spaces. Cognitive psychologists have for geographical regions. Then a further
have. Alluding to this Biblical passage, determined that when a text is being inference or construction is needed: The
cognitive scientists and reading research- understood, the reader (or listener) is fill- child has to understand that the names of
ers have spoken of the “Matthew effect” in ing in a lot of the unstated connections geographical regions stand for the popula-
reading. Those who already have good between the words to create an imagined tions of those regions and that those popu-
lations have been organized into some sort passages that sample a person’s general One critical finding is that word learn-
of collectivity so they can raise armies. knowledge of several kinds of subjects. (For ing takes place most efficiently when the
That’s just an initial stab at unpacking what more on reading comprehension tests, see reader or listener already understands the
the child must infer to understand the “What Do Reading Comprehension Tests context well. For example, researchers
phrase “North against South.” A full, Mainly Measure? Knowledge” in the Spring have found that we learn the words of a
explicit account of the taken-for-granted 2006 issue of American Educator.) foreign language most effectively when the
knowledge that someone would need to subject matter is familiar.13 If you read in
construct a situation model for this passage Why Building Vocabulary Is Vital French that “Lyon a battu Lille,” you will
would take many pages of analysis. and Why It Is Largely Built through make greater gains in learning what battu
To understand language, whether spo- Broad Exposure to Content means if you know something about soc-
ken or written, we need to construct a situ- Knowledge cer. This finding appeals to common sense.
ation model consisting of meanings Comprehending a text depends on know- You can guess accurately what the word
construed from the explicit words in the ing the meanings of most of its words. An ought to mean in the context because you
text, as well as meanings inferred from adequate early vocabulary is, therefore, know what is being talked about. This pic-
ture of how words are learned in context is
supported by recent research, which shows
that we infer the meanings of words by
grasping the whole meaning of the utter-
What the text doesn’t say often far ance in the form of a mental situation
model. If we are hearing a story about a
exceeds what it says. The reader team of firefighters putting out a fire and
has to fill in the blanks. we encounter the word flames for the first
time, we can make a good guess about
what it means because we understand the
situation referred to in the sentence in
which flames is used. We must grasp this
relevant background knowledge. The spo- fateful for later reading achievement. Other whole situation (precisely or vaguely)
ken and the unspoken taken together con- things being equal, the earlier children when we understand what is said or writ-
stitute the meaning. Without this relevant, acquire a large vocabulary, the greater ten. This understanding of the whole con-
unspoken background knowledge, we their reading comprehension will be in text is the basis for guessing the meanings
can’t understand the text. later grades. Vocabulary growth is a slow of new words. This fact explains why we
That is why we are able to understand process that gradually accumulates a very learn words up to four times faster in a
some texts but not others—no matter how large number of words and, therefore, must familiar context than in an unfamiliar
well we can decode the words (imagine be fostered intensively in the earliest one.14 An optimal early reading program
trying to understand a technical article on grades if we are to bring all children to pro- will exploit this characteristic of word
astrophysics). Since relevant, domain- ficiency in reading as quickly as possible. learning by ensuring that the topics of class
specific knowledge is an absolute require- Anne Cunningham and Keith Stanovich read-alouds, independent reading, and
ment for reading comprehension, there is have shown that under current conditions discussion are consistent over several class
no way around the need for children to of American schooling, vocabulary in sec- periods, so that the topic will become
gain broad general knowledge in order to ond grade is a reliable predictor of aca- familiar to the students and thus accelerate
gain broad general proficiency in reading. demic performance in 11th grade.11 They word learning.
Among experts on reading, there’s one have also shown that the biggest contribu-
group that understands this particularly tion to the size of any person’s vocabulary Why a Knowledge Focus
well—the makers of standardized reading must come from the printed page (whether Will Disproportionately Help
comprehension tests. Such tests always it is heard or read), because print uses a Disadvantaged Children
include a diversity of passages on quite dif- greater number of different words than The Matthew effect in reading, whereby
ferent subjects. Why? Through experimen- everyday oral speech does.12 the rich get richer and the poor get poorer,
tation, test makers found that such variety That a person has learned roughly is inevitable in the case of vocabulary and
is absolutely critical to the validity and reli- 60,000 to 100,000 words by 12th grade is knowledge. As we’ve seen, experts say
ability of the tests. If they sampled just one one of the most remarkable feats of the that we need to know at least 90 percent
kind of subject matter, their tests would human mind. Even though how we do it of a text’s words to understand it.15 Chil-
prove to be inaccurate as measures of gen- remains something of a psychological mys- dren who already have sufficient word
eral reading ability. Because of the inevi- tery, recent work has taught us enough knowledge will understand the text and
table influence of background knowledge, about vocabulary growth to formulate begin learning the meanings of the other
someone who reads well about the Civil some conclusions about the most produc- 10 percent of the words as well as acquire
War may not necessarily read well about tive means of enlarging children’s vocabu- new knowledge through their reading. But
molecular interactions. If a test is to mea- laries, especially among students whose those students who know only 70 percent
sure general reading ability, it must include initial vocabularies are relatively small. of the words will not understand the text
(and thus, will neither begin learning the can pick up new words at a faster rate than ment on this begs the next question:
other 30 percent of the words, nor acquire the advantaged student who already knows Knowledge of what? What knowledge
knowledge from the text). Now, after look- 95 percent of the words heard and read in should the schools be responsible for
ing at the text, they are further behind the school. This is because the former child is teaching to all kids? I believe that part of
advantaged group than they were before getting more opportunities to learn new the answer is quite straightforward, and I
they read the text. If this pattern con- words since she is further from a point of hope uncontroversial—and to teach it
tinues, the gap between the two groups diminishing returns. ought to take about 40–60 percent of cur-
will grow with each successive language Besides this structural possibility for ricular time. I will return to this question in
experience.16 narrowing the vocabulary gap, there is a a moment and explain how I think we
Let’s focus for a bit on the subject of
speeding up word learning for disadvan-
taged children. Between the ages of 2 and
17, an advantaged child learns an average
of 10 to 15 new words a day.* But the
growth in vocabulary is not linear: No one
learns the same number of words every
day, week, or year. The number of new
words gained per unit of time is rather
small at age 2, and it rises with each suc-
ceeding year. In later life, when people
already know most of the words they hear
and read, the number of new words they
gain per year slows down again.17
This nonlinear pattern of vocabulary
growth allows us to make a hopeful quali-
fication of the Matthew effect in reading
comprehension. Vocabulary growth in the
typical school is similar to the growth of
money in an interest-bearing bank
account. Suppose the interest on money is
compounded at 5 percent a year. Some-
body who starts out with just $10 in an
account will fall further and further behind
somebody who starts out with $100. After further opportunity for catching up, should answer it.
10 years, the initial difference of $90 will depending on the special richness of the But beyond this central core of knowl-
become a larger difference of $146. That is vocabulary being studied in school. That is edge that all students should know, how
because the growth rates stay the same for because the vocabulary heard in school is should the rest of students’ curricular time
both accounts and the supply of money is potentially richer than the vocabulary be spent? Exactly how much emphasis
not limited. That pattern, unfortunately, heard outside school. Oral speech tends to should schooling give to a particular event,
describes the vocabulary gap between use a smaller vocabulary than written individual, or historical trend? The answers
advantaged and disadvantaged students— speech.19 Almost all of the rare words that to these questions will always be some-
it widens over time.18 Potentially, though, we know have been gained from print— what subjective. Individuals from different
schools could alter this pattern because the print that we read silently or that is read regions and from different religious, eth-
rates of vocabulary growth in the two stu- aloud to us.20 If school conditions provide nic, and racial backgrounds may have
dents do not have to be identical. If a stu- enough context familiarity to speed up the particular views about what the proper
dent who is behind in word knowledge can learning of these rarer words for all groups, emphases should be. In addition, local
be brought to know 90 percent of the words then the relative gain by the disadvantaged districts, states, schools, and individual
that she hears and reads in school, then she groups will be greater and the gap will be teachers will have particular ideas about
narrowed. what should be taught, given their particu-
*Of course, the figure of 10 to 15 new words a day is lar histories and their own knowledge of
not a description of the actual process of word learning.
It is an average number, arrived at by taking the number
III. What Knowledge and what is interesting, relevant, and useful to
of words that a superior student knows at age 17 and How Much? the students in their schools and classes.
dividing that number by the number of days the student Part of the curriculum, perhaps about half,
has lived from age 2 to age 17. Children actually gain Such is the case for the fundamental, ines-
should be reserved for topics that have
vocabulary in fits and starts with advances and retreats capable importance of substantial, broad
and slow progress in small increments along a broad local resonance. Different locales will
background knowledge for reading com-
front. Words aren’t learned through one or even two make different choices and the debates
exposures; knowledge of what words mean and how prehension (and for performing well on
over those choices will no doubt be lively
they can be used gradually accumulates. reading comprehension tests). But agree-
and interesting—and hopefully enrich our
children’s education in many ways. ined British person or one consisting of from a Confederate line. Segregation
But while we pursue these debates and baseball experts. Every person who speaks was a local or perhaps a regional
encourage local areas to make different and writes must make an estimate of what story. It was slavery that was tearing
choices about how to allocate this portion can be left unexplained and what must be the nation apart.
of the curriculum, let’s also move quickly explicitly stated. Proficiency in reading This example shows that the back-
to identify what should be in the half of the (and listening, speaking, and writing) ground knowledge required to understand
curriculum that all students deserve to be requires possession of the broad knowl- the general sections of the New York Times,
taught. The question that we need to edge that the general reader is assumed to such as the City Lore section, is not deep.
answer is what must students learn so that have. It is not that of an expert—of course not, for
as adolescents and adults they are able to Here are the first three paragraphs of an we cannot all be experts on the diverse
comprehend written and spoken material
aimed at educated general audiences—
newspaper stories of civic interest, political
debates, popular books and magazines,
entry-level college texts, job-related read- Other things being equal, the earlier children
ing, high school exit tests and SATs, direc-
tions and commentaries by employers, acquire a large vocabulary, the greater their
testimony heard by juries, etc. Students
who possess this knowledge are prepared
reading comprehension will be in later grades.
to participate in civic life, move up career
ladders, succeed in college, converse con-
fidently with a wide variety of Americans
with whom they work or socialize, and article by Katherine Greider, taken at ran- subjects that are treated by newspapers. If
generally have the esteem that comes with dom from the City Lore section of the New publishers want their papers to be sold and
being regarded as an educated person. York Times on November 13, 2005. It is an read widely, they must not assume that
So, again the question: What knowledge? example of writing addressed to a general their readers are experts. They may take for
reader that a literate American high school granted only the relevant background
Students Need the Knowledge That graduate would be expected to understand. knowledge that a literate audience can be
Allows Them to Read Material expected to possess.
As the civil rights figure Rosa Parks
Aimed at a “General Audience” What do readers need to know in order
lay in state in the Capitol Rotunda
To sketch an answer to the question of to comprehend this passage? First and
two weeks ago, her 19th-century
what knowledge, we need a good under- foremost, we need to know who Rosa Parks
Northern forerunner, a young black
standing of the notion of the “general audi- was—indeed, the author suggests that
schoolteacher who helped integrate
ence.” When we say we want to educate those who do not know of Rosa Parks are
New York’s transit system by refusing
good readers, we don’t mean that we less knowledgeable than the typical kin-
to get off a streetcar in downtown
expect them to read a treatise aimed at dergartner. We need to have at least a vague
Manhattan, rested in near-perfect
physicists or constitutional scholars; we semantic grasp of key words like integrate,
obscurity.
mean that we expect them to be good “gen- streetcar, obscurity, parable, disparity, and
eral readers.” But what does that mean? It Mrs. Parks’s resistance on a bus segregation. We must be able to picture “a
sounds almost circular, but it means that became a central facet of American burgeoning but still fragmented” press and
they possess the shared knowledge that is identity, a parable retold with each grasp how it contrasts with 1955 televi-
assumed by individuals who communicate succeeding class of kindergartners. sion’s ability to make Americans a “wit-
with an educated general audience. But who has ever heard of Elizabeth ness” to events. We need to know some of
Every newspaper and book editor and Jennings? the things mentioned with exactness, but
every producer for radio and TV is con- not others. The author clearly does not
The disparity is largely an accident of
scious of the need to distinguish what can expect us to know who Elizabeth Jennings
timing. Thanks to television, Ameri-
be taken for granted from what must be was—but we are expected to know enough
cans around the country became a
explained. Learning the craft of writing is about Parks to immediately grasp what
witness to events in 1955 in Mont-
bound up with learning how to gauge what Jennings faced when she refused to get off
gomery, Ala.; by contrast, Jennings’s
can be assumed versus what must be a streetcar. The mere mention of Mont-
supporters had to rely on a burgeon-
explained. The general reader that every gomery, Ala., is assumed to trigger a flood
ing but still fragmented mid-19th-
journalist or TV newscaster must imagine in our minds of facts, film footage, and
century press. By 1955, when Parks
is somebody whose relevant knowledge is photos from the bus boycotts. Likewise, the
refused to be unseated, segregation
assumed to lie between the total ignorance words “rebel yell” and “Confederate line”
was emerging as an issue the nation
of a complete novice and the detailed are assumed to fill our minds with facts and
could not ignore. When Jennings, 24,
knowledge of an expert. A newspaper base- photos from the Civil War. Note, however,
made her stand, on July 16, 1854, the
ball story cannot assume an audience as that more knowledge is assumed with
first eerie rebel yell had yet to rise
uninformed about the game as our imag- regard to Montgomery in 1955 than Man-
hattan in 1854: Greider reminds us that text, what knowledge is taken for granted are of particular interest in some places but
segregation was at best a regional issue in in the classroom, in public orations, in not others. But this technical approach is a
Jennings’s time. Consider the knowledge serious radio and TV, in books and maga- big start. It is remarkable how much of the
domains included in this list. Montgomery zines and newspapers addressed to a gen- early curriculum in America can be built
belongs to history and geography; so does eral audience?” We considered and tried by simply asking the question, “Is this
the North. The two means of communica- out various scholarly approaches to this information often taken for granted in talk
tion and the two means of transportation problem. and writing addressed to a general literate
belong not only to history, but also to tech- Ultimately, we determined that the best audience?” As my colleagues at the Core
nology. Civil rights and Parks lying in state way to answer this question was by asking Knowledge Foundation have shown, a very
belong to history, current events, and poli- professional speakers and writers (includ- rich and interesting early education can be
ing, for example, lawyers, who based on this principle. Striking examples
must convince juries, and of success from applying this approach can
newspaper reporters) what be found—disadvantaged students gaining
specific items of knowl- ground, and all students gaining high lit-
edge they take for granted eracy. (See “Engaging Kids with Content:
when they speak and ‘The Kids Love It’” in the Spring 2006 issue
write. We then used a of American Educator.)
process that involved
regional groups of teach- IV. Maximizing Reading
ers, as well as administra- Comprehension, Especially
tors, representatives from
Among Poor Children
education and other
groups, a multicultural advi- Time is of the essence. Because of the Mat-
sory group, and scholars from thew effect, the greatest opportunities for
relevant disciplines to review the enhancing language comprehension come
critical material, to add to it, and to early; once wasted, they may be lost per-
subtract from it. From people in every manently. What are the best ways to use
tics. We may infer from this example that region of the country we found a reassur- school time productively so that we bring
only a person with broad general knowl- ing amount of agreement on the substance students from all social backgrounds to
edge is capable of reading with under- of this taken-for-granted knowledge. proficiency in reading and writing? How
standing the New York Times and other Several years after our compilation of can we impart the most enabling language
such newspapers. such knowledge was published, indepen- and knowledge as quickly as possible?
Reading achievement will not advance dent researchers investigated whether Most reading activities that teachers and
significantly until schools recognize and reading comprehension ability did in fact parents engage in with young children
act on the fact that it depends on the pos- depend on knowledge of the topics we had have been shown by research to be benefi-
session of a broad but definable range of set forth. The studies showed an unam- cial. But research rarely asks or answers a
diverse knowledge. Our sketch of the back- biguous correlation between knowledge of crucial question—what is the opportunity
ground knowledge needed to understand these topics and reading comprehension cost of engaging in this reading activity
Greider’s short passage offers clues to the scores, school grades, and other indexes of rather than that one?
kind of instruction that is needed to reading skill.21 One researcher investigated “Opportunity cost” is an important con-
advance general reading comprehension whether the topics we set forth as taken- cept from economics that reflects the fact
ability. It will be broad instruction in the for-granted items are in fact taken for that we forgo some benefits whenever we
worlds of nature and culture that will build granted in newspaper texts addressed to a engage in one activity rather than another.
the necessary platform for gaining deeper general reader. He examined the New York If we read the same story three times to
k n owl e dg e t h rou g h l i ste n i ng a n d Times by computer over a period of 101 a child, we need to ask, how great are the
reading. months and found that “any given day’s benefits that the child will accrue by repeti-
issue of the New York Times contained tion compared to the benefits of using that
What Knowledge Is Necessary to approximately 2,700 occurrences” of these valuable time in more productive activities,
Be a Good General Reader? unexplained terms, which “play a part in such as reading other stories on the same
The knowledge that exists in the world and the daily commerce of the published topic? If we ask students to repeatedly
could, in theory, be targeted toward chil- language.”22 endure lessons and exercises on “main
dren is infinite. How can we identify what This technical approach to deciding idea” and “prediction” and “inferencing”
portions of that knowledge are best to help what children need to know in order to join instead of using that time to familiarize
students become strong general readers? the literate speech community is, of course, them with important content, are we using
My colleagues Joseph Kett and James Trefil just one strategy for identifying the content the time as well as we could? The principle
and I set out to define an answer that we need to teach in the early grades. It does of opportunity cost in reading instruction
would provide useful guidance for schools. not include our ethical, civic, and aesthetic has become even more important now that
We asked ourselves, “In the American con- aspirations for education, nor topics that longer periods—as much as two and one-
half hours in New York City and California ing the specific knowledge they will need Clearly, then, a good way to induce fast
and at least 90 minutes virtually every- to understand newspapers, magazines, vocabulary gain for young children (for
where—are being devoted to language arts and serious books directed at the national whom so much is new and unfamiliar) is
in the early grades. This means that lan- language community. There is no success- to stay on a subject long enough for the
guage arts are getting time that in the past ful shortcut to teaching and learning this general topic to become familiar.
may have been allotted to history, science, specific knowledge. Those who develop
and the arts. Yet those neglected subjects language arts programs at the school level Oral Language Development/
are ultimately among the most essential or in publishing houses must understand Reading Aloud
ones for imparting the general knowledge that the skills they wish to impart are in fact The crucial years for gaining a good start in
that underlies reading comprehension. knowledge-drenched and knowledge- language are the early years. 26 At the
Bring Content to
Reading Instruction
A great opportunity is being lost when
an efficient and coherent approach to
the knowledge required for reading is
neglected in the very place where it is
Part of the curriculum, perhaps about
most needed—namely, in the long hours half, should be reserved for topics of
devoted to the subject of reading. Decod-
ing experts suggest that for most children,
community importance.
about 30 minutes per day is necessary to
teach decoding in grades 1 and 2 (more
and with greater intensity for struggling
students).23 Where schools spend 90–120
