In our kick-off episode for season six, host Susan Lambert is joined by podcast alum Margaret Goldberg, the co-founder of the Right to Read Project. They discuss the new, animated Science of Reading series Brain Builders, and how this free tool can be shared directly with students and with their caregivers. Importantly, Margaret also elevates the need to focus on the comprehension strand of the Science of Reading.
Show Notes:
Right to Read Project
Brain Builders animated videos
Brain Builders: VIP launch party
Knowledge at the Center of English Language Arts Instruction by Gina Cerveti and Freddy Heibert
Quotes:
“We looked at Scarborough's Rope. If we're really focused just on word recognition, we're not going to get all of our kids to where they need and deserve to be."
— Margaret Goldberg
“It's never too late to learn how to read. We can get you there.”
— Margaret Goldberg
In our kick-off episode for season six, host Susan Lambert is joined by podcast alum Margaret Goldberg, the co-founder of the Right to Read Project. They discuss the new, animated Science of Reading series Brain Builders, and how this free tool can be shared directly with students and with their caregivers. Importantly, Margaret also elevates the need to focus on the comprehension strand of the Science of Reading.
Show Notes:
Right to Read Project
Brain Builders animated videos
Brain Builders: VIP launch party
Knowledge at the Center of English Language Arts Instruction by Gina Cerveti and Freddy Heibert
Quotes:
“We looked at Scarborough's Rope. If we're really focused just on word recognition, we're not going to get all of our kids to where they need and deserve to be."
— Margaret Goldberg
“It's never too late to learn how to read. We can get you there.”
— Margaret Goldberg
This is Susan Lambert and welcome to Season 6 of Science of Reading: The Podcast. In the nearly three years since we launched this show, attention on early literacy instruction has skyrocketed.
Newscaster 1:The state is launching a new initiative to provide coaching for teachers as they apply new methods for reading...
Newscaster 2:Now, as mayor, he's reshaping New York City's entire approach to reading...
Newscaster 3:Texas legislators came up with the idea of developing a program that would help improve reading outcomes...
Newscaster 4:Now the rollout here will help North Carolina teachers get the support they need to put the Science of Reading technique into practice.
Susan Lambert:There's a real transformation happening across the country, placing a greater emphasis on the evidence-based practices known as Science of Reading. Our past seasons have focused on bringing you that evidence directly from researchers and practitioners. And on this season of the podcast, we're going to get into the nitty gritty of how schools, districts, and states can most effectively begin and sustain that transition to Science of Reading. Before we get into that nitty gritty, we want to start with this.
Cartoony voice:Minh's Brain Builder Diary presents Reading! Why, though?
Susan Lambert:That sound from the first episode of Brain Builders, a new animated series from Amplify and the Right to Read Project aimed at teaching kids about the Science of Reading.
Cartoony voice:I like gym class and history and music, but when it comes to reading, well, I just really start to get a headache. Ooh, that sounds no fun.
Susan Lambert:And we're starting there because as much as we're discussing the ins and outs of policy decisions and best practices at the school or district level, ultimately the reason we're doing all this is to help kids become confident and capable readers. So throughout this coming sixth season, as I speak with researchers, administrators, state policy makers , and more brilliant guests, I'm going to be sure to ask them about how their work impacts kids. And to kick off this season, I spoke with Margaret Goldberg, co-creator of this new Brain Builders series. Well, hi Margaret. Thank you for joining us again. This is the second time on the podcast for you. We appreciate it .
Margaret Goldberg:It's good to see you again.
Susan Lambert:Happy start of the school year.
Margaret Goldberg:Yes, it is definitely the start of the school year. <laugh> That requires a long pause, but definitely some excitement.
Susan Lambert:Yeah, I think , everybody's going to have to take a long pause at the start of t his school year, too. So for our listeners, I'm recording in the Eastern Standard Time where it's 9:00 PM. Margaret you're in California, where it's what, six o'clock?
Margaret Goldberg:Yep . Just got home from work. It's the first week of school with teachers. We're doing professional development this week and kids come next week.
Susan Lambert:How exciting!
Margaret Goldberg:[Exhausted sigh] Yes, it is.
Susan Lambert:<laugh> Well, we're gonna do a couple things today. So the reason that we really wanted you to be on this episode, kicking off our very brand-new season here at Science of Reading: The Podcast, is we really wanna put students and bring students to the center of all the work that we're doing. So we're going to take a few episodes to talk about things like state policy and district policy, but I really wanted us to start with the students and just really get grounded in a reminder of the work that we're doing and why we're doing it. And so to start that, I thought we could talk a little bit about the Brain Builders, which by the time this podcast episode airs, we will have already held the launch event for the Brain Builders. so let's just talk a little bit about them. Thirteen-episode series that was created to teach kids the most efficient way to learn, to read and w ere essentially then putting that Science of Reading directly into the h ands of kids. These videos were developed with a really unique partnership between the Right to Read Project, nonprofit, and Amplify, a for-profit. And I remember that very first conversation where I said, "Hey Margaret, I've got this idea. I'd like to do something for kids." Do you remember that conversation?