minutes per day on reading throughout constituted. The happy consequence will youngest ages, 2 through 7, long before
the elementary grades, that leaves at least be reading programs that are much more children can comprehend through reading
an hour per day that could be devoted to absorbing, enjoyable, and interesting than as well as they can through listening, prog-
imparting the language and world knowl- the disjointed, banal programs offered to ress in language occurs chiefly through
edge that is most important for compe- students today. listening and talking, not through reading
tence in listening, talking, reading, and and writing. This reality has rightly resulted
writing. Substantive topics in literature, Topic Immersion in some time being devoted to teacher
history, the arts, and the sciences—all We know that proficient reading requires read-alouds in the early grades. But it’s
of which literate Americans take for an adequate vocabulary. We know that worth considering how we might treat
granted—are deeply interesting and highly children’s vocabularies will get bigger these read-alouds and the conversations
engaging to children. when they hear or read rich material, fic- they generate differently if we regarded
For many years, the great reading tion or nonfiction. But not everyone knows them as absolutely fundamental to impart-
researcher Jeanne Chall complained that how to answer these questions about time ing necessary knowledge to children. For
the selections offered in language arts use: What is the most effective way to foster example, we might consider the effects of
classes did not provide students with the vocabulary gain? Is it better to read a child topic immersion—reading a sequence of
knowledge and language experiences they a short text of a different kind each day, or books on a significant topic (over days or
need for general competence in reading. is it better to stay on a topic that stretches weeks) instead of selecting books as stand-
In the two decades since Chall entered over several days or weeks? As we have alone texts. We would select books in part
this complaint, little has changed. Regret- seen, important research suggests that for the topics and language they brought to
tably, most early reading materials and children can learn words much faster if we the classroom and for the challenging
programs take such a formalistic view of stick to the same topic for several sessions, classroom conversations they sparked. We
reading comprehension that they neglect because word learning occurs much would consider how to use other class-
the systematic expansion of children’s faster—up to four times faster—when the room activities to engage children in the
general knowledge and accompanying verbal context is familiar.25 content of the books.
vocabulary. The systematic phonics in Suppose, for example, you are reading We need to place a great deal of empha-
these programs (which, on the whole, to 5-year-old Dmitri a story about kings sis in early grades reading classes on non-
are admirable) are not backed up by a and queens. If you extend that topic for the written, oral activities—on adults reading
systematic approach to the background next few days by reading more fiction and aloud coherent and challenging material,
knowledge that the children will need for nonfiction stories about kings and queens, on discussing it, on having children elabo-
later reading comprehension.24 how they lived, and what they did, the rate on these materials. There is every sci-
We need to reconceive language arts as chances are that Dmitri will increase his entific reason to predict that an intensive
a school subject. In trying to make all stu- general knowledge and vocabulary faster focus on oral language development dur-
dents proficient readers and writers, there than if you read about zebras the next day, ing the classroom reading period in early
is no avoiding the responsibility of impart- planets the day after that, and so on. grades will not only raise reading achieve-
ment for all students, it will also help nar- thesis and use a variety of sources” and classrooms is an unknown curriculum,
row the gap between social groups. “Read a variety of literature, including his- one that assures incoherence from grade
torical fiction, autobiography, and realistic to grade and school to school.
V. Beyond the Reading Class— fiction.” Coherence and commonality of cur-
Imparting Important Knowl- These are empty admonitions. And they riculum, gained through specifying core
constitute the first major shortcoming of content, has decisive educational advan-
edge Systematically, from the
these process-oriented, formalistic guide- tages over our vague, laissez faire curricu-
Earliest Ages lines—they offer no real guidance. In offer- l u m a r ra ng e m e nt s. O f c ou rs e, by
Great strides could be taken with reading ing no guidance, they guarantee an “commonality of content,” I do not mean a
comprehension if we simply brought well- incoherent education with huge gaps and
considered content into the reading cur- boring repetitions. Elementary school stu-
riculum. But there’s no getting around the dents reasonably complain of reading
fact that that’s only the beginning. If we Charlotte’s Web three years in a row.
really want to impart to students the gen- That’s not too surprising. With guide-
eral knowledge that will allow them to be lines like these, why should Mr. Green
strong general readers, they, especially if in grade three, Ms. Jones in grade
they’re not already from print-rich homes, four, and Ms. Hughes in grade five
deserve immersion in well-considered not treat their students to a book
content all day long—and from the earliest they are very fond of? Of course,
ages. And, as we will see, for practical rea- while students are reading that
sons, the specifics of the content—and estimable work three years run-
when it will be taught—can’t be decided ning (being bored in two of
separately by each school, teacher, or dis- them), they are missing at least
trict. Not if we really care about whether two other estimable books they
our students actually learn what they need might have been introduced to.
to learn in order to be strong readers. This kind of problem is not
limited to language arts. I once
Why Educational Effectiveness and did an analysis of a district sci-
Equity Require Students across ence curriculum which, like most Ameri- 100 percent common curriculum across
Schools to Share a Curriculum Core can curricula, had a hands-on, formalistic, the nation under which each child in each
I’m now looking at one state’s guidelines process orientation and found that stu- early grade follows exactly the same course
for language arts. (I won’t reveal the state, dents did a hands-on study of seeds in four of study. I mean rather a more reasonable
since its request for me to review the docu- different grades but were never required to percentage of common content, such as
ment indicates its own dissatisfaction with learn about photosynthesis at all.27 Gaps Thomas Jefferson and Horace Mann had in
them.) This state curriculum guide is quite and repetitions are the reality of American view—say, between 40 and 60 percent of
typical. It is a 103-page document orga- students’ school experience even when the topics that young children are taught.
nized into a dozen broad categories, all of they stay in the same school—and the gaps In addition, to reduce the negative
which apply to all grades from kindergar- are far greater for those many disadvan- impact of massive student mobility, we
ten through grade 12. The general catego- taged students who must change schools. must reach agreement not only about what
ries have process rubrics like “Students (See “Why the Absence of a Content-Rich subject matter should be taught in school,
shall demonstrate knowledge and under- Curriculum Core Hurts Poor Children but also about the grade level at which that
standing of media as a mode of communi- Most” in the Spring 2006 issue of American agreed-upon subject matter should be
cation,” “Students shall employ a wide Educator.) These gaps and repetitions taught. Just as we have created a conven-
range of strategies as they write, using the occur unwittingly, not through the feck- tion about the standard spelling of Missis-
writing process appropriately,” and “Stu- lessness of guideline makers nor the sippi, we need to create a convention about
dents shall apply a wide range of strategies incompetence of teachers, but thanks to the grade level at which school topics shall
to read and comprehend written materi- the formalistic idea that no particular piece be introduced. If we agree that primary-
als.” Then, in the more “detailed” amplifi- of knowledge will boost reading compre- grade children should be taught about the
cations of these categories for the early hension more than any other. It is true that lives of George Washington and Martin
grades, we find directives like, “Distinguish some of the new state standards can point Luther King, Jr., then we have an obligation
the purpose of various types of media pre- to increasingly specific guidance in a few to decide when these topics will be intro-
sentations, using informational or enter- areas, but these are the exceptions. In gen- duced. The ravages of mobility on disad-
tainment presentations,” “Use a variety of eral, the de facto curriculum in the Ameri- vantaged students ought to exert a
planning strategies/organizers,” and “Draft can school is defined by the textbooks that powerful moral claim in favor of such a
information collected during reading and/ are used and by the selections within them policy, which deserves to trump local sen-
or research into writing.” For later grades, that are made according to the tastes and timents about whether kindergarten is or
the detailed amplifications are directives beliefs of individual teachers. In other is not the right place for Washington or
like, “Write research reports that include a words, the curriculum in most American King. No one can really answer that ques-
tion in absolute terms. In most cases, ques- and astonishingly, at age 2, 30 percent of all not only greater learning, but also nar-
tions about proper grade level have no children attend. Analyses of records from rowed the achievement gap between eth-
absolute right answer, because, as Jerome tens of thousands of students—records nic groups. 30 That such academically
Bruner famously observed, almost any that include detailed information about focused schools would raise general
topic, if taught appropriately, can be taught race, ethnicity, and social class—show that achievement is obvious since an intense
at any school age.28 the earlier the child starts, the greater the focus on academics is self-evidently the
But Bruner’s insight emphatically does positive effect on reading will be. By the most likely means to raise academic
not argue for laissez faire regarding the end of fifth grade in France, the relative achievement. The finding on narrowing the
sequencing of topics. On the contrary, benefit to disadvantaged pupils who start achievement gap is more interesting, and
using an automotive analogy, either side of at the amazingly early age of 2 rather than it has positive implications for both advan-
the road, appropriately demarcated, is suit-
able for driving in either direction—which
is precisely why it is necessary to create a
convention for determining whether the
right side or the left side will be used.
Whichever side of the road a state decides
The early curriculum can be built by asking,
on, that same convention needs to hold for “Is this information often taken for granted?”
all roads in all the states, because cars cross
state lines every day—just as disadvan-
taged students move across schools (and
districts and even states) every day. The
consequence of not creating a convention
about the sequencing of agreed-upon top- 4 is over one-half of a standard deviation, taged and disadvantaged students.
ics is that some highly mobile students will quite a large effect size. (In terms of per- The theoretical explanation for Cole-
never read Charlotte’s Web or Langston centile scores, it’s like moving a student up man’s finding about equity is this: When
Hughes, while others will hear about them from the 16th to the 31st percentile or from students learn more in school during the
endlessly, in kindergarten, grade one, the 50th to the 69th percentile.) Those who course of a classroom period and during an
grade two, and beyond. start at age 3 do better in later reading than entire year, disadvantaged students begin
those who start at age 4, and starting school to catch up, even when their advantaged
Why Equity Requires Knowledge- at age 4 is better than starting at age 5. peers are learning more or less the same
Rich Preschool for Children from These studies show that the long-term gain things they are. That is because disadvan-
Low-Income Homes in starting early is greater for disadvantaged students start out knowing less, so
Research from many quarters argues that taged than for advantaged students. each additional bit of learning is propor-
the sooner children can be exposed to and Effective use of school time is especially tionally more enabling to them than to
engaged with words, knowledge, language, important in all areas of learning con- students who already knew more. If we are
and language conventions, the better off nected with the advancement of language reading a story about Johnny Appleseed
they’ll be. The reason for this is clear: comprehension, which is inherently a slow and some students know how plants grow
because the powerful Matthew effect will process. For children who grow up in while others don’t, the latter group, the
be working for them, not against them. highly articulate homes where they hear a botanically challenged students, will be the
That this is especially true for children from wealth of language every day, the need to ones who learn most from the story
the poorest, least language-rich homes use time effectively to enlarge language (assuming they know at least 90 percent of
should be obvious. comprehension is not as critical as it is for the words), although both groups will learn
When children are offered coherent, children who grow up in language-barren something new about Johnny Appleseed.
cumulative knowledge from preschool on, circumstances. For those growing up in And there is a further reason for the
reading proficiency is the result. The fullest such homes, schools themselves should equity effect that Coleman observed. When
evidence for the validity of this prediction become highly effective and efficient a lot of learning is going on in school, the
comes from large-scale studies conducted imparters of language in all its aspects: proportion of the academic knowledge
by French researchers on the effects of very vocabulary, syntax, knowledge, etc. If we gained in school increases and the propor-
early knowledge instruction in school on can do that, greater reading comprehen- tion gained outside school decreases.
later reading achievement.29 The French sion, higher school achievement, and When students are learning many aca-
are in a good position to perform such greater equity will be the result. demic things in the classroom, that will
studies. They have been running state- When James Coleman, the great soci- narrow the academic gap because disad-
sponsored preschools for more than a ologist of education, analyzed the school vantaged students are more dependent on
hundred years. By age 5, almost 100 per- characteristics that had the greatest impact schools for gaining academic information
cent of French children, including the on educational achievement and equity, than advantaged students. Advantaged
children of immigrants from Africa, Asia, he found that schools with greater aca- students have a chance to learn a lot of
and southern Europe, attend preschools. demic intensity—a persistent, goal- academically relevant things from their
At age 4, 85 percent of all children attend, directed focus on academics—produced homes and peer groups, whereas disad-
vantaged students learn academically rel- 6. See, for example: S. A. Stahl, Vocabulary Development Experimental Education 58, no. 4 (1990), 265–272; J. F.
(Cambridge, MA: Brookline, 1999). Pentony, “Cultural Literacy,” Adult Basic Education 7, no. 1
evant things mostly from their schools. 7. S. Caillies, G. Denhiere, and W. Kintsch, “The Effect of (1997), 39–45; and C. R. Hofstetter, “Knowledge, Literacy
and Power,” Communication Research 26 (1999), 58–80.
Boosting the in-school proportion thus Prior Knowledge on Understanding from Text: Evidence from
Primed Recognition,” European Journal of Cognitive 22. J. Willinsky, “The Vocabulary of Cultural Literacy in a
reduces the impact of the unfair distribution Psychology 14, no. 2 (2002), 267–286. Newspaper of Substance,” (paper presented at the annual
of out-of-school learning opportunities. 8. K. E. Stanovich, “Matthew Effects in Reading: Some meeting of the National Reading Conference, Tucson, AZ,
Consequences of Individual Differences in the Acquisition of November-December 1988).
There is another point to be made here. Literacy,” Reading Research Quarterly 21, no. 4 (1986), 23. Personal communication with Louisa Moats.
A school that enrolls a heavily middle-class 360–407. 24. K. Walsh, “Basal readers: The lost opportunity to build
population faces a far lower hurdle in get- 9. M. Singer, R. Revlin, and M. Halldorson, “Bridging- the knowledge that propels comprehension,” American
Inferences and Enthymemes,” in Inferences and Text Educator 27, no. 1 (2003), 24–27.
ting its children to reach high reading lev- Comprehension, ed. A. C. Graesser and G. H. Bower (San 25. T. K. Landauer and S. T. Dumais, “A Solution to Plato’s
Diego: Academic, 1990), 35–52.
els than does a counterpart school Problem: The Latent Semantic Analysis Theory of Acquisition,
10. A. C. Graesser, M. Singer, and T. Trabasso, “Constructing Induction, and Representation of Knowledge,” Psychological
enrolling a heavily low-income population. Inferences During Narrative Text Comprehension,” Review 104, no. 2 (1997), 211–240.
The first school enrolls students who typi- Psychological Review 101, no. 3 (1995), 371–395; and A. C. 26. B. Hart and T. R. Risley, Meaningful Differences in the
Graesser and R. A. Zwaan, “Inference generation and the Everyday Experience of Young American Children (Baltimore,
cally entered school ahead in their back- construction of situation models,” in Discourse Comprehen- MD: Peter Brookes, 1995).
sion: Essays in Honor of Walter Kintsch, ed. C. A. Weaver III,
ground knowledge and vocabulary and will S. Mannes, and C. R. Fletcher (Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence 27. E. D. Hirsch, Jr., The Schools We Need (New York:
have substantial access to knowledge and Erlbaum Associates, 1995), 117-139. Doubleday, 1996), 29.
11. A. E. Cunningham and K. E. Stanovich, “Early Reading 28. J. Bruner, The Process of Education (Cambridge, MA:
vocabulary in their non-school lives, as Acquisition and Its Relation to Reading Experience and Harvard University Press, 1960), 33.
well (whether from summer camp, vaca- Ability 10 Years Later,” Developmental Psychology 33, no. 6 29. This research is translated and summarized on the Core
(1997), 934–945. Knowledge Web site: www.coreknowledge.org/CKproto2/
tion trips, educated parents and relatives, Preschool/preschool_frenchequity_frames.htm.
12. A. E. Cunningham and K. E. Stanovich, “What Reading
museum visits, etc.). The counterpart Does for the Mind,” American Educator (Spring/Summer 30. J. S. Coleman, Equality of Educational Opportunity
school, with a heavily low-income student 1998), 1-8; D. P. Hayes and M. Ahrens, “Speaking and (Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Health, Education and
Writing: Distinct Patterns of Word Choice,” Journal of Welfare, Office of Education, 1966).
population, typically enrolls children who Memory and Language 27 (1988), 572–85; and W. Chafe
and J. Danielewicz (1987). “Properties of Spoken and
entered kindergarten already behind and Written Language,” in Comprehending Oral and Written
have fewer opportunities to gain this Language, ed. R. Horowitz and S. J. Samuels (San Diego:
Academic, 1988), 83–113.
knowledge and vocabulary outside school. 13. J. P. Gipe and R. D. Arnold, “Teaching Vocabulary
In comparison to the first school, the low- Through Familiar Associations and Contexts,” Journal of
Reading Behavior 11, no. 3 (1979), 281–285; and D. C.
income school’s task of bringing its stu- Pulido, “The Impact of Topic Familiarity, L2 Reading
dents to proficient reading comprehension Proficiency, and L2 Passage Sight Vocabulary on Incidental
Vocabulary Gain Through Reading for Adult Learners of
levels is enormous. Schools that enroll Spanish as a Foreign Language,” Dissertation Abstracts
many poor children can’t be merely effec- International, 61(10-A) (2001), p. 3892.
14. T. K. Landauer and S. T. Dumais, “A Solution to Plato’s
tive; to bring their students to proficient Problem: The Latent Semantic Analysis Theory of Acquisition,
reading levels, they need to be supereffec- Induction, and Representation of Knowledge,” Psychological
Review 104, no. 2 (1997), 211–240.
tive. They need an extraordinary level of 15. I. S. P. Nation, Teaching and Learning Vocabulary (New
help, support, and good ideas to meet the York: Newbury House, 1990); and S. A. Stahl, Vocabulary
Development (Cambridge, Mass.: Brookline Books, 1999).
challenges they face. I believe that the
16. C. Jencks and M. Phillips (eds), The Black-White Test
ideas put forward here can help these Score Gap (Washington, D.C.:Brookings Institute Press,
schools be supereffective, as their students, 1998).
17. R. P. Bowles, K. J. Grimm, and J. J. McArdle, “A
and the nation, need them to be.  Structural Factor Analysis of Vocabulary Knowledge and
Relations to Age,” Journals of Gerontology: Series B:
Endnotes Psychological Sciences and Social Sciences 60B, no. 5 (2005),
P234–P241.
1. R. Hofstadter, Anti-Intellectualism in American Life (New
York: Vintage Books, 1963). 18. M. F. Graves, G. J. Brunetti, and W. H. Slater, “The
reading vocabularies of primary-grade children of varying
2. K. Walsh, “Basal readers: The lost opportunity to build the geographic and social backgrounds,” in New Inquiries in
knowledge that propels comprehension,” American Reading Research and Instruction: Thirty First Yearbook of
Educator 27, no. 1 (2003), 24–27. the National Reading Conference, ed. J. A. Niles and L. A.
3. Among the many research reports on this subject, the Harris (Rochester, NY: National Reading Conference, 1982),
following are notable: A. Garnham and J. Oakhill, “The 99-104; Also see: M. F. Graves and W. H. Slater, “The
mental models theory of language comprehension,” in development of reading vocabularies in rural disadvantaged
Models of Understanding Text, ed. B. K. Britton and A. C. students, inner-city disadvantaged and middle-class
Graesser (Hillsdale, N.J.: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, suburban students” (paper presented at the meeting of the
1996), 313-340; A. C. Graesser and R. A. Zwaan, “Inference American Educational Research Association, Washington,
generation and the construction of situation models,” in D.C., 1987); and S. K. Baker, D. C. Simmons, and E. J.
Discourse Comprehension: Essays in Honor of Walter Kameenui, Vocabulary Acquisition: Synthesis of the Research
Kintsch, ed. C. A. Weaver III, S. Mannes, and C. R. Fletcher (Eugene, OR: National Center to Improve the Tools of
(Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1995), 117-139; Educators, 1995).
W. Kintsch, Comprehension: A Paradigm for Cognition (New 19. D. P. Hayes and M. Ahrens, “Speaking and Writing:
York: Cambridge University Press, 1998); H. van Oostendorp Distinct Patterns of Word Choice,” Journal of Memory and
and S. R. Goldman (eds.), The Construction of Mental Language 27 (1988), 572–85; and K. E. Stanovich, “Does
Representations During Reading (Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum reading make you smarter? Literacy and the development of
Associates, 1999); and R. A. Zwaan and G. A. Radvansky, verbal intelligence,” in Advances in Child Development and
“Situation models in language comprehension and Behavior 24, ed. H. Reese (San Diego, CA: Academic Press,
memory,” Psychological Bulletin 123, no. 2 (1988), 162-185. 1993), 133-180.
4. K. Walsh, “Basal readers: The lost opportunity to build the 20. K. E. Stanovich, “Does reading make you smarter?
knowledge that propels comprehension,” American Literacy and the development of verbal intelligence,” in
Educator 27, no. 1 (2003), 24–27. Advances in Child Development and Behavior 24, ed. H.
5. B. Rosenshine and C. Meister, “Reciprocal Teaching: A Reese (San Diego, CA: Academic Press, 1993), 133-180.
Review of the Research,” Review of Educational Research 21. G. J. Kosmoski, G. Gay, and E. L. Vockell, “Cultural
64, no. 4 (1994), 479-530. Literacy and Academic Achievement,” Journal of
How Knowledge Helps
It Speeds and Strengthens Reading Comprehension,
Learning—and Thinking
By Daniel T. Willingham become. We’ll begin by

exploring how knowledge
K
nowledge is Good.” So read the brings more knowledge
motto of the mythical Faber Col- and then turn to how
lege in the 1978 movie, Animal knowledge improves the
House. Those of us who work in q u a l i t y a n d sp e e d o f
education would agree, even if we were thinking.
unable to express ourselves so eloquently.
But why, exactly, is knowledge good? When I. How Knowledge
I’ve discussed this question with teachers, Brings More Knowledge
many have used the metaphor “It’s grist for The more you know, the easier it will
the mill.” That is, the goal of education is be for you to learn new things. Learning
seen not so much as the accumulation of new things is actually a seamless process,
knowledge, but as the honing of cognitive but in order to study it and understand it
skills such as thinking critically. Knowledge b e t t e r, c o g n i t i v e s c i e nt i s t s hav e
comes into play mainly because if we want approached it as a three-stage process.
our students to learn how to think critically, And they’ve found that knowledge helps
they must have something to think about. at every stage: as you first take in new
It’s true that knowledge gives students information (either via listening or read-
something to think about, but a reading of ing), as you think about this information,
the research literature from cognitive sci- and as the material is stored in memory.
ence shows that knowledge does much We’ll consider each of these stages in turn.
more than just help students hone their reading—but keep in mind that the same
thinking skills: It actually makes learning How Knowledge Helps points apply to listening. Suppose you read
easier. Knowledge is not only cumulative, You Take in New Information this brief text: “John’s face fell as he looked
it grows exponentially. Those with a rich The first stage in which factual knowledge down at his protruding belly. The invitation
base of factual knowledge find it easier to gives you a cognitive edge is when you are specified ‘black tie’ and he hadn’t worn his
learn more—the rich get richer. In addi- taking in new information, whether by tux since his own wedding, 20 years ear-
tion, factual knowledge enhances cognitive listening or reading. There is much more to lier.” You will likely infer that John is con-
processes like problem solving and reason- comprehending oral or written language cerned that his tuxedo won’t fit, although
ing. The richer the knowledge base, the than knowing vocabulary and syntax. the text says nothing directly about this
more smoothly and effectively these cogni- Comprehension demands background potential problem. The writer could add
tive processes—the very ones that teachers knowledge because language is full of the specifics (“John had gained weight
target—operate. So, the more knowledge semantic breaks in which knowledge is since he last wore his tuxedo, and worried
students accumulate, the smarter they assumed and, therefore, comprehension that it would not fit”), but they are not nec-
depends on making correct inferences. In essary and the added words would make
Daniel T. Willingham is a professor of psychology a casual conversation, the listener can the text dull. Your mind is well able to fill in
at the University of Virginia, where he has taught the gaps because you know that people are
gather missing background knowledge and
since 1992. Until about 2000, his research focused often heavier 20 years after their wedding,
solely on the brain basis of learning and memory. check on his inferences by asking ques-
Today, his research concerns the application of tions (e.g., Did you mean Bob Smith or Bob and that gaining weight usually means that
cognitive psychology to K–16 education. He Jones? What do you mean when you old clothing won’t fit. This background
writes the “Ask the Cognitive Scientist” column describe him as an entrepreneur?)—but knowledge about the world is readily avail-
for American Educator magazine, and is the able and so the writer need not specify it.
this is not the case when watching a movie
author of Why Don’t Students Like School?, Thus, an obvious way in which knowl-
Cognition: The Thinking Animal, When Can You or reading a book. (And sometimes it isn’t
Trust the Experts?, and Raising Kids Who Read the case in class when a student is too edge aids the acquisition of more knowl-
(forthcoming). His writing on education has embarrassed to ask a question.) edge lies in the greater power it affords in
appeared in thirteen languages. This article To provide some concrete examples making correct inferences. If the writer
appeared, with permission, in the Spring 2006 assumes that you have some background
and simplify the discussion, let’s focus on
issue of American Educator.
knowledge that you lack, you’ll be con- would search for some relationship between
fused. For example, if you read, “He was a carrying fish to a formal event and the other
real Benedict Arnold about it” and you elements of the situation (formal wear,
don’t know who Benedict Arnold was, stairs, purses, what you’ve been told of
you’re lost. This implication of background Jeanine and John). In this search you might
knowledge is straightforward and easy to retrieve the popular notion that wearing a
grasp. It is no surprise, then, that the ability tuxedo can make one look a little like a pen-
to read a text and make sense of it is highly guin, which immediately leads to the asso-
correlated with background knowledge.1 ciation that penguins eat fish. Jeanine is
If you know more, you’re a better reader. likening John to a penguin and thus she is
Most of the time you are unaware of teasing him. Sense is made, and reading can
making inferences when you read. For continue. Here, then, is a second and more
example, when you read the text above it’s subtle benefit of general knowledge: People
unlikely you thought to yourself, “Hmmm with more general knowledge have richer
... let me see now ... why am I being told associations among the concepts in mem-
about the last time he wore his tuxedo? ory; and when associations are strong, they edge means that you will rarely need to
Why would thinking about that make his become available to the reading process reread a text in an effort to consciously
face fall?” Those conscious inferences are automatically. That means the person with search for connections in the text (e.g., you
unnecessary because the cognitive pro- rich general knowledge rarely has to inter- will quickly realize that with her fish remark,
cesses that interpret what you read auto- rupt reading in order to consciously search Jeanine is likening John to a penguin).
matically access not just the literal words for connections.
that you read, but also ideas associated This phenomenon has been verified How Knowledge Helps
with those words. Thus, when you read experimentally by having subjects read texts You Think about New Information
“tux,” the cognitive processes that are mak- on topics with which they are or are not very Comprehending a text so as to take in new
ing sense of the text can access not just “a familiar. For example, Johanna Kaakinen information is just the first stage of learning
formal suit of clothing,” but all of the and her colleagues had subjects read a text that new information; the second is to
related concepts in your memory: Tuxedos about four common diseases (e.g., flu) for think about it. This happens in what cogni-
are expensive, they are worn infrequently, which they were likely already familiar with tive scientists call working memory, the
they are not comfortable, they can be the symptoms, and a text about four uncom- staging ground for thought. Working
rented, they are often worn at weddings, mon diseases (e.g., typhus) for which they memory is often referred to metaphorically
and so on. As the text illustrates, the cogni- likely were not.2 For each text, there was as a space to emphasize its limited nature;
tive processes that extract meaning also additional information about the diseases one can maintain only a limited amount of
have access to concepts represented by the that subjects likely did not know. information in working memory. For
intersection of ideas; “tux” makes available The researchers used a sophisticated example, read through this list one time,
“clothing,” and “20 years after wedding” technology to unobtrusively measure then look away and see how many of the
makes available “gaining weight.” The where subjects fixated their eyes while they letters you can recall.
intersection of “clothing” and “gaining read each text. Researchers thus had a pre- CN
weight” yields the idea “clothing won’t fit” cise measure of reading speed, and they
and we understand why John is not happy. could tell when subjects returned to an NFB
All of these associations and inferences earlier portion of the text to reread some- ICB
happen outside of awareness. Only the thing. The researchers found that when
SCI
outcome of this cognitive process—that reading unfamiliar texts, subjects more
John is concerned his tux won’t fit any- often reread parts of sentences and they ANC
more—enters consciousness. more often looked back to previous sen- AA
Sometimes this subconscious inference- tences. Their reading speed was also slower There were 16 letters on the list, and
making process fails and the ideas in the text overall compared to when they read famil- most people can recall around seven—
cannot be connected. When this happens, iar texts. These measures indicate that there is not sufficient space in working
processing stops and a greater effort is made processing is slower when reading about memory to maintain more than that. Now
to find some connection among the words something unfamiliar to you. try the same task again with this list.
and ideas in the text. This greater effort Thus, background knowledge makes one
requires conscious processing. For example, a better reader in two ways. First, it means CNN
suppose that later in the same text you read, that there is a greater probability that you FBI
“John walked down the steps with care. will have the knowledge to successfully CBS
Jeanine looked him up and down while she make the necessary inferences to under-
waited. Finally she said, ‘Well, I’m glad I’ve stand a text (e.g., you will know that people CIA
got some fish in my purse.’ ” Jeanine’s com- are often heavier 20 years after their wed- NCAA
ment might well stop the normal flow of ding and, thus, John is worried that his tux Much easier, right? If you compare the
reading. Why would she have fish? You won’t fit). Second, rich background knowl- two lists, you will see that they actually
contain the same letters. The second list man resulting in two runners being out, the is typical in such studies.13 First, Hambrick
has been reorganized in a way that encour- students with baseball knowledge would tested college students for their knowledge
ages you to treat C, N, and N as a single chunk those actions by recognizing them of basketball. This test took place in the
unit, rather than as three separate letters. as a double play—but the students without middle of the college basketball season.
Putting items together this way is called baseball knowledge would have to try to Two and one-half months later (at the end
chunking. It greatly expands how much fits remember the whole series of actions.) of the season), subjects completed ques-
in your working memory—and, therefore, Second, because they were able to chunk, tionnaires about their exposure to basket-
how much you can think about. The typical the students with baseball knowledge had ball (e.g., game attendance, watching
persons’ working memory can hold about free space in their working memory that television, and reading magazines or news-
seven letters or almost the same number of they could devote to using the replica to papers) and also took tests that measured
multi-letter chunks or pieces of informa- reenact the play as well as providing a their knowledge of specific men’s basket-
tion. Note, however, that chunking coherent verbal explanation. Without ball events from the prior two and one-half
depends on background knowledge. If you
weren’t familiar with the abbreviation for
the Federal Bureau of Investigation, you
couldn’t treat FBI as a single chunk. All of these associations and inferences hap-
The ability to chunk and its reliance on
background knowledge has been tested in pen outside of awareness. Only the outcome
a number of studies. These studies show of this cognitive process enters consciousness.
that this ability makes people better able to
briefly remember a list of items, just as you
could remember more letters in the second
example. This benefit has been observed being able to chunk, the students with little months. The results showed (not surpris-
in many domains, including chess, 3 baseball knowledge simply didn’t have ingly) that subjects who reported an inter-
bridge,4 computer programming,5 dance enough free space in their working memory est in the game also reported that they had
steps,6 circuit design,7 maps,8 and music.9 to simultaneously remember all of the had greater exposure to basketball infor-
Of course, we seldom want to briefly actions, keep track of their order, do the reen- mation. The more interesting finding was
remember a list. The important aspect of actment, and describe the reenactment. that, for a given level of exposure, greater
chunking is that it leaves more free space in This study illustrates the importance of prior basketball knowledge was associated
working memory, allowing that space to be the working memory advantage that back- with more new basketball knowledge. That
devoted to other tasks, such as recognizing ground knowledge confers.11 Most of the is, the people who already knew a lot about
patterns in the material. For example, in one time when we are listening or reading, it’s basketball tended to remember more
study, the researchers tested junior high not enough to understand each sentence basketball-related news than people with
school students who were either good or on its own—we need to understand a the same exposure to this news but less
poor readers (as measured by a standard series of sentences or paragraphs and hold prior knowledge.* As I said in the introduc-
reading test) and who were also knowledge- them in mind simultaneously so that they tion, the rich get richer.
able or not about the game of baseball (as can be integrated or compared. Doing so is What’s behind this effect? A rich network
measured by a test created for the study by easier if the material can be chunked of associations makes memory strong: New
three semi-professional baseball players).10 because it will occupy less of the limited material is more likely to be remembered if
The children read a passage written at an space in working memory. But, chunking it is related to what is already in memory.
early 5th-grade reading level that described relies on background knowledge. Remembering information on a brand new
a half inning of a baseball game. The pas- topic is difficult because there is no existing
sage was divided into five parts, and after How Knowledge Helps network in your memory that the new infor-
each part the student was asked to use a You Remember New Information mation can be tied to. But remembering
replica of a baseball field and players to Knowledge also helps when you arrive at new information on a familiar topic is rela-
reenact and describe what they read. The the final stage of learning new informa- tively easy because developing associations
researchers found that baseball knowledge tion—remembering it. Simply put, it is between your existing network and the new
had a big impact on performance: Poor easier to fix new material in your memory material is easy.
readers with a high knowledge of baseball when you already have some knowledge of ***
displayed better comprehension than good the topic.12 Many studies in this area have Some researchers have suggested that
readers with a low knowledge of baseball. subjects with either high or low amounts prior knowledge is so important to memory
What’s going on here? First, the students of knowledge on a particular topic read that it can actually make up for or replace
with a lot of knowledge of baseball were new material and then take a test on it what we normally think of as aptitude. Some
able to read a series of actions and chunk some time later; inevitably those with prior studies have administered the same mem-
them. (For example, if some of the text knowledge remember more. ory task to high-aptitude and low-aptitude
described the shortstop throwing the ball A study by David Hambrick is notable children, some of whom have prior knowl-
to the second baseman and the second because it looked at real-world learning edge of the subject matter and some of
baseman throwing the ball to the first base- and did so over a longer period of time than whom do not; the studies found that only
prior knowledge is important.14 But some most of your working memory, leaving no
researchers disagree. They report that, space for you to consider solutions. I can
although prior knowledge always helps give you a sense of this impact with a
memory, it cannot eliminate the aptitude sample problem called the Tower of Hanoi.
differences among people. Since everyone’s The picture shows three pegs with three
memory gets better with prior knowledge, rings of increasing size. The goal is to move
assuming equal exposure to new knowledge all the rings to the rightmost peg. There are
(as in a classroom without extra support for just two rules: You can only move one ring
slower students), the student with overall at a time, and you can’t put a larger ring on
lower aptitude will still be behind the stu- top of a smaller ring. See if you can solve
dent with higher aptitude.15 In the end, the the problem.
issue is not settled, but as a practical matter With some diligence, you may well be
of schooling, it doesn’t matter much. What able to solve the problem. The solution is
matters is the central, undisputed finding: to move the rings as follows: A3, B2, A2, C3, can easily chunk the order of ring size—
All students will learn more if they have A1, B3, A3. smallest to largest.
greater background knowledge. Now consider this problem: These two problems give you a sense of
the advantages of background knowledge
In the inns of certain Himalayan vil-
II. How Knowledge for problem solving. The problem solver
lages is practiced a refined tea cere-
Improves Thinking with background knowledge in a particular
mony. The ceremony involves a host
domain sees problems in her domain like
Knowledge enhances thinking in two ways. and exactly two guests, neither more
the Tower of Hanoi; everything is simple and
First, it helps you solve problems by freeing nor less. When his guests have
easy to understand. When she is outside her
up space in your working memory. Second, arrived and seated themselves at his
domain, however, the same problem solver
it helps you circumvent thinking by acting table, the host performs three ser-
cannot rely on background knowledge and
as a ready supply of things you’ve already vices for them. These services are
problems seem more like the confusing tea
thought about (e.g., if you’ve memorized listed in the order of the nobility the
ceremony. It’s all she can do to simply
that 5 + 5 = 10, you don’t have to draw two Himalayans attribute to them: stok-
understand the rules and the goal.
groups of five lines and count them). To ing the fire, fanning the flames, and
These examples put the “grist for the
simplify the discussion, I’ll focus mostly on pouring the tea. During the cere-
mill” metaphor in a new light: It’s not suffi-
research that explores the benefits of mony, any of those present may ask
cient for you to have some facts for the ana-
knowledge for problem solving, which is another, “Honored Sir, may I perform
lytic cognitive processes to operate on.
essentially the type of thinking that stu- this onerous task for you?” However,
There must be lots of facts and you must
dents must do in mathematics and science a person may request of another only
know them well. The student must have suf-
classes. But keep in mind that in much the the least noble of the tasks that the
ficient background knowledge to recognize
same way, knowledge also improves the other is performing. Furthermore, if
familiar patterns—that is, to chunk—in
reasoning and critical thinking that stu- a person is performing any tasks,
order to be a good analytical thinker. Con-
dents must do in history, literature, and then he may not request a task that is
sider, for example, the plight of the algebra
other humanities classes. nobler than the least noble task he is
student who has not mastered the distribu-
already performing. Custom requires
How Knowledge Helps tive property. Every time he faces a problem
that by the time the tea ceremony is
You Solve Problems with a(b + c), he must stop and plug in easy
over, all the tasks will have been
numbers to figure out whether he should
In the last section, I discussed one way that transferred from the host to the most
write a(b) + c or a + b(c) or a(b) + a(c). The
prior knowledge helps reading: It allows senior of the guests. How can this be
best possible outcome is that he will eventu-
you to chunk some information, which accomplished?
ally finish the problem—but he will have
leaves more room in working memory to
You would probably have to read the taken much longer than the students who
sort through the implications of a text. You
problem several times just to feel that you know the distributive property well (and,
get much the same benefit if you are trying
understand it—but this problem is actually therefore, have chunked it as just one step
to solve a problem. If you don’t have suffi-
identical to the Tower of Hanoi. Each guest in solving the problem). The more likely
cient background knowledge, simply
is like a peg, and each task is like a ring. The outcome is that his working memory will
understanding the problem can consume
goal and the rules of transfer are the same. become overwhelmed and he either won’t
*Careful readers may notice that in this study there is The difference is that this version is much finish the problem or he’ll get it wrong.
some possibility that the college students’ interest in more demanding of working memory. The
basketball (not just their knowledge) could have some
first version does not require you to main- How Knowledge Helps
effect on their memory of basketball events. A more
tain the problem in working memory You Circumvent Thinking
complicated study controlled for interest by creating
experts. Subjects were brought in to pre-learn some because it is so effectively represented in It’s not just facts that reside in memory;
information (which then served as their background
the figure. The second version requires that solutions to problems, complex ideas
knowledge) and then return two days later to learn
additional knowledge. The researchers still found a the solver remember the order of nobility you’ve teased apart, and conclusions
memory boost from background knowledge.20 of the tasks, whereas in the first version you you’ve drawn are also part of your store of
4. R. W. Engle and L. Bukstel, “Memory processes among bridge
knowledge. Let’s go back to the algebra soning process is very slow as the player players of differing expertise,” American Journal of Psychology 91
students for a moment. The student who consciously considers each possible move. (1978), 673–689.
5. K. B. McKeithen, J. S. Reitman, H. H. Rueter, and S. C. Hirtle,
does not have the distributive property Interestingly, a recent study indicates that “Knowledge organization and skill differences in computer
firmly in memory must think it through the recognition process accounts for most programmers,” Cognitive Psychology 13 (1981), 307–325.
6. F. Allard and J. L. Starkes, “Motor-skill experts in sports, dance,
every time he encounters a(b + c), but the of the differences among top players.17 and other domains,” in Toward a General Theory of Expertise:
student who does, circumvents this pro- Burns compared the performance of top Prospects and Limits, ed. K. A. Ericsson and J. Smith (New York:
Cambridge University Press, 1991), 126-152
cess. Your cognitive system would indeed players at normal and blitz tournaments. 7. D. E. Egan and B. J. Schwartz, “Chunking in recall of symbolic
be poor if this were not possible; it is much In blitz chess, each player has just five min- drawings,” Memory & Cognition 7 (1979), 149–158.
8. K. J. Gilhooly, M. Wood, P. R. Kinnear, and C. Green, “Skill in
faster and less demanding to recall an utes to complete an entire game, whereas map reading and memory for maps,” Quarterly Journal of
answer than it is to solve the problem in a normal tournament, players would Experimental Psychology: Human Experimental Psychology 40
(1988), 87–107.
again. The challenge, of course, is that you have at least two hours. Even though play 9. J. Sloboda, “Visual perception of musical notation: Registering
don’t always see the same problem, and was so sped up that the slow reasoning pitch symbols in memory,” Quarterly Journal of Experimental
Psychology 28 (1976), 1–16.