Margaret Goldberg:Yes I do. And keep going, go ahead. You tell it and then I'll tell my version. <laugh>
Susan Lambert:No, I was just gonna ask you: what do you remember that about that conversation? and in hindsight, like, was this a really good idea for us to do this? < Laugh>
Margaret Goldberg:Yes, because when you were telling me the idea of like, I wanna do these short videos with kid-friendly explanations about what's going on in their brain and how learning to read develops, and all of those things was like, "I've been thinking the exact same thing!" <Laugh> So it felt like we both had a similar idea. And though you had thought it through way more than I had gotten the opportunity to do so, but it just felt like we were both noticing that there was a really important adult conversation that was happening, but there were very limited tools for kids to be able to one get explanations for the instruction that teachers were delivering or that parents were prompting them to do as they were reading. And then, too, like really wanting the adults to be able to have a third point to talk with kids about, or to talk with each other about. So they're kind of , PD for adults also at the same time.
Susan Lambert:Yeah. And I think we also talked about, you know, there's a use case for teachers, for sure, to do some professional development with teachers, but also for parents too, to better understand what in the world is going on with this Science of Reading and, and what seems like a very in-your-face sort of conversation right now about learning to read.
Margaret Goldberg:Yeah. And it's, I feel like part of it is that some parents really wanna get more information about what's happening is they're hearing about this discussion and, and other cases, there are actually parents who are like, "I'm begging my child to sound out words . I'm trying to convince them that I'm not evil for doing this!" and to have a third point and be able to say, "This is why I'm prompting you in this way," could be really helpful for them.
Susan Lambert:For sure. So it ended up being...sort of the way this whole thing unfolded is you all at the Right to Read Project, really outlined the scope and sequence of these 13 episodes. What was it like to do that? And , sort of, how did you come to the place of these 13 topics?
Margaret Goldberg:What was funny about the experience was it actually came relatively easily. Like we definitely had some deep discussion and a lot of back-and-forth about it, but the alignment that we had in how you would want to explain this to kids was apparent from the beginning. I think part of what we wanted to focus on was that reading is joyful. It's amazing. It's powerful. It's useful. Like we wanted to launch with the why behind learning to read and write.
Cartoony voice:One day I wanna travel the whole world. I wanna see every country there is to see. I can't go to any of the places I wanna go yet. I'm just a kid too. But I can read about them.
Margaret Goldberg:And then we wanted to get into some really kid-friendly explanations for things that a lot of adults don't know about, like the history of the written language and spelling in English and like some attention to the morphology and how the brain learns how to read. But then we were also thinking about the kinds of conversations that we've had with kids that have been tricky, like explaining—there's a really cute episode, that's "every word wants to be a sight word when it grows up."
Cartoony voice:A sight word is one that your brain knows so well, it can think of what the word means in a flash. That sounds great. So why didn't my aunt use more of these sight words when she wrote this? But that's the thing! Any word can become a sight word. It just takes time.
Susan Lambert:I love that.
Margaret Goldberg:<laugh> Like trying to explain to kids what we're trying to do with developing automaticity, talking to them about fluency and how it comes with hard work, and it makes comprehension possible for them, talking to them about vocabulary and background knowledge. And then there was one that I was so excited when I finally got to see the video, 'cause I didn't know how it was gonna unfold, but just the concept of self monitoring. And like that reading is thinking. And if you don't understand what you're reading, then you're not actually reading.
Cartoony voice:Sometimes when we're excited by something we read or when we're not excited by something we read, we're tempted to read it really fast. But when we do, we might miss something important. So sometimes I make sure to stop to ask myself whether I really understood what I just read and that can clear things up. I might, because...
Margaret Goldberg:There have been so many times I've wanted to have that conversation with kids and this is gonna make it easier. I'm really looking forward to it. But actually Susan, will you talk about the 13th episode? Because we had planned for a series of 12 that had more of like an elementary minded child at the center of it. And then we added the 13th episode for struggling readers and it was your inspiration.
Susan Lambert:Yeah. I mean we have so many struggling readers in middle and and even high school. And how cool is it to bring an episode to them to say, "You know what, it's not your fault that you don't know how to read. You just didn't get good instruction. And given good instruction and extra practice and time you can actually make that happen.
Cartoony voice:Because learning to read can be hard work. Sometimes people don't recognize that. Eventually reading becomes fun, I think, but when you're just starting out, it can be really hard.
Susan Lambert:So I just thought it was really important that we spoke to what we know, which is there's a lot of kids in those upper grades that don't know how to read.
Margaret Goldberg:