you may not recognize that a new problem processes barely had any time to contrib- 10. D. R. Recht and L. Leslie, L, “Effect of prior knowledge on
is analogous to one you’ve seen before. For ute to performance, the relative ratings of good and poor readers’ memory of text,” Journal of Educational
Psychology 80 (1988), 16–20.
example, you may have successfully solved the players were almost unchanged. That 11. See also: D. G. Morrow, V. O. Leirer, and P. A. Altieri, “Aging,
the Tower of Hanoi problem and moments indicates that what’s making some players expertise, and narrative processing,” Psychology and Aging 7
(1992), 376–388; and G. J. Spilich, G. T. Vesonder, H. L. Chiesi,
later not realized that the tea ceremony better than others is differences in their fast and J. F. Voss, “Text processing of domain-related information for
individuals with high- and low-domain knowledge,” Journal of
problem is analogous. recognition processes, not differences in Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior 18 (1979), 275–290.
Fortunately, knowledge also helps with their slow reasoning processes. This find- 12. T. Y. Arbuckle, V. F. Vanderleck, M. Harsany, and S. Lapidus,
“Adult age differences in memory in relation to availability and
this: A considerable body of research ing is rather striking. Chess, the prototypi- accessibility of knowledge-based schemas,” Journal of
shows that people get better at drawing cal game of thinking and reflection, turns Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition 16
(1990), 305–315; M. E. Beier and P. L. Ackerman, “Age, ability
analogies as they gain experience in a out to be largely a game of memory among and the role of prior knowledge on the acquisition of new
domain knowledge: Promising results in a real-world
domain. Whereas novices focus on the those who are very skilled. Some research- environment,” Psychology and Aging 20 (2005), 341–355; W.
Schneider, J. Korkel, and F. E. Weinert, “Domain-specific
surface features of a problem, those with ers estimate that the best chess players knowledge and memory performance: A comparison of high- and
more knowledge focus on the underlying have between 10,000 and 300,000 chess- low-aptitude children,” Journal of Educational Psychology 81
(1989), 306–312; and C. H. Walker, “Relative importance of
structure of a problem. For example, in a piece chunks in memory.18 domain knowledge and overall aptitude on acquisition of
domain-related information,” Cognition and Instruction 4 (1988),
classic experiment Michelene Chi and her Burns’s study of chess skill meshes well 25–42.
colleagues asked physics novices and with studies of science education. A recent 13. D. Z. Hambrick, “Why are some people more knowledgeable
than others? A longitudinal study of knowledge acquisition,”
experts to sort physics problems into cat- meta-analysis evaluated the results of 40 Memory & Cognition 31 (2003), 902–917.
egories.16 The novices sorted by the surface experiments that studied ways to improve 14. B. K. Britton, M. Stimson, B. Stennett, and S. Gülgöz,
“Learning from instructional text: Test of an individual differences
features of a problem—whether the prob- students’ scientific problem-solving model,” Journal of Educational Psychology 90 (1998), 476–491;
lem described springs, an inclined plane, skills.19 The results showed that the suc- D. R. Recht and L. Leslie, L, “Effect of prior knowledge on good
and poor readers’ memory of text,” Journal of Educational
and so on. The experts, however, sorted the cessful interventions were those that were Psychology 80 (1988), 16–20; W. Schneider, J. Korkel, and F. E.
Weinert, “Domain-specific knowledge and memory performance:
problems based on the physical law designed to improve students’ knowledge A comparison of high- and low-aptitude children,” Journal of
Educational Psychology 81 (1989), 306–312; and C. H. Walker,
needed to solve it (e.g., conservation of base. Especially effective were those in “Relative importance of domain knowledge and overall aptitude
energy). Experts don’t just know more than which students were asked to integrate and on acquisition of domain-related information,” Cognition and
Instruction 4 (1988), 25–42.
novices—they actually see problems dif- relate different concepts by, for example, 15. V. C. Hall and B. Edmondson, B, “Relative importance of
ferently. For many problems, the expert drawing a concept map or comparing dif- aptitude and prior domain knowledge on immediate and delayed
post-tests,” Journal of Educational Psychology 84 (1992),
does not need to reason, but rather, can ferent problems. Interventions designed to 219–223; D. Z. Hambrick and R. W. Engle, R. W, “Effects of
domain knowledge, working memory capacity, and age on
rely on memory of prior solutions. improve the students’ scientific problem- cognitive performance: An investigation of the knowledge-is-
Indeed, in some domains, knowledge is solving strategies had little or no impact, power hypothesis,” Cognitive Psychology 44 (2002), 339–387; D.
Z. Hambrick and F. L. Oswald, “Does domain knowledge
much more important than reasoning or even though the goal of all the studies was moderate involvement of working memory capacity in
higher-level cognition? A test of three models,” Journal of
problem-solving abilities. For example, to improve scientific problem solving. Memory and Language 52 (2005), 377–397; and W. Schneider,
D. F. Bjorklund, and W. Maier-Brückner, “The effects of expertise
most of the differences among top chess We’ve seen how knowledge improves and IQ on children’s memory: When knowledge is, and when it is
players appear to be in how many game learning and thinking. But what does this not enough,” International Journal of Behavioral Development 19
(1996), 773–796.
positions they know, rather than in how mean for the classroom? My sidebar 16. M. T. H. Chi, P. Feltovich, and R. Glaser, “Categorization and
effective they are in searching for a good “Knowledge in the Classroom” in the representation of physics problems by experts and novices,”
Cognitive Science 5 (1981), 121–152.
move. It seems that there are two processes Spring 2006 issue of American Educator 17. B. B. Burns, “The effects of speed on skilled chess
to selecting a move in chess. First, there is offers some strategies for building stu- performance,” Psychological Science 15 (2004), 442–447.
18. F. Gobet and H. A. Simon, “Five seconds or sixty? Presentation
a recognition process by which a player dents’ store of knowledge. 
time in expert memory,” Cognitive Science 24 (2000), 651–682.
sees which part of the board is contested, 19. R. Taconis, M. G. M. Ferguson-Hessler, and H. Broekkamp,
“Teaching science problem solving: An overview of experimental
which pieces are in a strong or weak posi- Endnotes work,” Journal of Research in Science Teaching 38 (2001),
tion, and so forth. The second process is 1. G. J. Kosmoski, G. Gay, and E. L. Vockell, “Cultural Literacy 442–468.
and Academic Achievement,” Journal of Experimental Education
20. J. P. Van Overschelde and A. F. Healy, “Learning of nondomain
one of reasoning. The player considers 58, no. 4 (1990), p. 265–272.
facts in high- and low-knowledge domains,” Journal of
possible moves and their likely outcome. 2. J. K. Kaakinen, J. Hyönä, and J. M. Keenan, “How prior Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition 27
knowledge, WMC, and relevance of information affect eye (2001), 1160–1171.
The recognition process is very fast, and it fixations in expository text,” Journal of Experimental Psychology:
Learning, Memory, and Cognition 29 (2003), 447–457.
identifies which pieces the slower reason-
3. W. G. Chase and H. A. Simon, “Perception in chess,” Cognitive
ing process should focus on. But the rea- Psychology 4 (1973), 55–81.
Teaching Vocabulary
Early, Direct, and Sequential
By Andrew Biemiller
I
have come to the conclusion that
vocabulary growth is inadequately
addressed in current educational cur-
ricula, especially in the elementary
and preschool years, and that more
teacher-centered and planned curricula
are needed, just as had been the case with
phonics. My late friend Jeanne Chall came
to the same conclusion through her work
on the stages of reading development,1 her
work on textbook difficulty,2 and especially
as summarized in The Reading Crisis.3 In
this book, Chall and her colleagues traced
the relative reading achievement declines
experienced by working-class children
who had become competent readers by
third grade, but whose vocabulary limita-
tions had an increasingly negative effect on
reading comprehension as they advanced all the knowledge that is needed for math The consequences of an increased
to seventh grade. achievement is taught in school, whereas emphasis on phonics. In recent years, we
The importance of vocabulary first came the vocabulary growth needed for success- have seen a tremendous emphasis on the
to my attention as a result of Wesley Beck- ful reading comprehension is essentially importance of phonics instruction to
er’s famous Harvard Educational Review left to the home. ensure educational progress. We also have
article,4 noting that DISTAR’s early success I have also been influenced by the con- seen that while more children learn to
with decoding was muted for reading com- sistent finding in the oral reading miscue “read” with increased phonics instruction,
prehension in the later elementary grades literature that, when overall error rates there have not been commensurate gains
due to vocabulary limitations. Becker reach 5 percent of running words (tokens), in reading comprehension.5 What is miss-
argued that this was a matter of experience “contextual” errors (those that make sense ing for many children who master phonics
rather than general intelligence, observing in context) virtually disappear. I infer from but don’t comprehend well is vocabu-
that while his DISTAR students’ reading this that when readers (or listeners?) lary—the words they need to know in order
comprehension declined relative to more understand less than 95 percent of the to understand what they’re reading. Thus
advantaged students by grade 4, their words in a text, they are likely to lose the vocabulary is the “missing link” in reading/
mathematics performance remained high. meaning of that text and are especially language instruction in our school system.
He suggested that the difference was that unlikely to infer meanings of unfamiliar Because vocabulary deficits particularly
words. affect less advantaged and second-lan-
Vocabulary development is both impor- guage children, I will be arguing that such
Andrew Biemiller is a professor emeritus with the tant and ignored. Can we—educators—do “deficits” are fundamentally more remedi-
Dr. Eric Jackman Institute of Child Study,
Department of Human Development and better, or are we simply bumping into consti- able than many other school learning
Applied Psychology, University of Toronto, tutional limitations that are beyond the problems.
Ontario, where he led the teacher education pro- power of schools to affect? In the remainder Schools now do little to promote vocabu-
gram for 15 years. His latest book is Words Worth of this article, I am going to summarize a few lary development, particularly in the cru-
Teaching. This article is slightly updated and points that support the argument for an cial years before grade 3. The role of
reprinted with permission; originally printed in
the International Dyslexia Association quarterly increased emphasis on vocabulary and sug- schooling in vocabulary acquisition has
newsletter, Perspectives, Fall 2000. It appeared, gest the need for a more teacher-centered been the subject of much debate. Early
with permission, in the Spring 2001 issue of and curriculum-structured approach to (pre-literacy) differences in vocabulary
American Educator. ensure adequate vocabulary development. growth are associated with social class.6
Nagy and Herman7 and Sternberg8 argue end of elementary school.16 (An average difficult, even though once in school chil-
that much vocabulary acquisition results total of around 3,000 root-word meanings dren appear to acquire new vocabulary at
from literacy and wide reading rather than are learned before kindergarten.) This con- similar rates. To “catch up,” vocabulary-
from direct instruction. However, it is obvi- clusion, based on root-word meanings disadvantaged children have to acquire
ous that a great deal of vocabulary acquisi- sampled from Dale and O’Rourke’s Living vocabulary at above-average rates. This
tion occurs before children become Word Vocabulary,17 is partly based on the rarely happens.
literate, and before they are reading books observation that many similar or affixed The sequential nature of vocabulary
that introduce unfamiliar vocabulary. 9 meanings are acquired at about the same acquisition. Much evidence clearly indi-
Cantalini 10 and Morrison, Smith, and age and probably do not require separate cates that vocabulary is acquired in largely
Dow-Ehrensberger11 report that vocabu- instruction. the same order by most children. The exis-
lary acquisition in kindergarten and grade
1 is little influenced by school experience,
based on the finding that the youngest first-
graders have about the same vocabulary
(Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test) as the
oldest kindergarten children. Cantalini
also reported the same result for second
grade.
The relatively small number of words
that need to be learned. It is sometimes
argued that the number of words children
need to learn is so great that this can only
happen incidentally through wide read-
ing.12 This argument is quite reminiscent
of the argument that the spelling-to-sound
structure of English is so difficult that it
can’t be taught, but only learned through
experience. In both cases, the complexity
of what needs to be learned has been
somewhat exaggerated. Many years ago,
Lorge and Chall13 argued that traditional
dictionary sampling methods for assessing
vocabulary had greatly overestimated the
volume of vocabulary children needed to Evidence that vocabulary differences tence of empirical vocabulary norms (as in
acquire. As Lorge and Chall, Beck and present by grade 2 may account for most the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test and
McKeown,14 and others have noted, we vocabulary differences in elementary Living Word Vocabulary) indicate that
need to focus on root-word growth rather school. There has been relatively little dis- some words are acquired later than others.
than the acquisition of all inflected and cussion or examination of individual dif- Slonim and I have found very high correla-
derived forms of words. (Another term for ferences in vocabulary growth. Hart and tions (mostly over .90) between how well
root words is base words.) Examples of root Risley observed large differences associ- words are known in different grades.21 We
words include door, rock (a big stone), rock ated with word learning opportunities in also found that when data are ordered by
(move—as with a cradle), bible (an author- the toddler and preschool years.18 I have how many word meanings children know,
itative book) or tall. Words with affixes are also found that large vocabulary differ- rather than their grade level, we can clearly
not additional root words. Examples ences are present by the end of grade 2— identify a range of word meanings known
include doors, rocks, rocking, bibles, taller. amounting to a difference of more than well (above 75 percent), word meanings
Jeremy Anglin’s monograph suggests 4,000 root words between the highest and being acquired (74 percent – 25 percent),
that children acquire about 1,200 root lowest quartiles in a normative popula- and those that are little known. Further-
words a year during the elementary years, tion.19 By grade 4, the lowest quartile had more, these ranges are sequential. At any
with perhaps half that many root words only reached the average for grade 2 chil- given point in vocabulary acquisition, a
learned per year prior to grade 1.15 (He also dren. Thus, if we could find ways of sup- preliminary conclusion from this work is
argues that perhaps twice that many words porting more rapid vocabulary growth in that there are about 2,000–3,000 root words
need to be learned, particularly including the early years, more children would be that a child is likely to be learning. This
idiomatic forms.) My own research sug- able to comprehend “grade-level” texts in makes the construction of a “vocabulary
gests that the average number of root-word the upper elementary grades. Note that the curriculum” plausible.
meanings acquired per year may be some- “reading grade level” of texts is in fact Defining an essential vocabulary for
what smaller, more like 1,000 root-word almost entirely determined by the vocabu- high school graduates. A corollary of the
meanings per year from early infancy to the lary load of those texts.20 Thus early vocab- sequential nature of vocabulary acquisi-
ulary limitations make “catching up” tion is the possibility of defining a common
vocabulary needed by most high school It is possible that environment and “capac- them. (I am referring to new meanings, not
graduates. Several studies have shown that ity” interact—that constitutionally more- simply word meanings that are unfamiliar
college entrants need 11,000 to 14,000 root advantag e d children als o may b e in print.) Present school practices fall far
words if they are to complete a 4-year col- environmentally more advantaged. How- short of this objective in the primary
lege degree, while college graduates typi- ever, a number of studies summarized in grades. (Though schools may do better in
cally have about 17,000 root words.22 We Biemiller,29 Biemiller and Boote,30 Stahl,31 the upper elementary grades.) Other types
need further research on the degree to and elsewhere clearly indicate that chil- of vocabulary instruction (e.g., using
which we can identify these words. It is dren can acquire and retain two or three affixes, word-family approaches, and direct
clear that all do not know the same exact word meanings per day through instruc- instruction in inferencing) will also be use-
words. But it is equally clear that most pos- tion involving contextualized introduction ful, especially in grades 3 and above.
sess a substantial common vocabulary plus
a further discipline-specific vocabulary.
The hypothesis that most root-word and
idiomatic vocabulary learned before and There is clear evidence that vocabulary is
during elementary school results from direct associated with socio-economic status—
explanation of words. We know relatively
little about the processes by which children presumably reflecting differences
add words to their vocabularies. Some of
the data are negative—evidence that chil-
in opportunities.
dren do not easily acquire words by infer-
ence, especially children younger than age
10.23 In Bus, Van Ijzendoom, and Pellegri-
ni’s summary of the effects of reading to and explanation of new words. Further- This particular objective raises the pos-
children, there is evidence that younger more, while less-verbally-fluent or lower- sibility of returning to a more basal
children profit less from simply being “read vocabulary children and adolescents have approach (using controlled and planned
to.”24 There is also positive evidence that been found to benefit little from inferring vocabulary, especially in the primary
children do readily acquire vocabulary word meanings,32 more-direct approaches grades) as one component of classroom
when provided with a little explanation as have been reported to work well with these language and reading instruction. If vocab-
novel words are encountered in context.25 children (see Biemiller and Boote, Elley, ulary acquisition is largely sequential in
Preliminary evidence from directly inter- Feitelson, and Whitehurst references cited nature, it would appear possible to identify
viewing children about word acquisition previously). Overall, I suspect that most that sequence and to ensure that children
suggests that as late as grade 5, about 70 children (90 percent plus) can acquire new at a given vocabulary level have an oppor-
percent of words that are self-reported to vocabulary at rates necessary to reach what tunity to encounter words they are likely to
be learned are acquired as a result of direct are now “grade-level” or near grade-level be learning next, within a context that uses
explanation, either as a result of the child’s vocabulary in middle elementary school, the majority of the words that they have
request or instruction, usually by a if given adequate opportunity to use new already learned. Some researchers are
teacher.26 Overall, I believe that before age words and adequate instruction in word already beginning to work on this objective
10, the evidence supports the conclusion meanings. (e.g., David Francis in Texas, Barbara Foor-
that a substantial majority of new root The need for planned introduction and man in Florida, Jan Hulstijn in the Nether-
words are acquired through explanation by explanation of vocabulary plus various lands, Margaret McKeown, Isabel Beck,
others (including explanations in texts) tools to help children become more inde- and Amy Crosson in Pittsburgh, William
rather than by inference while reading, as pendent in dealing with new vocabulary. I Nagy in Seattle, Judith Scott and Elfrieda
has often been argued by Anderson, Nagy have suggested above the hypothesis that Hiebert in Santa Cruz, Catherine Snow and
and Herman, by Sternberg, and others. For 70 percent or more of the root words Nonie Lesaux in Cambridge, and Esther
practical purposes, we should be prepared learned by grade 6 are learned as a result of Geva and myself in Toronto). Many prob-
to ensure the availability and use of expla- direct explanation by parents, peers, teach- lems need to be solved. Existing lists of
nations of word meanings throughout at ers, and texts. Those who learn more words words (e.g., Living Word Vocabulary) do
least the elementary school years. almost undoubtedly encounter more not correspond closely enough to observed
Although children differ in their oppor- words and receive more explanations of sequences of word acquisition to be great
tunities to learn words and the ease with word meanings. This is especially true of guides (although they are better than noth-
which they learn words, evidence suggests symbolic or abstract words that are mostly ing). William Nagy (personal communica-
that most can acquire vocabulary at normal acquired after kindergarten.33 This sug- tion) has proposed combining Dale and
rates. There is clear evidence that vocabu- gests that we could do considerably more O’Rourke’s data with expert ratings—a very
lary is associated with socioeconomic sta- than we do now to ensure the development reasonable suggestion.
tus—presumably reflecting differences in of adequate vocabulary through systematic Given the establishment of plausible
opportunities.27 There is also clear evi- exposure to twenty or more new words per vocabulary lists, teachers could relate
dence relating vocabulary development to week combined with adequate explanation these lists to vocabulary being introduced
various phonological skills or capacities.28 of these words and opportunities to use in books (short stories, novels, texts,
poems) being studied, be aware of words teachers should strive to explain 20 or
Sadly, as of this 2014 reprinting,
to introduce or explain (or to query chil- more new word meanings per week. 36
attention to vocabulary in schools has
dren about if they don’t ask!), and be aware Children should also be encouraged to ask
not improved very much! Since
of some important words that aren’t going about word meanings they aren’t sure of, “Teaching Vocabulary: Early, Direct,
to be covered in the established curricu- both during read-alouds and at other times and Sequential” was published in
lum. These words could be taught directly, in the classroom. Most children are limited American Educator in 2001, vocabu-
or other materials (e.g., stories to be read in what they can read at this age level. lary has been recognized as impor-
to class) could be introduced that include Teacher read-alouds and vocabulary tant for school children, but that
them. (Since this article was first pub- explanations should ensure coverage of as recognition has not resulted in the
lished, I have produced Words Worth many as 1,600 high priority root word changes in curricula or classroom
Teaching, a book with potential high-pri- meanings between kindergarten and grade practices that could actually enhance
ority vocabulary words34). 2.37 vocabulary acquisition for disadvan-
taged or second language students.
Conclusion: A substantially greater In the later elementary years, continued
If you would like to know more, my
2009 book, Words Worth Teaching,
provides a lot of guidance for
vocabulary curricula, and lists 1,600
“priority root words” for primary
grade children and an additional list
of 2,900 “priority root words” for
upper elementary children. The book
also includes some practical sugges-
tions for vocabulary instruction and
assessment for primary and upper
elementary students.39
–Andrew Biemiller
vocabularies similar to median second-

grade children). Is this simply the product
of “intelligence”? I believe it is in consider-
teacher-centered effort is needed to promote development will include 2,900 priority able part the result of different learning
vocabulary development, especially in the root words between grades 3 and 6.38 It opportunities. After grade 2, vocabulary
kindergarten and early primary years. In should be possible to have students take growth rates look similar or faster for “low-
Jeanne Chall’s last book, The Academic more responsibility for learning needed quartile” children. If we could keep them
Achievement Challenge, she presented a word meanings, but teachers should moni- from being so far behind by grade 2, they
summary of research supporting the effec- tor acquisition of at least some of these apparently wouldn’t be so far behind in
tiveness of “teacher centered” approaches word meanings. In addition, in the upper grade 5!
to education.35 The information reviewed elementary grades, instruction is needed I don’t believe we can make all kids
here similarly points to the need for a more in deriving word meanings from affixed alike. But I think we could do much more
planned (but contextualized) introduction words (e.g., prebuilt, workable), word fami- to give them similar tools to start with.
of vocabulary. This is especially true in the lies, and idioms, as well as in ways of infer- Some kids may have to work harder to add
pre-literate years (before grades 3 or 4 ring word meanings. If we are serious vocabulary, and educators may have to
when children begin to read books that are about “increasing standards” and bringing work harder with some kids. So what’s
likely to introduce new vocabulary). Spe- a greater proportion of schoolchildren to new? Now, unfortunately, educators do
cifically, increased teacher-centered high levels of academic accomplishment, virtually nothing before grade 3 or 4 to
vocabulary work should include the delib- we cannot continue to leave vocabulary facilitate real vocabulary growth. By then,
erate introduction of a wider range of development to parents, chance, and it’s too late for many children. 
vocabulary in the early primary years highly motivated reading.
through oral sources. Thus, I strongly recommend a more Endnotes
1. J. S. Chall, Stages of Reading Development, 2nd edition
This means reading books aloud to chil- teacher-directed and curriculum-directed (New York: Harcourt Brace, 1996).
dren. These books should have more approach to fostering vocabulary and lan- 2. J. S. Chall and S. S. Conard, Should Textbooks Challenge
advanced vocabulary than the books chil- guage growth. If education is going to have Students? (New York: Teachers College Press, 1991).
3. J. S. Chall, V. A. Jacobs, and L. E. Baldwin, The Reading
dren in kindergarten and grades 1 or 2 a serious “compensatory” function, we Crisis: Why Poor Children Fall Behind (Cambridge, MA:
could read to themselves. There may also must do more to promote vocabulary. Our Harvard University Press, 1990).
be videos or other activities that introduce current data show large “environmental” 4. W. C. Becker, “Teaching reading and language to the
disadvantaged: What we have learned from field research,”
needed vocabulary. One example is PBS’s effects in kindergarten to grade 2. Large Harvard Educational Review 47 (1977), 518-543.
program Martha Speaks. In the course of differences remain by grade 5 (e.g., chil- 5. J. S. Chall, V. A. Jacobs, and L. E. Baldwin, The Reading
Crisis: Why Poor Children Fall Behind (Cambridge, MA:
several teacher re-readings of books, dren in the lowest fifth-grade quartile have
Harvard University Press, 1990); D. Gregory, L. Earl, and B. 21. A. Biemiller and N. Slonim, “Estimating root word Really Works in the Classroom? (New York: Guilford, 2000).
O’Donoghue, A Study of Reading Recovery in Scarborough: vocabulary growth in normative and advantaged 36. A. Biemiller and C. Boote, “An effective method for
1990-1992 (Scarborough, Ontario: Scarborough Board of populations: Evidence for a common sequence of vocabulary building meaning vocabulary in primary grades,” Journal of
Education, 1993); N. A. Madden, R. E. Slavin, J. L. Karweit, L. acquisition,” Journal of Educational Psychology 93 (2001), Educational Psychology 98 (2006), 44-62.
J. Dolan, and B. A. Wasik, “Success for all: Longitudinal 498-520.
effects of a restructuring program for inner-city schools,” 37. A. Biemiller, Words Worth Teaching (Columbus, OH:
22. C. A. D’Anna, E. B. Zechmeister, and J. W. Hall, “Toward SRA/McGraw-Hill, 2009).
American Educational Research Journal 30 (1993), 123-148; a meaningful definition of vocabulary size,” Journal of
and G. S. Pinnell, C. A. Lyons, D. E. Deford, A. S. Bryk, and Reading Behavior 23, no. 1 (1991), 109-122; R. Goulden, P. 38. A. Biemiller, Words Worth Teaching (Columbus, OH:
M. Seltzer, “Comparing instructional models for the literacy Nation, and J. Read, “How large can a receptive vocabulary SRA/McGraw-Hill, 2009).
education of high-risk first-graders,” Reading Research be?” Applied Linguistics 11, no. 4 (1990), 341-363; and S.
Quarterly 29 (1994), 9-38. 39. A. Biemiller, Words Worth Teaching (Columbus, OH:
Hazenberg and J. H. Hulstijn, “Defining a minimal receptive SRA/McGraw-Hill, 2009).
6. G. Duncan, J. Brooks-Gunn, and P. Klebanov, “Economic second-language vocabulary for nonnative university
deprivation and early childhood development,” Child students: An empirical investigation,” Applied Linguistics 17,
Development 65 (1994), 296-318; B. Hart and T. R. Risley, no. 2 (1996), 145-163.
Meaningful Differences in the Everyday Experience of Young 23. C. Robbins and L. C. Ehri, “Reading storybooks to
American Children (Baltimore, MD: Paul H. Brookes kindergartners helps them learn new vocabulary words,”
Publishing Co., 1995); and V. C. McLloyd, “Socioeconomic Journal of Educational Psychology 86 (1994), 54-64; and H.
disadvantage and child development,” American Werner and B. Kaplan, “The acquisition of word meanings:
Psychologist 53 (1988), 185-204. A developmental study,” Monographs of the Society for
7. W. E. Nagy and P. A. Herman, “Breadth and depth of Research in Child Development 15, no. 1 (1952).
vocabulary knowledge: Implications for acquisition and 24. Bus, A.G., van Ijzendoorn, M.H. & Pellegrini, A.D. (1995).
instruction,” in The Nature of Vocabulary Acquisition, ed. M. “Joint book reading makes for success in learning to read: A
G. McKeown and M. E. Curtis (Hillsdale, N.J.: Erlbaum meta-analysis of intergenerational transmission of literacy.”
Associates, 1987), 19-36. Review of Educational Research, 65, 1-21.
8. R. J. Sternberg, “Most vocabulary is learned from 25. I. L. Beck, C. Perfetti, and M. G. McKeown, “Effects of
context,” in The Nature of Vocabulary Acquisition, ed. M. G. long-term vocabulary instruction on lexical access and
McKeown and M. E. Curtis (Hillsdale, N.J.: Erlbaum reading comprehension,” Journal of Educational Psychology
Associates, 1987), 89-106. 74 (1982), 506-521; A. Biemiller and C. Boote, “An effective
9. W. C. Becker, “Teaching reading and language to the method for building meaning vocabulary in primary grades,”
disadvantaged: What we have learned from field research,” Journal of Educational Psychology 98 (2006), 44-62; W. B.
Harvard Educational Review 47 (1977), 518-543; and B. Hart Elley, “Vocabulary acquisition from listening to stories,”
and T. R. Risley, Meaningful Differences in the Everyday Reading Research Quarterly 24 (1989), 174-186; D.
Experience of Young American Children (Baltimore, MD: Paul Feitelson, B. Kita, and Z. Goldstein, “Effects of listening to
H. Brookes Publishing Co., 1995). series stories on first-graders’ comprehension and use of
10. M. Cantalini, The Effects of Age and Gender on School language” Research in the Teaching of English 20 (1986),
Readiness and School Success, (unpublished doctoral 339-356; D. Feitelson, Z. Goldstein, J. Iraqi, and D. I. Share,
dissertation, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education. “Effects of listening to story reading on aspects of literacy
Toronto, Ontario, 1987). acquisition in a diglossic situation,” Reading Research
Quarterly 28 (1991), 70-79; and G. J. Whitehurst, F. L. Falco,
11. F. J. Morrison, L. Smith, and M. Dow-Ehrensberger, C. Lonigan, J. E. Fischel, B. D. DeBaryshe, M. C. Valdez-
“Education and cognitive development: A natural Menchaca, and M. Caulfield, M., “Accelerating language
experiment,” Developmental Psychology 31 (1995), development through picture book reading,” Developmental
789-799. Psychology 24 (1988), 552-588.
12. R. C. Anderson, “Research foundations to support wide 26. A. Biemiller, “Size and sequence in vocabulary
reading,” in Promoting Reading in Developing Countries, ed. development: Implications for choosing words for primary
V. Greanery (New York: International Reading Association, grade vocabulary instruction,” in Teaching and Learning
1996), 55-77; W. E. Nagy and P. A. Herman, “Breadth and Vocabulary: Bringing Research to Practice, ed. A. Hiebert and
depth of vocabulary knowledge: Implications for acquisition M. Kamil (Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum Associates, 2005),
and instruction,” in The Nature of Vocabulary Acquisition, 223-242.
ed. M. G. McKeown and M. E. Curtis (Hillsdale, N.J.: Erlbaum
Associates, 1987), 19-36; and R. J. Sternberg, “Most 27. B. Hart and T. R. Risley, Meaningful Differences in the
vocabulary is learned from context,” in The Nature of Everyday Experience of Young American Children (Baltimore,
Vocabulary Acquisition, ed. M. G. McKeown and M. E. MD: Paul H. Brookes Publishing Co., 1995); and C. Snow, M.
Curtis (Hillsdale, N.J.: Erlbaum Associates, 1987), 89-106. S. Burns, and P. Griffin (Eds.), Preventing Reading Difficulties
in Young Children (Washington, D.C.: National Academy
13. I. Lorge, and J. S. Chall, “Estimating the size of Press, 1998).
vocabularies of children and adults: An analysis of
methodological issues,” Journal of Experimental Education 28. S. E. Gathercole, G. J. Hitch, E. Service, and A. J. Martin,
32 (1963), 147-157. “Phonological short-term memory and new word learning in
children,” Developmental Psychology 33 (1997), 966-979;
14. I. Beck and M. McKeown, “Conditions of vocabulary and J. L. Metsala, “Young children’s phonological awareness
acquisition,” in Handbook of Reading Research, Vol. 2, ed. and nonword repetition as a function of vocabulary
R. Barr, M. L. Kamil, P. B. Mosenthal, and P. D. Pearson (New development,” Journal of Educational Psychology 91
York: Longman, 1990), 789-814. (1999), 743-751.
15. J. M. Anglin, “Vocabulary development: A morphologi- 29. A. Biemiller, Language and Reading Success (Cambridge,
cal analysis,” Monographs of the Society for Research in MA: Brookline Books, 1999).
Child Development 58, no. 10 (1993).
30. A. Biemiller and C. Boote, “An effective method for
16. A. Biemiller, “Size and sequence in vocabulary building meaning vocabulary in primary grades,” Journal of
development: Implications for choosing words for primary Educational Psychology 98 (2006), 44-62.
grade vocabulary instruction,” in Teaching and Learning
Vocabulary: Bringing Research to Practice, ed. A. Hiebert and 31. S. A. Stahl, Vocabulary Development (Cambridge, MA:
M. Kamil (Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum Associates, 2005), Brookline Press, 1999).
223-242. 32. K. Cain and J. Oakhill, “Reading comprehension
17. E. Dale and J. O’Rourke, The Living Word Vocabulary difficulties,” in Handbook of Children’s Literacy, ed. T.
(Chicago: World Book/Childcraft International, 1981). Nunes, and P. Bryant (Dordrecht, Netherlands, Kluwer
Academic Publishers, 2003), 313-338; M. Elshout-Mohr and
18. B. Hart and T. R. Risley, Meaningful Differences in the M. M. van Daalen-Kapteijns, “Cognitive processes in
Everyday Experience of Young American Children (Baltimore, learning word meanings,” in The Nature of Vocabulary
MD: Paul H. Brookes Publishing Co., 1995). Acquisition, ed. M. G. McKeown and M. E. Curtis (Hillsdale,
19. A. Biemiller, “Size and sequence in vocabulary NJ: Erlbaum Associates, 1987), 53-72; and C. Robbins and L.
development: Implications for choosing words for primary C. Ehri, “Reading storybooks to kindergartners helps them
grade vocabulary instruction,” in Teaching and Learning learn new vocabulary words,” Journal of Educational
Vocabulary: Bringing Research to Practice, ed. A. Hiebert and Psychology 86 (1994), 54-64.
M. Kamil (Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum Associates, 2005), 33. A. Biemiller, M. Rosenstein, R. Sparks, T. K. Landauer,
223-242. and P. Foltz, P., “Models of Vocabulary Acquisition: Direct
20. J. S. Chall and S. S. Conard, Should Textbooks Challenge Tests and Text-Derived Simulations of Vocabulary Growth,”
Students? (New York: Teachers College Press, 1991); and J. Scientific Studies of Reading 18 (2014), 130-154.
S. Chall and E. Dale, Readability revisited: The New 34. A. Biemiller, Words Worth Teaching (Columbus, OH:
Dale-Chall Readability Formula (Cambridge, MA: Brookline SRA/McGraw-Hill, 2009).
Books, 1995).
35. J. S. Chall, The Academic Achievement Challenge: What
Oral Comprehension Sets the Ceiling on
Reading Comprehension
By Andrew Biemiller
T
o succeed at reading, a child must
be able to identify or “read”
printed words and to understand
the story or text composed of
those words. Both identifying words and
understanding text are critical to reading
success. For many children, increasing
reading and school success will involve
increasing oral language competence in
the elementary years.
The main argument is as follows:
• During elementary school, a child’s
maximum level of reading compre-
hension is determined by the child’s
level of listening comprehension.
• Later, adolescents and adults may
comprehend more complex printed
narrative or expository text than
spoken text. This is because print
remains after reading and can be
reviewed, while oral language
• Children differ markedly in the grade. Thus, at grade 3.9 (end of
usually cannot. However, children
language and especially the 3rd grade), the 90th percentile
must reach the point where they
vocabulary they have upon entering children’s reading comprehen-
can understand printed text as well
kindergarten. Advanced children sion and vocabulary are around
as spoken text before their compre-
(75th percentile or higher) are grade-equivalent 5.4 while the
hension of printed text can exceed
about a “year” ahead of average 10th percentile children are at 2.4.
their comprehension of spoken
children, while delayed children (Norms are for the Canadian Test
text.
(25th percentile or lower) are about of Basic Skills.2) Some of this
a year behind.1 difference is attributable to
cumulative vocabulary deficits in
• Language continues to develop
Andrew Biemiller is a professor emeritus with the less-advanced children.
Dr. Eric Jackman Institute of Child Study, during the primary years. How-
Department of Human Development and ever, the gap between children • Current school reading curricula
Applied Psychology, University of Toronto, with advanced language and typically have little effect on oral
Ontario, where he led the teacher education pro- children with restricted language language development during the
gram for 15 years. His latest book is Words Worth
grows wider during the elemen- primary years b ecause the level of
Teaching. This article is excerpted from Language
and Reading Success, a title in From Reading tary years. In elementary school, language used is often limited to
Research to Practice: A Series for Teachers, 90th percentile children differ what the children can read and
Brookline Books, 1999, (800-666-BOOK). It from 10th percentile children by write, there are few opportunities
appeared, with permission, in the Spring 2003 the grade equivalents of their for language development in
issue of American Educator.
primary classes. (This is true for this point, the child’s level of reading com- to that attained by the 75th percentile 3rd-
children whose first language is prehension is obviously far below her lis- grader. The same is true of reading compre-
English. Non-English-speaking tening comprehension. There is hension measures.
children in English-speaking considerable evidence that for the majority If we could improve the word-identifi-
schools do clearly acquire some of children, comprehension of printed cation skills of children at the 25th percen-
English. However, as a group, they language continues to lag behind compre- tile in reading comprehension, we would
also clearly remain at a disadvan- hension of spoken language well past 3rd get some improvement—up to the child’s
tage compared to English-speak- grade.3 When a child can understand lan- listening comprehension level. But in
ing children in elementary guage equally well whether presented in many cases, we would still be looking at a
schools.) print or speech, the distinction between child with a comprehension level that is far
below that of many peers. To bring a child
to grade-level language comprehension
means, at a minimum, that the child must
acquire and use grade-level vocabulary plus
The listening comprehension of the average some post-grade-level vocabulary. Obvi-
ously, this does not mean simply memoriz-
child begins to develop in infancy and ing more words, but rather coming to
continues to grow long after grade 6. understand and use the words used by
average children at that level. Knowledge
of this vocabulary will not guarantee suc-
cess, but lack of vocabulary knowledge can
ensure failure. 
• In the upper elementary grades, listening and reading comprehension
those who enter 4th grade with ceases to be important and the child has Endnotes
significant vocabulary deficits become “literate.” However, a number of 1. N. W. Bankson, Bankson Language Screening Test
(Baltimore, Md.: University Park Press, 1977); and L. M. Dunn
show increasing problems with studies suggest that average children don’t and L. M. Dunn, Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test-Revisited
reading comprehension, even if reach the point of being able to read what (Circle Pines, Minn.: American Guidance Service, 1982).
2. E. King, Canadian Test of Basic Skills (Scarborough, ON:
they have good reading (word they could understand if they heard it until Nelson, 1987).
identification/decoding) skills. around 7th or 8th grade. Of course, they 3. T. G. Sticht and J. H. James, “Listening and Reading,” in
The available evidence does not can understand simpler text sooner. Handbook of Research on Reading, vol. 1, ed. P. D. Pearson,
R. Barr, and M. L. Kamil (Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum Associates,
suggest a substantial “catching- Listening comprehension continues to 1984), 293-317.
up” process, but rather a continu- grow during the elementary years. Thus a 4. W. E. Nagy and P. A. Herman, “Breadth and depth of
vocabulary knowledge: Implications for acquisition and
ing slippage relative to those with typical 3rd-grader can comprehend more instruction,” in The Nature of Vocabulary Acquisition, ed.
average and above-average complex oral stories, expositions, etc., than M.G. McKeown & M.E. Curtis (Hillsdale, N.J.: Erlbaum
Associates, 1987), 19-36; and R. J. Sternberg, “Most
achievement. a typical 1st-grader. Broadly speaking, lan- vocabulary is learned from context, in The Nature of
Vocabulary Acquisition, ed. M.G. McKeown & M.E. Curtis
guage can only “grow” through interaction (Hillsdale, N.J.: Erlbaum Associates, 1987), 89-106.
• Thus, early delays in oral language
with people and texts that introduce new
come to be reflected in low levels of
vocabulary, concepts, and language struc-
reading comprehension, leading to
tures. In grades 1 and 2, this growth cannot
low levels of academic success. If
result mainly from reading experiences
we are to increase children’s
because most children are not reading con-
ability to profit from education,
tent that is as advanced as their oral lan-
we will have to enrich their oral
guage. We often assume that children’s
language development during the
reading experiences contribute much to
early years of schooling. Although
their increasing ability to comprehend
not all differences in language are
language.4 However, for many children,
due to differences in opportunity
most language growth continues to come
and learning, schools could do
from non-print sources (parents, peers,
much more than they do now to
teachers, class discussions, television, etc.)
foster the language development
throughout the elementary years. For
of less-advantaged children and
many children, the skills necessary for
children for whom English is a
reading printed English remain too poor
second language.
for them to read “grade-level” texts that
The listening comprehension of the introduce new vocabulary and new con-
average child begins to develop in infancy ceptual structures. The problem is even
and continues to grow long after grade 6. more severe for struggling students. For
Reading comprehension typically begins example, the listening vocabulary level of
to develop in kindergarten or 1st grade. At a 25th percentile 6th-grader is equivalent
Beyond Comprehension
We Have Yet to Adopt a Common Core Curriculum That Builds
Knowledge Grade by Grade—But We Need To
T
he prevailing view of the Ameri-
can educational community is
that no specific background
knowledge is needed for reading.
Any general background knowledge will
do. This innocent-sounding idea, so liber-
ating to the teacher and the student, frees
schools from any requirement to teach a
specific body of knowledge. This purported
liberation from “mere” information and
rote learning is one of the most precious
principles of American educational
thought, and lies at its very core. Its propo-
nents disparage those who favor a definite,
cumulative course of study for children as
“traditional,” “hidebound,” and “reaction-
ary,” to mention only the more polite terms.
Yet the supposedly liberating and
humane idea that any general background
knowledge will serve to educate children
and make them proficient readers is not
only incorrect, it is also very old and tired;
it has had its day for at least half a century,
during which time American reading pro-
lyn Jager Adams’s article on page 60 of this the Civil War may not necessarily read well
ficiency and verbal SAT scores have
volume.) Scapegoats for the decline, such about molecular interactions.
declined drastically.1 (For a detailed expla-
as television and social forces, have been One particularly elegant experiment
nation of the drop in SAT scores, see Mari-
invoked to explain it, but they cannot fully was conducted to find out how important
E. D. Hirsch, Jr., is founder of the Core Knowledge explain why other nations, equally domain-specific knowledge is in actual
Foundation and professor emeritus of education addicted to television but not to American reading tasks.3 In two of the groups of stu-
and humanities at the University of Virginia. He educational theories that disparage “mere” dents studied, one had good decoding
is a fellow of the Academy of Arts and Sciences. information, have not suffered a similarly skills but little knowledge of the subject,
He has written several acclaimed books, includ- drastic decline in reading proficiency.2 baseball, while another had poor decoding
ing the bestseller Cultural Literacy: What Every
American Needs to Know and The Schools We It is true that given a good start in skills but knew a lot about baseball. As
Need and Why We Don’t Have Them, and decoding, a child will develop fluency and predicted, the reading comprehension of
served as editor of the eight-volume Core Knowl- accuracy in decoding with practice. And it the low-skills, baseball-knowing group
edge series for parents, which ranges from What is also true that decoding is a skill that can proved superior to the reading compre-
Your Preschooler Needs to Know to What Your be transferred from one text to another. But hension of the high-skills, baseball-igno-
6th-Grader Needs to Know. This article is
adapted with permission from his book, The the progress of a child’s reading compre- rant group. These results have been
Knowledge Deficit: Closing the Shocking Educa- hension is different. That progress does not replicated in other situations and knowl-
tion Gap for American Children (New York: follow a reliable course of development. edge domains; they show the powerful
Houghton Mifflin, 2006). It appeared, with per- Because comprehension is knowledge effect of prior knowledge on actual reading
mission, in the Winter 2010–2011 issue of Ameri- dependent, someone who reads well about ability.4
can Educator.
Faulty Ideas devoted to gaining general knowledge, This example shows that the back-
which is the central requisite for high read- ground knowledge required to understand
Most current reading programs talk about
ing ability. the general sections of the New York Times,
“activating” the reader’s background
Most current reading programs do not such as the book review section, is not
knowledge so she can comprehend a text.
prepare students for high school, higher deep. It is not that of an expert—of course
But in practice, they are only paying lip
education, the workplace, or citizenship not, for we cannot all be experts on the
service to the finding that background
because they do not make a systematic diverse subjects that are treated by books.
knowledge is essential to reading compre-
effort to convey coherently, grade by grade, If authors want their books to be sold and
hension. Little attempt is made to enlarge
the knowledge that books (including high read, they must not assume that their read-
children’s background knowledge—and,
school textbooks), newspapers, magazines, ers are experts. They may take for granted
as a direct result, little is accomplished in
terms of expanding children’s ability to
comprehend more complex and varied
texts. The disjointed topics and stories that
one finds in current reading programs,
such as “Going to School” and “Jenny at the Most reading programs only pay lip service
Supermarket,” seem designed mainly to
appeal to the knowledge that young read-
to the finding that background knowledge
ers probably already have. is essential to reading comprehension.
For decades, most professional educa-
tors have believed that reading is an all-
purpose skill that, once learned, can be
applied to all subjects and problems. A and serious radio and TV programs assume only the relevant background knowledge
specific, fact-filled, knowledge-building American readers and listeners possess. that a literate audience can be expected to
curriculum, they hold, is not needed for (Every newspaper, book, and magazine possess.
gaining all-purpose cognitive skills and editor, and every producer for radio and TV What do readers need to know in order
strategies. Instead of burdening our minds is conscious of the need to distinguish what to comprehend this passage? We need to
with a lot of supposedly dead facts, they can be taken for granted from what must know first that this is a book review, which
call for us to become expert in solving be explained. The general reader or listener aims to tell us what the book is about and
problems, in thinking critically—in reading that every journalist or TV newscaster must whether it is worth reading. We need to
fluently—and then we will be able to learn imagine is somebody whose relevant understand that the reviewer is favorably
anything we need. knowledge is assumed to lie between the disposed to the book, calling it “ebullient,”
This idea sounds plausible. (If it did not, total ignorance of a complete novice and and that it is a nonfiction work about a
it could not have so thoroughly captured the detailed knowledge of an expert.) scientist named Luca Turin. We need to
the American mind.) Its surface plausibil- have at least a vague semantic grasp of key
ity derives from the fact that a good educa- How Much Knowledge words like ebullient, boring, obsessive,
tion can indeed create very able readers pioneering, estimation. We need to know
Do We Need?
and critical thinkers. The mistake is to some of the things mentioned with exact-
think that these achievements are the Here is the first paragraph of an article by
ness, but not others. It’s not necessary to
result of acquiring all-purpose skills rather Janet Maslin, taken at random from the
know how long a cubit is. Indeed, the text
than broad factual knowledge. As the study books section of the New York Times on
implies that this is an odd bit of informa-
of students’ abilities to comprehend a text February 6, 2003. It is an example of writing
tion, and we can infer that it is some form
about baseball demonstrated, reading and addressed to a general reader that a literate
of measurement. We need to know in gen-
critical thinking are always based on con- American high school graduate would be
eral what Paris is, what the moon is and
crete, relevant knowledge and cannot be expected to understand.
that it circles the earth, that it is not too far
exercised apart from what psychologists When Luca Turin was a boy growing away in celestial terms, and we need to
call “domain-specific” knowledge.5 up in Paris, according to Chandler have some idea what a Nobel Prize is and
The idea that reading with comprehen- Burr’s ebullient new book about him, that it is very prestigious. Consider the
sion is largely a set of general-purpose “he was famous for boring everyone knowledge domains included in this list.
skills and strategies that can be applied to to death with useless, disconnected Paris belongs to history and geography; so
any and all texts is one of the main barriers facts, like the distance between the does Egypt. The moon belongs to astron-
to our students’ achievement in reading. It earth and the moon in Egyptian omy and natural history. The Nobel Prize
leads to activities (like endless drilling in cubits.” Mr. Burr sets out to explain belongs to general history and science.
finding the main idea) that are deadening how such obsessive curiosity turned We may infer from this example that
for agile and eager minds, and it carries big Mr. Turin into a pioneering scientist only a person with broad knowledge is
opportunity costs. These activities actually who, in the author’s estimation, capable of reading with understanding the
slow down the acquisition of true reading deserves a Nobel Prize. New York Times and other newspapers.
ability: they take up time that could be This fact has momentous implications for
education, and for democracy as well. A sidered various scholarly approaches to knowledge was published, independent
universal ability of citizens to read news- this problem. One was to look at word researchers investigated whether reading
papers or their equivalent with under- frequencies. If a word appeared in print comprehension ability did in fact depend
standing is the essence of democracy. quite often, then its meaning was probably on knowledge of the topics we had set
Thomas Jefferson put the issue unforget- not going to be explained by the writer. We forth. The studies showed an unambiguous
tably: “The basis of our government being looked at a frequency analysis of the Brown correlation between knowledge of these
the opinion of the people, the very first Corpus, a collection of passages from very topics and reading comprehension scores,
object should be to keep that right; and diverse kinds of publications that was school grades, and other measures of read-
were it left to me to decide whether we lodged at Brown University, but we found ing ability. One researcher investigated
should have a government without news- that this purely mechanical approach, whether the topics we set forth as taken-
papers or newspapers without a govern- while partially valid, did not yield alto- for-granted knowledge are in fact taken for
ment, I should not hesitate a moment to
prefer the latter. But I should mean that
every man should receive those papers and
be capable of reading them.” 6 The last
phrase, “be capable of reading them,” is
often omitted from the quotation, but it is
the crucial one. Reading achievement will
not advance significantly until schools
recognize and act on the fact that it
depends on the possession of a broad but
definable range of diverse knowledge.
Effectively teaching reading requires
schools to systematically teach the diverse,
enabling knowledge that reading with
comprehension requires.
What Knowledge
Do We Need?
gether accurate or intelligent results. For granted in newspaper texts addressed to a
But what exactly does that enabling knowl-
example, because the Brown Corpus was general reader. He examined the New York
edge comprise? That is the nuts-and-bolts
compiled in the 1950s, “Nikita Khrush- Times by computer over a period of 101
question. The practical problem of helping
chev” was a more frequent vocabulary months and found that “any given day’s
all students achieve adequate reading
item than “George Washington.”7 issue of the Times contained approximately
comprehension depends on our schools
A much better way of finding out what 2,700 occurrences” of these unexplained
being able to narrow down what seems at
knowledge speakers and writers take for terms, which “play a part in the daily com-
first glance to be vast amounts of heteroge-
granted is to ask them whether they merce of the published language.”8
neous information into a teachable reper-
assume specific items of knowledge in An inventory of the tacit knowledge
tory that will enable students to understand
what they read and write. This direct shared by good readers and writers cannot,
the diverse texts addressed to the average
approach proved to be a sounder way of of course, be fixed at a single point in time.
citizen. Our sketch of the background
determining the tacit knowledge, because The knowledge that writers and radio and
knowledge needed to understand Maslin’s
what we must teach students is the knowl- TV personalities take for granted is con-
short passage offers clues to the kind of
edge that proficient readers and writers stantly changing at the edges, especially on
instruction needed to advance general
actually use. From people in every region issues of the moment. But inside the edges,
reading comprehension ability. It will be
of the country we found a reassuring at the core, the body of assumed knowl-
broad instruction in the worlds of nature
amount of agreement on the substance of edge in American public discourse has
and culture as a necessary platform for
this taken-for-granted knowledge. remained stable for many decades.9 This
gaining deeper knowledge through listen-
We had predicted this agreement. The core of knowledge changes very slowly, as
ing and reading. But what, exactly, should
very nature of communicative compe- sociolinguists have pointed out. If we want
that broad general knowledge be?
tence, a skill that successful teachers, to bring all students to reading proficiency,
My colleagues Joseph Kett and James
reporters, doctors, lawyers, book club this stable core is the enabling knowledge
Trefil and I set out to answer that question
members, and writers have already shown that we must teach.
back in the 1980s. We asked ourselves, “In
themselves to have, requires that it be That’s more easily said than done. One
the American context, what knowledge is
widely shared within the speech commu- essential, preliminary question that we
taken for granted in the classroom, in pub-
nity. Shared, taken-for-granted back- faced was this: how can this necessary
lic orations, in serious radio and TV, in
ground knowledge is what makes knowledge be sequenced in a practical way
books and magazines and newspapers
successful communication possible. Sev- for use in schools? We asked teachers how
addressed to a general audience?” We con-
eral years after our compilation of such to present these topics grade by grade and
created working groups of experienced broad knowledge of the world. The happy Mobility is a term to denote students’
teachers in every region of the country to consequence is a reading program that is moving from one school to another in the
produce a sequence independently of the much more absorbing, enjoyable, and middle of the year. The percentage of eco-
others. There proved to be less agreement interesting than the disjointed, pedestrian nomically disadvantaged students who
on how to present the material grade by programs offered to students today. migrate during the school year is appall-
grade than there had been in identifying Most current programs assume that ingly high, and the effects are dishearten-
what the critical topics are. That difficulty language arts is predominantly about “lit- ingly severe. One study has analyzed those
too was predicted, since the sequencing of erature,” which is conceived as poems and effects on 9,915 children. With this large
many topics is inherently arbitrary. While fictional stories, often trivial ones meant to group, the researchers were able to factor
it’s plausible that in math, addition needs be inoffensive vehicles for teaching read- out the influences of poverty, race, single-
to come before multiplication, and that in ing skills. Stories are indeed the best vehi- parent status, and lack of parental educa-
history, Greece probably ought to come cles for teaching young children—an idea tion in order to isolate just the effects of
before Rome, maybe it’s not plausible that
Greece should come before George
Washington.
We collected the accumulated wisdom
of these independent groups of teachers,
made a provisional draft sequence, and in Long-term memory is not used to
1990 held a conference where 145 people store isolated facts, but to store huge
from every region, scholarly discipline, and
racial and ethnic group got together to work complexes of integrated information
extremely hard for two and a half days to
agree on an intelligent way to teach this
that result in problem-solving skill.
knowledge sequentially. Over time, this
Core Knowledge Sequence has been refined
and adjusted, based on actual classroom
experience. It is now used in several hun-
that was ancient when Plato reasserted it changing schools. Even with other adverse
dred schools (with positive effects on read-
in The Republic. But stories are not neces- influences factored out, children who
ing scores), and it is distinguished among
sarily the same things as ephemeral fic- changed schools often were much more
content standards not only for its interest,
tions. Many an excellent story is told about likely than those who did not to exhibit
richness, and specificity, but also because
real people and events, and even stories behavioral problems and to fail a grade.10
of the carefully thought-out scientific foun-
that are fictional take much of their worth The researchers found that the adverse
dations that underlie the selection of topics.
from the nonfictional truths about the effects of such social and academic inco-
(The Core Knowledge Sequence is available
world that they convey. herence are greatly intensified when par-
online at www.coreknowledge.org.)
The new Core Knowledge language arts ents have low educational levels and when
Today, in response to requests from
program contains not only fiction and compensatory education is not available in
educators, the Core Knowledge Founda-
poetry, but also narratives about the real the home. But this big fact of student
tion offers a range of instructional sup-
worlds of nature and history. Since word mobility is generally ignored in discussions
ports, including detailed teacher guides, a
learning occurs much faster in a familiar of school reform. It is as if that elephant in
day-by-day planner, and an anthology of
context, the program stays on each selected the middle of the parlor is less relevant or
African American literature, music, and
subject-matter domain long enough to important than other concerns, such as the
art. And, we are now offering a complete
make it familiar. Such integration of sub- supposed dangers of encouraging unifor-
language arts program for elementary
ject-matter content in reading classes mity or of allowing an “outsider” to decide
grades. This program, which was pilot
enriches background knowledge and what subjects are to be taught at which
tested in 17 urban, suburban, and rural
enlarges vocabulary in an optimal way. grade level.
schools, addresses both the skills and the
In a typical American school district, the
knowledge that young children need to
Constantly Changing average rate at which students transfer in
become strong readers and writers. This
Schools—A Critical Issue and out of schools during the academic
new program is our attempt to reconceive
year is about one-third.11 In a typical inner-
language arts as a school subject. In trying Thus far, I’ve mostly been explaining the
city school, only about half the students
to make all students proficient readers and need for a fact-filled, knowledge-building
who start in the fall are still there in the
writers, there is no avoiding the responsi- curriculum. But the critical issue of student
spring—a mobility rate of 50 percent.12
bility of imparting the specific knowledge mobility demands more than just each
Given the curricular incoherence in a typi-
they will need to understand newspapers, school adopting or adapting such a cur-
cal American school (in which two fourth-
magazines, and serious books. There is no riculum. If we are really to serve all of our
grade classrooms may cover completely
successful shortcut to teaching and learn- children to the best of our ability, then
different content), the education provided
ing this specific knowledge—and there is nothing short of a common curriculum—
to frequently moving students is tragically
nothing more interesting than acquiring one shared by all schools—will do.
fragmented. The high mobility of low- students know about a subject, because Growth, Development, School Function, and Behavior,”
Journal of the American Medical Association 270, no. 11
income parents guarantees that disadvan- they have been taught very different topics (September 15, 1993), 1334–1338.
taged children will be most severely in prior grades, depending on the different 11. D. Cohen, “Moving Images,” Education Week, August
affected by the educational handicaps of preferences of their teachers. Typically, 3, 1994, 32–39; D. Kerbow, “Patterns of Urban Student
Mobility and Local School Reform,” Journal of Education for
changing schools, and that they will be the therefore, the teacher must spend a great Students Placed at Risk 1, no. 2 (1996), 147-169; S. Pribesh
and D. B. Downey, “Why Are Residential and School Moves
ones who are most adversely affected by deal of time at the beginning of each year Associated with Poor School Performance?,” Demography
lack of commonality across schools. reviewing the preparatory material stu- 36, no. 4 (1999), 521–534; T. Fowler-Finn, “Student Stability
vs. Mobility,” School Administrator 58, no. 7 (August 2001),
The finding that our mobile students dents need to know in order to learn the 36–40; R. W. Rumberger, K. A. Larson, R. K. Ream, and G. J.
(who are preponderantly from low-income next topic—time that would not need to be Palardy, The Educational Consequences of Mobility for
California Students and Schools, PACE Policy Brief (Berkeley,
families) perform worse than stable ones so extensive (and so very boring to stu- CA: Policy Analysis for California Education, 1999); and D.
Stover, “The Mobility Mess of Students Who Move,”
does not mean that their lower perfor- dents who already have the knowledge) if Education Digest 66, no. 3 (2000), 61–64.
mance is a consequence of poverty. That is the incoming students had all been taught 12. U.S. General Accounting Office, Elementary School
to commit the fallacy of social determin- using a common core curriculum and thus Children: Many Change Schools Frequently, Harming Their
Education (Washington, DC: GAO, 1994).
ism. Where there is greater commonality of had all gained this knowledge already. 13. B. C. Straits, “Residence, Migration, and School
the curriculum, the effects of mobility are If states would adopt a common core Progress,” Sociology of Education 60 (1987), 34–43, cited in
H. J. Walberg, “Improving Local Control and Learning,”
less severe. In a summary of research on curriculum that builds knowledge grade by reprint 1994.
student mobility, Herbert Walberg states grade, reading achievement would rise for 14. H. W. Stevenson and J. W. Stigler, The Learning Gap:
Why Our Schools Are Failing and What We Can Learn from
that “common learning goals, curriculum, all groups of children. So would achieve- Japanese and Chinese Education (New York: Summit, 1992).
and assessment within states (or within an ment in math, science, and social studies 15. E. D. Hirsch, Jr., The Schools We Need (New York:
entire nation) ... alleviate the grave learning because, as common sense predicts, read- Doubleday, 1996), 38–41; Centre for Educational Research
and Innovation, Immigrants’ Children at School (Paris:
disabilities faced by children, especially ing is strongly correlated with the ability to Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development,
1987).
poorly achieving children, who move from learn in all subjects. Equally important, the
16. E. D. Hirsch, Jr., The Schools We Need (New York:
one district to another with different cur- achievement gap between social groups Doubleday, 1996), 22–26.
ricula, assessment, and goals.” 13 The would be greatly narrowed and social jus-
adverse effects of student mobility are tice would be served. 
much less severe in countries that use a
nationwide core curriculum. Endnotes
While ignoring important issues like 1. There is a large literature on the decline of verbal SAT
scores in the 1960s and 1970s, and on NAEP (National
mobility that really do impede learning, Assessment of Educational Progress) scores when these
began to be collected in the 1970s. A summary of these
some people blame ineffective teachers for issues with full bibliographical references can be found in E.
students’ lackluster performance. But so- D. Hirsch, Jr., Cultural Literacy (Boston: Houghton Mifflin,
1987), 1–10; and E. D. Hirsch, Jr., The Schools We Need
called low teacher quality is not an innate (New York: Doubleday, 1996), 39–42, 176–79.
characteristic of American teachers; inef- 2. See C. Jencks, “What’s Behind the Drop in Test Scores?,”
(working paper, Department of Sociology, Harvard University,
fective teaching is the consequence of the Cambridge, MA, July–August 1978).
ineffective training they have received and 3. D. R. Recht and L. Leslie, “Effect of Prior Knowledge on
of the vague, incoherent curricula they are Good and Poor Readers’ Memory of Text,” Journal of
Educational Psychology 80, no. 1 (March 1988), 16–20.
given to teach, both of which result from 4. W. Schneider and J. Korkel, “The Knowledge Base and
most education schools’ de-emphasis on Text Recall: Evidence from a Short-Term Longitudinal Study,”
Contemporary Educational Psychology 14, no. 4 (1989),
specific, cumulative content. No teacher, 382–393, “Performance was more a function of soccer
however capable, can efficiently cope with knowledge than of aptitude level.”
5. For reviews of the scientific literature on these subjects,
the huge differences in academic prepara- see E. D. Hirsch, Jr., Cultural Literacy (Boston: Houghton
tion among the students in a typical Ameri- Mifflin, 1987); E. D. Hirsch, Jr., The Schools We Need (New
York: Doubleday, 1996); W. Schneider, J. Korkel, and F. E.
can classroom—differences that grow with Weinert, “Expert Knowledge, General Abilities, and Text
each successive grade.14 In other nations, Processing,” in Interactions among Aptitudes, Strategies,
and Knowledge in Cognitive Performance, ed. W. Schneider
the differences between groups diminish and F. E. Weinert (New York: Springer-Verlag, 1990),
235-251.
over time, so that they are closer together
6. Letter to Colonel Edward Carrington, January 16, 1787,
by grade 7 than they were in grade 4.15 Even taken from A. Koch and W. Peden (eds.), The Life and
the most brilliant and knowledgeable Selected Writings of Thomas Jefferson, (New York: Random
House, 1944), 411–412.
American teacher faced with huge varia- 7. N. W. Francis and H. Kucera, Frequency Analysis of English
tions in student preparation cannot Usage: Lexicon and Grammar (Boston: Houghton Mifflin,
1982).
achieve as much as an ordinary teacher 8. J. Willinsky, “The Vocabulary of Cultural Literacy in a
can within a more coherent curricular sys- Newspaper of Substance,” (paper presented at the annual
meeting of the National Reading Conference, Tucson, AZ,
tem like those found in the nations that November 29–December 3, 1988).
outperform us. 9. E. D. Hirsch, Jr., Cultural Literacy (Boston: Houghton
The chief cause of our schools’ ineffi- Mifflin, 1987).
10. D. L. Cohen, “Frequent Moves Said to Boost Risk of
ciency is precisely this curricular incoher- School Problems,” Education Week, September 22, 1993,
ence.16 At the beginning of the school year, 15. See also: D/ Wood, N. Halfon, D. Scarlata, P. Newacheck,
and S. Nessim, “Impact of Family Relocation on Children’s
a teacher cannot be sure what the entering
Advancing our Students’
Language and Literacy
The Challenge of Complex Texts
F
ew Changes on SAT Posted by
Class of 2010.” 1 “Scores on SAT
College Entrance Test Hold
Steady.”2 “Class of 2008 Matches
’07 on the SAT.” 3 Year by year, point by
point, it is hard to see the real news in these
headlines. The real news is not that the SAT
scores have held steady. The real news is
that the SAT scores haven’t increased. The
SAT scores of our college-bound students
have been languishing not for one or two
years, but for a long time. Several decades
ago, scores were much higher.
The SAT score decline began in 1962,
nearly 50 years ago. From 1962 to 1980,
math scores fell 36 points to 492 while ver-
bal scores fell 54 points to 502. Since 1980,
the math scores have been gradually
climbing back and are now at 516. Fluctua- States joined 19 other developed countries
Marilyn Jager Adams is a visiting scholar in the tions aside, the verbal scores remain in an international evaluation of adult lit-
Cognitive, Linguistic, and Psychological Sciences unchanged, even today stuck at 502. eracy levels.5 As compared with their peers
Department at Brown University and former
chief scientist for Soliloquy Learning, Inc. She is If I were writing the headline for the in the other countries, the literacy scores
the author of numerous scholarly papers and next newspaper story on the SATs, here’s of older U.S. adults (36 years old and up)
several books, including two landmark works, what you’d see: “Seniors and Their SAT were quite high, ranking in the top five. In
Beginning to Read: Thinking and Learning Scores Sabotaged by Low-Level Text- contrast, the scores for younger U.S. adults
about Print and Phonemic Awareness in Young books.” And if the copyeditor would let me, (35 years old or less) ranked in the bottom
Children, as well as a number of empirically
validated classroom resources, including Scho- I’d add an exclamation point! The literacy half of the distribution by every measure.
lastic’s System 44 (2009) and iRead (2013), level of our secondary students is languish- Among young adults with a high school
technology-based programs for building literacy ing because the kids are not reading what diploma or less, those from the United
foundations. She has served on the advisory they need to be reading. This is a strong States fell at the bottom of the pile, ranking
board for several of the Public Broadcasting Sys- claim. Let me lay out the evidence and 19th out of 20. Even among participants
tem’s educational programs including Sesame
Street and Between the Lions. She also devel- argument so you can judge for yourself. who had completed four or more years of
oped a vocabulary assessment for the 2014 postsecondary education, the scores of our
National Assessment of Adult Literacy (NAAL) Not Just the SAT Scores young adults were below the average for
and was on the development team for the Com- same-aged and like-educated peers in the
To be sure, whether scores on the SAT
mon Core State Standards for English Language other countries. The young adults in this
Arts and Literacy. This article is adapted with exams truly reflect relevant or important
permission of the Guilford Press from “The Chal- intellectual or academic proficiencies study would have graduated from high
lenge of Advanced Texts: The Interdependence of remains a topic of discussion.4 Yet, the school between 1974 and 1998, during the
Reading and Learning,” which Adams wrote for SATs are not the only indication that the period when the verbal SAT scores were
Reading More, Reading Better, edited by Elfrieda bottoming out.
literacy growth of our secondary students
H. Hiebert, copyright 2009 by Guilford Press. It In international assessments of school-
appeared, with permission, in the Winter 2010– has fallen behind.
2011 issue of American Educator. Between 1994 and 1998, the United children, the performance of our fourth-
graders is above average. However, the 21. And among that 51 percent, average and 1975, and using readability analyses
performance of our high school students is performance on the complex texts was at to compare their difficulty. 15 The data
average, at best.6 The results of our own chance levels (i.e., random guessing would indicated that the SAT passages had actu-
National Assessment of Educational Prog- produce the same scores). ally become easier over this period—so
ress (NAEP) show a similar contrast: while scores should have been going up. Further,
the reading of younger students has been SAT Decline between 1963 and 1975, during the years
improving over time, that of older students Prompts Investigation of the score decline, the average difficulty
has not. NAEP’s analysis of changes in of the test passages lay at the eleventh-
Back in 1977, having watched SAT scores
reading performance between 1971 and grade level, which should have been
fall for 15 years, the College Board, which
2008 shows that average scores of 9-year- solidly in range for twelfth-grade college-
developed and administers the SAT,
olds increased by 12 points. Those of bound students. Yet scores were going down.
engaged a panel to try to identify the
13-year-olds increased by 4 points. But the
average scores of 17-year-olds have not
changed. 7 The lack of progress among
17-year-olds is especially jarring when
factoring in our dropout problem. Roughly
25 percent of eighth-graders nationwide
drop out of school before completing high
school;8 presumably, those who stay in
school, and therefore participate in NAEP
as 17-year-olds, disproportionately include
the more successful and motivated stu-
dents. One can’t help but wonder whether
they were trying hard when they took the
tests, since there is no personal conse- underlying causes of the decline.11 A first Chall thought there had to be some rea-
quence for doing well or poorly on the hypothesis to be checked was whether the son why the twelfth-graders were not able
international trials or the NAEP. test had somehow become more demand- to read eleventh-grade texts. With this in
On the other hand, college entrance ing. But, no, to the contrary, indications mind, she and her colleagues evaluated
examinations are voluntary, and perform- were that scoring had become more popular eleventh-grade textbooks in his-
ing well on them is the very point of taking lenient.12 A second prominent hypothesis tory, literature, grammar, and composition.
them. ACT (known until 1996 as the Ameri- was that the decline was due to changes in The average difficulty of the textbooks lay
can College Testing Program) tracked the the demographics of the test takers. Analy- between the ninth- and tenth-grade levels.
literacy scores of eighth-, tenth-, and ses showed this hypothesis to be largely Could this discrepancy between the
twelfth-graders on ACT college readiness correct, but only for a brief while. Over the reading level of the SAT and that of the
and entrance exams. 9 For each of the early 1960s, changes in the composition of textbooks explain the score decline? If
cohorts examined (and regardless of gen- the tested population accounted for as students had neither practiced nor been
der, race/ethnicity, or household income), much as three-quarters of the test score instructed with reading materials as hard
the students were collectively on track in decline—and, no wonder, for during this as the SAT passages, then one could hardly
the eighth and tenth grades for better period the number of students taking the expect them to read the latter with compe-
scores than they ultimately obtained in the SAT tripled. Over the 1970s, however, tence and confidence.
twelfth grade. ACT’s report concludes that though the test-taking population stabi- By the early 1990s, SAT scores appeared
there is a specific problem at the secondary lized, the scores did not. Instead, the to have plateaued. The College Board
school level.* decline continued, even steeper than decided to “recenter” the scale by adding
Taking a closer look at the poor perfor- before, while the extent to which it could about 80 points to the verbal scores (and
mance of students on its college entrance be ascribed to demographic shifts shrank about 25 points to the math scores) so as to
exam, ACT determined that the major to 30 percent at most.13 Furthermore, the return the mean of each test to a value
stumbling block for students is complex scores that dropped most were those of the close to 500 points.† Beleaguered, the Col-
texts. The maximum score on the reading strongest students, the students in the top lege Board also changed the name of the
component of the ACT college entrance 10 percent of their class; the scores of stu- test from the Scholastic Aptitude Test to
exam is 36; scores of less than 21 predict dents toward the bottom of the distribution simply the SAT, with the letters standing for
reading difficulties in college coursework held steady or even increased.14 nothing.
and also in the workplace. Among students Another hypothesis examined by the
who took the ACT exam in 2005, the scores College Board’s panel was that the read- A Closer Look at Textbooks
of 51 percent—more than half—fell below ing selections on the tests had somehow In the 1980s and 1990s, another team of
become too hard for the students. Reading researchers, led by Donald P. Hayes,
*The same conclusion was drawn by the College researcher Jeanne Chall and her colleagues returned to Chall’s hypothesis, extending
Entrance Examination Board in the mid-1970s and again tested this hypothesis by sampling passages her work with a revealing series of studies.
in the mid-1980s.10 from SAT tests administered between 1947
In one of the most extensive, they analyzed To wit, while the analyses of Hayes and focused on trade publications rather than
the difficulty of 800 elementary, middle, his colleagues showed that textbooks had school materials, and the texts they used
and high school books published between become progressively easier over the cen- included preschool books, children’s
1919 and 1991.16 Their results indicated tury, they also indicated that the difficulty books, comic books, adult books, maga-
that the difficulty of the text in these books of English language newspapers had zines, newspapers, and abstracts from
had been significantly reduced and, fur- remained nearly constant. 18 Could this scientific magazines. For comparison, they
ther, that the years over which this reduc- disparity be a factor in the declining circu- compiled and analyzed a variety of oral
tion occurred were temporally aligned with lation of newspapers? Similarly, they found language samples, including language
the SAT score decline. the level of the wording of scientific maga- from prime-time adult television shows,
As one indication of this trend, the aver- children’s television shows, mothers’
age length of the sentences in books pub- speech to children ranging in age from
lished between 1963 and 1991 was shorter infancy to adolescence, conversations
than that of books published between 1946 among college-educated adults (including
and 1962. In the seventh- and eighth-grade An analysis of from the Oval Office), and adults providing
textbooks, for example, the mean length of expert witness testimony for legal cases.
sentences decreased from 20 words to 14 800 schoolbooks Regardless of the source or situation and
words—“the equivalent of dropping one or
two clauses from every sentence.”17 Mean-
published between without exception, the richness and com-
plexity of the words used in the oral lan-
while, the sophistication of the books’ 1919 and 1991 found guage samples paled in comparison with
wording also declined. The wording of the written texts. Indeed, of all the oral
schoolbooks published for eighth-graders that the difficulty of language samples evaluated, the only one
from 1963 forward was as simple as that in the text had been that exceeded even preschool books in
books used by fifth-graders before 1963. l e x i c a l ra n g e w a s e x p e r t w i t n e s s
Worse, among literature texts required in significantly reduced. testimony.
English classes, the wording of twelfth- This difference between the wording of
grade texts published after 1963 was sim- oral and written language must lie at the
pler than the wording of seventh-grade crux of the advanced literacy challenge, as
texts published prior to 1963. it points to a profound dilemma. On the
Continuing their investigation, the zines, whether aimed at professionals or one hand, the extent of this disparity
researchers found that it was especially laypersons, had increased dramatically implies that the great majority of words
schoolbooks for students in grades 4 and up from 1930 to 1990.19 If it is a national goal needed for understanding written lan-
that were simplified in the years after 1962. to inspire more students to become engi- guage is likely to only be encountered—
Moreover, although the wording of school- neers and scientists, then shouldn’t the and thus can only be learned—through
books for children generally increased difficulty of our schoolbooks have experience with written text. On the other
across grades 1 through 8, the same was not increased alongside? If a goal is to ensure hand, research has taught us that written
true of high school books. Across grades 9 that our students will be able to stay suffi- text is accessible—and thus permits learn-
through 12 (including texts for Advanced ciently informed about scientific progress ing—only if the reader or listener already
Placement courses), the difficulty levels of to conduct business, reflect on policy, and knows the vast majority of words from
the literature books were shown to differ manage their family’s health and educa- which it is constructed. Indeed, research
little from one another or from the grade 7 tion, then at a minimum, shouldn’t the indicates that reading with comprehension
and grade 8 offerings. One bright spot was difficulty of our schoolbooks keep pace depends on understanding at least 95 per-
high school students’ science texts, which with the difficulty of scientific publications cent of the words of a text.22
were significantly more difficult than their aimed at the general public?
English books. However, even among sci- How Many New Words Do
ence texts, only those designated for The Vocabulary of Readers Need to Learn?
Advanced Placement coursework evi- Written Language So roughly how many words do kids need
denced difficulty levels comparable to that
Reading educators have long appreciated to learn in order to be proficient readers?
of the average daily newspaper for adults.
that there is a very strong relationship This question raises the second key part of
Such a disparity between the students’
between vocabulary and reading compre- the vocabulary problem.
schoolbooks and the passages on the SAT
hension. But what exactly is it about the Suppose you counted the number of
might well explain the decline in SAT
wording of texts that underlies this rela- times each different word in this article
scores. More significantly, failing to pro-
tion? Part of the answer is that written texts occurred. What you would find is that there
vide instruction or experience with
draw upon many more words than nor- are a few words that I have used quite a
“grown-up” text levels seems a risky course
mally arise in oral language situations.20 number of times, and many, many others
toward preparing students for the reading
To gain insight into this phenomenon, that I used only once or twice. This distri-
demands of college and life.
Hayes and colleagues compared spoken bution of word counts or frequencies is an
†The scores given in the introduction are all on the new,
language with texts.21 For this study, they example of what is known as Zipf’s law.23
recentered scale.
According to Zipf’s law, every natural mon words. At the other extreme, more represent/misrepresent. Eliminating all
language sample is made up of relatively than half of the words appeared only once. such “closely related” words from the word
few words that recur over and over again, Still worse: the team estimated that the count that Carroll and colleagues had done
and many, many words that arise very actual number of different words in the for the dictionary, and keeping only base
infrequently. The type of natural language children’s reading materials—that is, the words plus affixed or compound words
sample does not matter and, provided that number of different words that would have whose meanings are harder to figure out
it is not too short, neither does its size. That turned up if they had counted such texts from their base words (such as vice/vicious,
is, whether you counted all the words in a exhaustively rather than just working with well/farewell, shift/shiftless, fix/prefix),
casual conversation, a lecture, a newspa- Nagy and Anderson estimated that the
per article, a whole book, or even a whole actual number of separate words that chil-
library’s worth of books, you would find the dren need be taught is closer to 100,000. If
same thing: of all the different words in Nagy and Anderson’s elimination rules
your sample, a small number would occur were too aggressive given children’s word
over and over again, while many, many
others would occur only once.
We must organize sense, then the actual number might be
double or triple their estimate. And, of
Zipf’s law may feel intuitively obvious. our readings in course, if we extend concern from grade-
Less obvious, however, are its implications school materials to advanced texts, the
with respect to the vocabulary challenge.
every subject so actual number must be larger still.
An example may vivify the issue. Count- each text bootstraps
ing words that appear in relevant text is a Developing Students’
common approach to making dictionaries. the language and Vocabulary: Examining the
For example, if you wanted to make a dic- knowledge needed Options
tionary for geologists, you might begin by
gathering a sample of the kind of articles for the next. So, what is the best way to help students
about geology that you think your custom- master the many, many words they must
ers would like to read and then counting know to understand advanced texts? In
the number of occurrences of all the differ- broad terms, there appear to be only two
ent words within them. The goal is to make options: (1) to endeavor to teach students
sure your dictionary contains all the words the words they will need to know, and (2)
that your customers will want to look up excerpts—would have totaled 609,606. Due to expect students to learn new words
most. to Zipf’s law, a sample of 5 million words through reading.
Similarly, as part of creating The Ameri- was just plain too small even to identify— Is direct vocabulary instruction worth-
can Heritage School Dictionary,24 John Car- much less to judge the relative frequency while? Based on a highly regarded meta-
roll and his colleagues were asked to figure of—the vast majority of words that might analysis, the answer seems to be a
out which words should be included by well have belonged in the dictionary. resounding “yes.”27 Across studies involv-
examining children’s reading materials. To But hold it. We are talking about materi- ing a variety of students, instructional
do this, the team gathered texts that had als that are specifically written for and specifics, and outcome measures, the
been written especially for children in meant to be understood by schoolchildren meta-analysis showed that direct vocabu-
grades 3 through 8, taking care that the col- in grades 3 through 8. How can they pos- lary instruction significantly increases
lection as a whole captured the range of sibly be expected to know more than knowledge of words that are taught. Just as
different kinds of text and topics that the 600,000 different words? importantly, students who received vocab-
children might read in amounts that were In fact, many of these words are cousins ulary instruction were found to perform
proportionate to how often they could be of each other. For example, if a child knows significantly better on global nonspecific
expected to read them. From across these the word shoe, then she or he is unlikely to vocabulary measures such as standardized
materials, the team then extracted 10,000 experience difficulty with shoes. Similarly, tests, indicating that such instruction pro-
excerpts, totaling 5 million words of text in a child probably won’t have trouble with motes learning of words beyond those that
all, which, after sorting, turned out to word families like walk, walked, and walk- have been explicitly taught (e.g., being
include 86,741 different words. Their job ing. Pushing this reasoning further, vocab- taught a word like aquarium helps with
was then to figure out which of these 86,741 ulary researchers Bill Nagy and Richard indirectly learning words like aquatic,
words arose sufficiently often to warrant Anderson 26 have argued that students aqueduct, and aqueous).
inclusion in the dictionary.25 shouldn’t have problems with any sort of However, we must bear in mind that, by
Enter Zipf’s law. Just 109 very frequent prefixing, suffixing, or compounding of a its very nature, direct vocabulary instruc-
words accounted for fully half of the vast word, provided that the meaning of the tion admits coverage of precious few words
sample of children’s reading material that word’s base is preserved. As examples, they relative to the magnitude of the challenge.
Carroll and colleagues had put together. suggested that if children know the word Even if, beginning in grade 1 and continu-
Indeed, 90 percent of the sample was elf, they should have little problem with ing through grade 12, teachers consistently
accounted for by just 5,000 relatively com- elfin or with pairs such as cow/cowhand, taught—and students per fectly
know/knowledge, therapy/therapeutic, and retained—20 vocabulary words each and
every week, the gain in vocabulary would that is, the context—in which the word has In short, the model’s response to any text
total only 8,640 words in all (20 words × 36 appeared. Where a word shows up in mul- it “reads” extends well beyond what is
weeks of school × 12 years), many times tiple contexts, the strength of the associa- denoted by the specific words of the text.
fewer than what is required. tion between the word and each of the Further, the richness of the model’s repre-
Such considerations have led some separate contexts is weakened through sentation of any text that it “reads” depends
scholars to argue that the only feasible competition. Where a word arises repeat- on how much it already knows. Just as with
means by which students might acquire an edly in one particular context, the associa- people,32 the larger its starting vocabulary
adequate reading vocabulary is through tion between the two is strengthened. and the more it has read before, the more it
the process of inferring the meaning of Importantly, the associations between will learn and understand from the next text.
each new word from its context in the words and contexts in the LSA model are In comparing LSA’s word-learning to
course of reading.28 Indeed, research shows that of schoolchildren, the researchers
that the probability that students under- began by “training” it with a set of texts
stand and retain any given new word that judged comparable to the lifelong learning
they encounter in print is 0.05.29 of a typical seventh-grader. The researchers
So how far will this get them? Research- then gave the model new texts to “read”
ers have (generously) estimated that and measured its vocabulary growth. The
median, middle-class, fifth-grade students
read close to 1,000,000 words of text per
Inference and results showed that the likelihood that the
computer gained adequate understanding of
year, in school and out.30 Based on Carroll comprehension new words it encountered in these new texts
and colleagues’ research, we can expect a was 0.05—just exactly the same as research-
million words of reading to include roughly strategies seem to do ers have found for schoolchildren.33
17,200 different words. If we suppose that little to compensate But the results showed something else,
the students already know one-quarter of too. It turned out that, with each new read-
the words in their texts, then the number for weak domain ing, the model effectively increased its
of new words they should encounter
through this reading would equal 12,900
knowledge. understanding not just of words that were
in the text but also of words that were not
per year. Yet, if the likelihood that the stu- in the text. Indeed, measured in terms of
dents will understand and retain each of total vocabulary gain, the amount the
these words is only 0.05, then their vocabu- model learned about words that did not
lary can only be expected to grow by 645 appear in a given reading was three times
per year, giving them but 5,160 new words as much as what it learned about words
by the time they graduate from high school. bidirectional. That is, there are links from that were in the reading.
Recalling that even texts that are for each word to each of its contexts and also “What?” we cry, “How can that be? How
students in grades 1 through 8 presume from each context to all of its words. As a can reading a text produce increases in
knowledge of at least 100,000 different result, the full complex of knowledge that knowledge of words that it does not even
words, it is clear that both estimates for is called forth as each word is “read” contain? That is not credible! It makes no
learning vocabulary fall way short of the extends through its contexts to other sense!” But wait. If we were talking about
need. At the same time, however, both words, and through those words to other knowledge rather than words, then it
estimates also seem at odds with the intui- contexts and words. Thus, as the model would make lots of sense. Every concept—
tive sense that a high school student need “reads” the next word of the text and the simple or complex, concrete or abstract—is
be neither a genius nor a tireless scholar to next and the next, activation spreads to learned in terms of its similarities, differ-
read and understand most materials writ- other, related complexes of knowledge, ences, and relationships with other con-
ten for grade-school children. which may well include clusters that have cepts with which we are familiar. As a
never before been directly represented by simplistic example, when we read about
Insights from a any combination of words and contexts the tigers, then, by dint of both similarities and
Computer Model of model has ever “read” before. contrasts, we learn more about all sorts of
Moreover, because the model’s knowl- cats and, further, about every subtopic
Vocabulary Acquisition
edge is represented relationally, the addi- mentioned along the way. The more deeply
For another way to think about vocabulary tion or modification of any one connection we read about tigers, the more nuanced
acquisition, let’s consider an intriguing impacts many others, pulling some closer and complex these concepts and their
computer model called Latent Semantic together, pushing some further apart, and interrelations become.
Analysis (LSA) that was developed by Tom otherwise altering the strengths and pat- As explained earlier, it was to be
Landauer and his colleagues.31 The core terns of connections among words and expected that LSA’s full response to any
mechanism underlying the LSA model is contexts. Through this dynamic, reading new text would spread beyond the content
“associative learning.” When a text is input causes the connections that collectively of the text itself. The unexpected discovery
into the LSA model, the computer builds capture LSA’s knowledge of words to grow, was that this dynamic would impact the
an association between each individual shrink, and shift continuously, continually, model’s understanding of individual
word of the text and the total set of words— and always in relation to one another. words. Given that words are really nothing
more than labels for interrelated bundles are to construct, interpret, and reflect on models such as LSA statistically emulate.
of knowledge, perhaps this should not have the meaning of the text. A core implication The second mode of reasoning is con-
been surprising. of the LSA model is that students’ knowl- scious and rule-based. Such logical, ana-
In the study that modeled a seventh- edge of words grows less through any pro- lytic thought also warrants instructional
grader, the researchers were able to gauge cess of inferring their meanings, one by attention in our schools, as it is our means
LSA’s overall vocabulary growth by compu- one, based on the sentences in which they of deliberately evaluating and vetting our
tationally examining changes in the repre- arise, than as a product of learning more thoughts for bias, happenstance, and
sentation of every word to which it had ever generally about the contexts in which they inconsistencies. However, no reasoning
been exposed. Yet here is a mull-worthy arise and of understanding the concepts strategy, however well-structured, can rival
correlate: unavoidably, the bundles of con- and relationships to which they refer. the speed, power, or clarity of knowledge-
cepts and relations that emerged or were driven understanding;43 nor can it com-
strengthened through LSA’s reading expe- pensate for an absence of sufficient
rience included many that pertained to information.
words that the model had never seen There may one day be modes and meth-
before. An analogous effect might explain ods of information delivery that are as
why researchers have found time and again efficient and powerful as text, but for now
that the strength of students’ vocabulary there is no contest. To grow, our students
predicts the likelihood that they will learn must read lots. More specifically, they must
new words from context,34 the probability read lots of “complex” texts—texts that
that they will correctly infer a new word’s offer them new language, new knowledge,
meaning from context, 35 and both the and new modes of thought. Beyond the
amount and nature of their reasoning basics, as E. D. Hirsch, Jr., the founder of
when they are asked to explain how they Core Knowledge, has so forcefully argued,
do so.36 Even when students are told the Knowledge, Cognitive the reading deficit is integrally tied to a
meaning of a new word, their prior vocabu- knowledge deficit.44
Strategies, and Inferences
lary strength predicts the likelihood that
they will retain it.37 (These are known as If reading results in so rich a network of Back to the Classroom:
“Matthew effects,” referring to the notion knowledge through nothing more than
A Strategy for Developing
that the rich get richer and the poor get overlaps and contrasts in associations,
then shouldn’t students learn far more Advanced Reading
poorer.) As the reader’s linguistic and con-
ceptual knowledge grows in richness and efficiently, given active, incisive inference The capacity to understand and learn from
complexity, it will increasingly support the and comprehension strategies? Research any text depends on approaching it with
meanings of many new words and the rep- indicates that such strategies can be taught the language, knowledge, and modes of
resentation of many new spheres of and suggests that doing so may improve thought, as well as the reading skill, that it
knowledge. comprehension.38 However, inference and presumes. It would seem, then, that when
Cognitive psychologists broadly agree comprehension strategies seem to do little assigning materials from which students
that the meaning of any word consists of to compensate for weak domain knowl- are to learn, there are basically but two
bundles of features and associations that edge.39 Instead, research repeatedly shows choices. Either the materials must be suf-
are the cumulative product of the reader’s prior domain knowledge to be a far stron- ficiently accessible in language and con-
experience with both the word in context ger predictor of students’ ability to compre- cept for the students to read and
and the concepts to which it refers. What is hend or to learn from advanced texts.40 Of understand on their own, or the students
unique about the LSA model is its demon- course, students’ comprehension and must be given help as they read. Some stu-
stration that this structure and dynamic learning is also influenced by their reading dents receive such help in their homes, but
can so richly and powerfully evolve skills (such as decoding and fluency). But many do not and, as I have argued else-
through accrued experience with the vari- even the advantage of strong reading skills where, this is likely the major factor under-
ous contexts in which words do and do not turns out to be greatest for students with lying the achievement gap.45 In any case,
occur—that is, sheerly through reading. strong domain knowledge.41 because opportunities for one-on-one
Another way to state the larger point Again, such findings should not be sur- reading assistance are limited in the typical
here is that words are not just words. They prising. Cognitive research affirms that school setting, educators often feel that
are the nexus—the interface—between there are two modes of reasoning.42 The their only alternative is to restrict assign-
communication and thought. When we first, most common mode is knowledge- ments to materials that are within their
read, it is through words that we build, based. This sort of reasoning is rapid, students’ independent reach. There follows
refine, and modify our knowledge. What extensive, and automatic. This is the sort of the popularity of so-called high-low texts,
makes vocabulary valuable and important reasoning that ensures, for example, that intended to offer high interest or informa-
is not the words themselves so much as the we properly understand the meaning of fan tion alongside low demands on vocabulary
understandings they afford. The reason we depending on whether the text is about a and reading skill.
need to know the meanings of words is that soccer fan, a ceiling fan, or a peacock’s fan. It was in this spirit, through earnest
they point to the knowledge from which we This is the sort of reasoning that computer efforts to ensure full curricular access to all,
that the complexity of schoolbooks came egories are low frequency, both tend to be tional texts about Mars that I picked off the
to be relaxed. Sadly, as this strategy pulled excluded by readability formulas that are Internet affirms that, without exception,
vortically upon itself, it did not solve the based on large word-frequency counts. Yet, and whether the intended audience was
access problem but, instead, made it the “information” in a text is shown to young children or scientists, the nouns
worse. In terms of literacy growth, making depend disproportionately on words in Mars and planet are among the five most
the textbooks easier is an approach that this second category.48 Because of this, frequent in each. The balance of the domi-
ultimately denies students the very lan- when words in this second category are nant nouns in each text depends on the
guage, information, and modes of thought removed or substituted so as to “simplify” subtopic in focus—variously, its moons, its
they need most in order to move up and on. the text, much of the information in the text geography, our efforts at its exploration,
Is there any escape from this dilemma? is removed along with them. etc.
The answer is yes, there is, and it follows With this in mind, and combined with
directly from Zipf’s law. Again, according what else we know about literacy growth,
to Zipf’s law, every coherent text is made Zipf ’s law prescribes a self-supporting
up of a few words that recur again and strategy for developing the sorts of knowl-
again, and many words that occur just once edge structures that complex texts require.
or only a few times. And, again, Zipf’s law A benefit of a com- That is, we know that even for young49 and
is shown to hold for virtually every natural delayed50 readers, any new word encoun-
language domain, regardless of its size, mon core curriculum tered (and identified correctly) in print
topic, modality, or sophistication. would be an overhaul becomes a sight word with little more than
Let us first consider the implications of a single encounter, provided its meaning is
Zipf’s law with respect to word-frequency of the texts we give known. We know that the more that stu-
counts such as the one undertaken for The
American Heritage School Dictionary.46
students to read, and dents already know about the topic of a
text, the greater their understanding and
Recall that the goal of such large frequency the kind of learning learning will be as they read.51 We know
counts is to capture as broad and represen- that vocabulary strength predicts the speed
tative a picture of the language as possible. and thought we and security with which students learn the
For this reason, the collective texts from expect their read- meanings of unfamiliar words, whether
which they are constructed are chosen to through reading52 or direct instruction.53
represent as broad and representative a ing to support. The challenge, then, lies in organizing
range of topics and genres as possible our reading regimens in every subject and
while avoiding repetition of any particular every class such that each text bootstraps
topic or text. A consequence of this text- the language and knowledge that will be
sampling strategy is that the low-frequency needed for the next. Zipf’s law tells us that
words within these word counts fall into A more specific statement of Zipf’s law this can be done by carefully sequencing
two different categories. In the first cate- is this: which words appear frequently and and scaffolding students’ reading materials
gory are words that are rare because they infrequently in any given text depends on within any given topic. Ideally, such scaf-
are complex, technical, obsolete, or eso- what the text is about. So, in a text about folding would begin on the very first day of
teric (e.g., caprifoliaceous, omphaloskepsis, cooking, the word habitat would be infre- school, with prekindergarten and kinder-
and mumpsimus). In the second category, quent, but in a text about ecology, it would garten teachers reading aloud stories and
however, are words that are rare because not. The problem with large word-fre- nonfiction texts that build on each others’
their meanings are relatively specific and quency counts—and, by extension, with vocabulary and ideas.
are often tied to specific contexts, topics, the readability formulas that are based on Teachers in any grade (and parents)
and genres. 47 For example, a high-fre- them—is that, by design, the texts from would do well to follow this relatively
quency word such as home may be which they are generated are collectively straightforward strategy:
expected in texts of many different types topic-neutral. Similarly, if your students 1. Select a topic about which your stu-
and topics of which only a small subset were to read a little of this and a little of dents need to learn. (There will be plenty
would accept such low-frequency syn- that, without rereading anything or dwell- of time for other topics once you’ve started
onyms as condominium, wigwam, hospice, ing on any topic, then the likelihood of this process.) If the students are below
habitat, birthplace, burrow, or warren. The their encountering any given information- grade level, begin with shorter, simpler
same holds for the high-frequency word bearing word would be quite small. texts.
strong versus the more specific alternatives In contrast, if your students read several 2. Teach the key words and concepts
valid, virile, tensile, pungent, dominant, texts on a single topic, they would encoun- directly, engaging students in using and
vibrant, durable, lethal, tyrannical, and ter a number of domain-specific, informa- discussing them to be sure they are well
undiluted. More generally, the greater the tion-bearing words. In such texts, the anchored.
information that a word carries, the fewer words that rise to the top are those most 3. As the students learn the core vocab-
the topics and contexts in which it will useful for describing the concepts and ulary, basic concepts, and overarching
arise. relationships that are central to that topic. schemata of the domain, they will become
Because words in both of these two cat- For example, a quick sampling of informa- ready to explore its subtopics, reading (or
having read aloud to them) as many texts ity for our children’s religious education From my perspective, a great benefit of
as needed or appropriate on each subtopic has been reassigned from the school to a common core curriculum is that it would
in turn. families and churches. However, the edu- drive a thorough overhaul of the texts we
Gradually and seamlessly, students will cational and literacy levels required by the give students to read, and the kinds of
find themselves ready for texts of increas- other dimensions of life, liberty, and the learning and thought we expect their read-
ingly greater depth and complexity. Better pursuit of happiness have exploded. In our ing to support. Amid the relatively few SAT
yet, as their expertise on, say, Mars, times, written language has become the headlines this fall, the one written by the
expands, they will find themselves in a far major medium not just for education but College Board, which administers the SAT,
better position to read about Venus, Jupiter, for information in every aspect of life. Fur- stood out: “2010 College-Bound Seniors
earth sciences, space exploration, and on ther, as priest, professor, and historian Results Underscore Importance of Aca-
and on. Walter Ong has pointed out, the ubiquity demic Rigor.”55 As the College Board went
Can advanced texts really be made of audio support hardly matters: written on to explain, “students in the class of 2010
accessible to less proficient readers in this language is the underlying medium for who reported completing a core curricu-
way? Yes. As a concrete example, no text on educated communication regardless of lum—defined as four or more years of
dinosaurs would get through a readability modality.54 English, three or more years of mathemat-
formula for second-graders. However, hav- The arguments for a common core cur- ics, three or more years of natural science,
ing built up their vocabulary and domain riculum are partly that it would be readily and three or more years of social science
knowledge, many second-graders are able accessible to every teacher and school, and history—scored, on average, 151
to read and understand remarkably partly that it would provide continuity and points higher on the SAT than those who
sophisticated texts about dinosaurs with coherence for the millions of students who did not complete a core curriculum.” We’ve
great satisfaction. Similarly, I have rarely frequently change schools (an issue E. D. known at least since Socrates that chal-
met a Boston cabby—no matter how much Hirsch, Jr., explores beginning on page 55 lenging, well-sequenced coursework leads
he decried reading—who wasn’t quick to of this volume), and partly that a vocabu- to more learning. It is time for us, as a
pick up and read a news article about the lary-building curriculum is too big and too nation, to act on that knowledge and give
Red Sox. Knowledge truly is the most pow- hard a job for any teacher or school to put all students the common core curriculum
erful determinant of reading comprehen- together alone. Creating each unit, for each they need to be prepared for advanced
sion. The greatest benefits of literacy grow grade K–12, will depend on judicious selec- reading and learning. 
through reading deeply in multiple tion not just of topics but of the reading
domains and about multiple topics. We materials comprising each unit. From the Endnotes
1. C. Gewertz, “Few Changes on SAT Posted by Class of
can and must do a better job of leading— billions of pages of print that are available, 2010,” Education Week, September 22, 2010.
and enabling—our students to do so. If finding those that are both well written and 2. E. Gorski, “Scores on SAT College Entrance Test Hold
education is the key to opportunity, then appropriate will take work. The task of Steady,” Associated Press, September 13, 2010.
3. S. Rimer, “Class of 2008 Matches ’07 on the SAT,” New
their options, in school and beyond, building a good core curriculum will York Times, August 26, 2008.
depend on it. require intense effort by teams of educa- 4. See, for example, W. Wirtz and H. Howe II, On Further
tors and scholars, including the best minds Examination: Report of the Advisory Panel on the Scholastic
Aptitude Test Score Decline (New York: College Entrance
The Role of a Common and sensibilities available. Examination Board, 1977); T. Lewin, “Students’ Paths to
Small Colleges Can Bypass SAT,” New York Times, August
Core Curriculum In creating a common core curriculum, 31, 2006; J. M. Rothstein, “College Performance Predictions
the goal is neither to dictate nor to limit and the SAT,” Journal of Econometrics 121, no. 1–2 (2004),
There are some who object reflexively to 297–317; and L. C. Stedman, “Respecting the Evidence: The
what all students should be able to know Achievement Crisis Remains Real,” Education Policy Analysis
the notion of a common core curriculum. Archives 4, no. 7 (1996), 1–31.
and do. As detailed within the Winter
Yet, if you think about it, the very concept 5. A. Sum, I. Kirsch, and R. Taggart, The Twin Challenges of
2010–2011 issue of American Educator, the Mediocrity and Inequality: Literacy in the U.S. from an
of publicly supported schooling is predi-
core curriculum might fill only two-thirds International Perspective (Princeton, NJ: Educational Testing
cated on the belief that there is a certain Service, 2002).
of students’ instructional time. Perhaps,
body of knowledge and abilities that is 6. S. Provasnik, P. Gonzales, and D. Miller, U.S. Performance
too, the units would be populated with across International Assessments of Student Achievement:
needed by every citizen for a safe, respon- Special Supplement to the Condition of Education 2009
alternate sets of readings. After all, as (Washington, DC: National Center for Education Statistics,
sible, and productive life.
reviewed in this article, the greatest benefit 2009).
Under the Massachusetts School Law of 7. B. D. Rampey, G. S. Dion, and P. L. Donahue, NAEP 2008
of a well-structured program of reading
1642, every town was made responsible for Trends in Academic Progress (Washington, DC: National
and learning is that it prepares the student Center for Education Statistics, 2009).
teaching every child “to read perfectly the
to read other materials with competence 8. M. Seastrom, L. Hoffman, C. Chapman, and R. Stillwell,
English tongue,” and to understand the The Averaged Freshman Graduation Rate for Public High
and thoughtful comprehension. If educa- Schools from the Common Core of Data: School Years
capital laws of the commonwealth and the 2001–02 and 2002–03 (Washington, DC: National Center
tion is to nurture interest and support rel-
principles of religion, as well as for ensur- for Education Statistics, 2005).
evance, it must also leave room for some 9. ACT, Reading between the Lines: What the ACT Reveals
ing every child was provided an appren-
choice. The purpose of a core curriculum about College Readiness in Reading (Iowa City, IA: ACT,
ticeship in “some lawful calling, labour, or 2006).
is to build the foundations that will put
employment.” In effect, these requirements 10. W. Wirtz and H. Howe II, On Further Examination: Report
students in good stead to choose and pur- of the Advisory Panel on the Scholastic Aptitude Test Score
constituted the colony’s common core Decline (New York: College Entrance Examination Board,
sue what they wish to learn and do—which, 1977); and W. W. Turnbull, Student Change, Program
curriculum.
of course, depends integrally on their being Change: Why the SAT Scores Kept Falling (New York:
In the centuries since then, responsibil- College Entrance Examination Board, 1985).
able to learn and do it.
11. W. Wirtz and H. Howe II, On Further Examination: Report Induction, and Representation of Knowledge,” Psychological Technology, vol. 2, ed. M. C. McKenna, L. D. Labbo, R. D.
of the Advisory Panel on the Scholastic Aptitude Test Score Review 104, no. 2 (1997), 211–240. Kieffer, and D. Reinking (Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum
Decline (New York: College Entrance Examination Board, 32. A. E. Cunningham and K. E. Stanovich, “Early Reading Associates, 2006), 109–128; and M. J. Adams, “The Limits
1977). Acquisition and Its Relation to Reading Experience and of the Self-Teaching Hypothesis,” in Educating the Other
12. A. E. Beaton, T. L. Hilton, and W. B. Schrader, Changes in Ability 10 Years Later,” Developmental Psychology 33, no. 6 America: Top Experts Tackle Poverty, Literacy, and
the Verbal Abilities of High School Seniors, College Entrants, (1997), 934–945; and H. L. Gradman and E. Hanania, Achievement in Our Schools, ed. S. B. Neuman (Baltimore:
and SAT Candidates between 1960 and 1972 (New York: “Language Learning Background Factors and ESL Paul H. Brookes, 2008), 277–300.
College Entrance Examination Board, 1977). Proficiency,” Modern Language Journal 75, no. 1 (1991), 46. J. B. Carroll, P. Davies, and B. Richman, The American
13. L. C. Stedman, “The Condition of Education: Why 39–51. Heritage Word Frequency Book (Boston: Houghton Mifflin,
School Reformers Are on the Right Track,” Phi Delta Kappan 33. W. E. Nagy, R. C. Anderson, and P. A. Herman, “Learning 1971).
75, no. 3 (1993), 215–225. Word Meanings from Context during Normal Reading,” 47. M. Stubbs, “Language Development, Lexical
14. W. W. Turnbull, Student Change, Program Change: Why American Educational Research Journal 24, no. 2 (1987), Competence and Nuclear Vocabulary,” in Educational
the SAT Scores Kept Falling (New York: College Entrance 237–270. Linguistics, ed. M. Stubbs (Oxford: Blackwell, 1986), 98–115.
Examination Board, 1985). 34. M. Daneman and I. Green, “Individual Differences in 48. P. J. Finn, “Word Frequency, Information Theory, and
15. J. S. Chall, S. S. Conard, and S. H. Harris, An Analysis of Comprehending and Producing Words in Context,” Journal Cloze Performance: A Transfer Feature Theory of Processing
Textbooks in Relation to Declining SAT Scores (New York: of Memory and Language 25, no. 1 (1986), 1–18; P. A. in Reading,” Reading Research Quarterly 13, no. 4
College Entrance Examination Board, 1977). Herman, R. C. Anderson, P. D. Pearson, and W. E. Nagy, (1977-1978), 508–537.
“Incidental Acquisition of Word Meaning from Expositions 49. A. E. Cunningham, “Accounting for Children’s
16. D. P. Hayes, L. T. Wolfer, and M. F. Wolfe, “Schoolbook with Varied Text Features,” Reading Research Quarterly 22,
Simplification and Its Relation to the Decline in SAT-Verbal Orthographic Learning while Reading Text: Do Children
no. 3 (1987), 263–284; J. L. Shefelbine, “Student Factors Self-Teach?” Journal of Experimental Child Psychology 95,
Scores,” American Educational Research Journal 33, no. 2 Related to Variability in Learning Word Meanings from
(1996), 489–508. no. 1 (2006), 56–77.
Context,” Journal of Reading Behavior 22, no. 1 (1990),
17. D. P. Hayes, L. T. Wolfer, and M. F. Wolfe, “Schoolbook 71–97; and R. J. Sternberg and Janet S. Powell, “Compre- 50. D. L. Share and C. Shalev, “Self-Teaching in Normal and
Simplification and Its Relation to the Decline in SAT-Verbal hending Verbal Comprehension,” American Psychologist 38, Disabled Readers,” Reading and Writing: An Interdisciplinary
Scores,” American Educational Research Journal 33, no. 2 no. 8 (1983), 878–893. Journal 17 (2004), 769–800.
(1996), 497. 35. L. Morrison, “Talking about Words: A Study of French as 51. T. O’Reilly and D. S. McNamara, “The Impact of Science
18. D. P. Hayes, L. T. Wolfer, and M. F. Wolfe, “Schoolbook a Second Language Learners’ Lexical Inferencing Knowledge, Reading Skill, and Reading Strategy Knowledge
Simplification and Its Relation to the Decline in SAT-Verbal Procedures,” Canadian Modern Language Review 53, no. 1 on More Traditional ‘High-Stakes’ Measures of High School
Scores,” American Educational Research Journal 33, no. 2 (1996), 41–75; and H. Nassaji, “The Relationship between Students’ Science Achievement,” American Educational
(1996), 489–508. Depth of Vocabulary Knowledge and L2 Learners’ Lexical Research Journal 44, no. 1 (2007), 161–196.
Inferencing Strategy Use and Success,” Canadian Modern 52. M. Daneman and I. Green, “Individual Differences in
19. D. P. Hayes, “The Growing Inaccessibility of Science,” Language Review 61, no. 1 (2004), 107–134.
Nature 356, no. 6372 (1992), 739–740. Comprehending and Producing Words in Context,” Journal
36. M. G. Calvo, A. Estevez, and M. G. Dowens, “Time of Memory and Language 25, no. 1 (1986), 1–18; P. A.
20. D. Biber, “Are There Linguistic Consequences of Literacy? Course of Elaborative Inferences in Reading as a Function of Herman, R. C. Anderson, P. D. Pearson, and W. E. Nagy,
Comparing the Potentials of Language Use in Speech and Prior Vocabulary Knowledge,” Learning and Instruction 13, “Incidental Acquisition of Word Meaning from Expositions
Writing,” in The Cambridge Handbook of Literacy, ed. D. R. no. 6 (2003), 611–631; and H. Nassaji, “The Relationship with Varied Text Features,” Reading Research Quarterly 22,
Olson and N. Torrance (Cambridge: Cambridge University between Depth of Vocabulary Knowledge and L2 Learners’ no. 3 (1987), 263–284; J. L. Shefelbine, “Student Factors
Press, 2009), 75–91. Lexical Inferencing Strategy Use and Success,” Canadian Related to Variability in Learning Word Meanings from
21. D. P. Hayes and M. G. Ahrens, “Vocabulary Simplification Modern Language Review 61, no. 1 (2004), 107–134. Context,” Journal of Reading Behavior 22, no. 1 (1990),
for Children: A Special Case of ‘Motherese’?” Journal of 71–97; and R. J. Sternberg and Janet S. Powell, “Compre-
37. A. Biemiller and C. Boote, “An Effective Method for hending Verbal Comprehension,” American Psychologist 38,
Child Language 15, no. 2 (1988), 395–410. Building Meaning Vocabulary in Primary Grades,” Journal of no. 8 (1983), 878–893.
22. E. A. Betts, Foundations of Reading Instruction (New Educational Psychology 98, no. 1 (2006), 44–62; J. R.
York: American Book Company, 1946); R. P. Carver, Jenkins, M. L. Stein, and K. Wysocki, “Learning Vocabulary 53. A. Biemiller and C. Boote, “An Effective Method for
“Percentage of Unknown Vocabulary Words in Text as a through Reading,” American Educational Research Journal Building Meaning Vocabulary in Primary Grades,” Journal of
Function of the Relative Difficulty of the Text: Implications for 21, no. 4 (1984), 767–787; and C. Robbins and L. C. Ehri, Educational Psychology 98, no. 1 (2006), 44–62; J. R.
Instruction,” Journal of Reading Behavior 26, no. 4 (1994), “Reading Storybooks to Kindergartners Helps Them Learn Jenkins, M. L. Stein, and K. Wysocki, “Learning Vocabulary
413–437; M. H. Hsueh-chao and P. Nation, “Unknown New Vocabulary Words,” Journal of Educational Psychology through Reading,” American Educational Research Journal
Vocabulary Density and Reading Comprehension,” Reading 86, no. 1 (1994), 54–64. 21, no. 4 (1984), 767–787; C. A. Perfetti, E. W. Wlotko, and
in a Foreign Language 13, no. 1 (2000), 403–430; and B. L. A. Hart, “Word Learning and Individual Differences in
38. National Reading Panel, Teaching Children to Read: An Word Learning Reflected in Event-Related Potentials,”
Laufer, “What Percentage of Text-Lexis Is Essential for Evidence-Based Assessment of the Scientific Research
Comprehension?” in Special Language: From Humans Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and
Literature on Reading and Its Implications for Reading Cognition 31, no. 6 (2005), 1281–1292; and C. Robbins and
Thinking to Thinking Machines, ed. C. Lauren and M. Instruction; Reports of the Subgroups (Washington, DC:
Nordman (Clevedon, UK: Multilingual Matters, 1988), L. C. Ehri, “Reading Storybooks to Kindergartners Helps
National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, Them Learn New Vocabulary Words,” Journal of Educational
316–323. 2000). Psychology 86, no. 1 (1994), 54–64.
23. G. K. Zipf, The Psycho-Biology of Language (Boston: 39. T. O’Reilly and D. S. McNamara, “The Impact of Science
Houghton Mifflin, 1935). 54. W. J. Ong, Orality and Literacy: The Technologizing of
Knowledge, Reading Skill, and Reading Strategy Knowledge the Word, 2nd ed. (New York: Routledge, 2002).
24. The American Heritage School Dictionary (Boston: on More Traditional ‘High-Stakes’ Measures of High School
Houghton Mifflin, 1977). Students’ Science Achievement,” American Educational 55. College Board, “2010 College-Bound Seniors Results
Research Journal 44, no. 1 (2007), 161–196. Underscore Importance of Academic Rigor,” press release,
25. J. B. Carroll, P. Davies, and B. Richman, The American September 13, 2010, www.collegeboard.com/press/
Heritage Word Frequency Book (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 40. F. Dochy, M. Segers, and M. M. Buehl, “The Relation releases/213182.html.
1971). between Assessment Practices and Outcomes of Studies:
26. W. E. Nagy and R. C. Anderson, “How Many Words Are The Case of Research on Prior Knowledge,” Review of
There in Printed School English?” Reading Research Educational Research 69, no. 2 (1999), 145–186; and A. M.
Quarterly 19, no. 3 (1984), 304–330. Shapiro, “How Including Prior Knowledge as a Subject
Variable May Change Outcomes of Learning Research,”
27. S. A. Stahl and M. M. Fairbanks, “The Effects of American Educational Research Journal 41, no. 1 (2004),
Vocabulary Instruction: A Model-Based Meta-Analysis,” 159–189.
Review of Educational Research 56, no. 1 (1986), 72–110.
41. T. O’Reilly and D. S. McNamara, “The Impact of Science
28. W. E. Nagy, P. A. Herman, and R. C. Anderson, “Learning Knowledge, Reading Skill, and Reading Strategy Knowledge
Words from Context,” Reading Research Quarterly 20, no. 2 on More Traditional ‘High-Stakes’ Measures of High School
(1985), 233–253. Students’ Science Achievement,” American Educational
29. W. E. Nagy, R. C. Anderson, and P. A. Herman, “Learning Research Journal 44, no. 1 (2007), 161–196.
Word Meanings from Context during Normal Reading,” 42. See S. A. Sloman, “The Empirical Case for Two Systems
American Educational Research Journal 24, no. 2 (1987), of Reasoning,” Psychological Bulletin 119, no. 1 (1996),
237–270. 3–22; and S. A. Sloman, Causal Models: How People Think
30. R. C. Anderson, P. T. Wilson, and L. G. Fielding, “Growth about the World and Its Alternatives (Oxford: Oxford
in Reading and How Children Spend Their Time Outside of University Press, 2005).
School,” Reading Research Quarterly 23, no. 3 (1988), 43. K. A. Ericsson, N. Charness, R. R. Hoffman, and P. J.
285–303; and W. E. Nagy, R. C. Anderson, and P. A. Herman, Feltovich (eds.), The Cambridge Handbook of Expertise and
“Learning Word Meanings from Context during Normal Expert Performance (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
Reading,” American Educational Research Journal 24, no. 2 2006).
(1987), 237–270.
44. E. D. Hirsch, Jr., The Knowledge Deficit: Closing the
31. T. K. Landauer, “Learning and Representing Verbal Shocking Education Gap for American Children (Boston:
Meaning: The Latent Semantic Analysis Theory,” Current Houghton Mifflin, 2006).
Directions in Psychological Science 7, no. 5 (1998), 161–164;
and T. K. Landauer and S. T. Dumais, “A Solution to Plato’s 45. M. J. Adams, “The Promise of Automatic Speech
Problem: The Latent Semantic Analysis Theory of Acquisition, Recognition for Fostering Literacy Growth in Children and
Adults,” in International Handbook of Literacy and
555 New Jersey Ave., NW | Washington, D.C. 20001
Tel: 202.879.4401 | shankerinstitute.org

Literacy Ladders 2015

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

Literacy Ladders 2015

Uploaded by

Document Information

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

Literacy Ladders 2015

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

This volume is a joint project of the Albert Shanker Institute (ASI), American Federation of

The Albert Shanker Institute is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization estab-

The American Federation of Teachers is a union of professionals that cham-

The Core Knowledge Foundation is an independent, nonprofit, nonpartisan

11 The Magic of Words

18 Dual Language Learners

22 Why Reading to Children Is Important

42 How Knowledge Helps

52 Oral Comprehension Sets the

59 Advancing our Students’ Language and Literacy

By Susan B. Neuman and ences across socioeconomic lines, differ-

Myth 5: Just Follow the Vocabulary

Claude Goldenberg is a professor of education at

By Susan L. Hall and

Susan L. Hall is the founder and president of 95

Overview of the Story—

I have never met you, but I hear that

Practical Tips about

Typically, a literate British person

By Daniel T. Willingham become. We’ll begin by

vocabularies similar to median second-

By Marilyn Jager Adams

You might also like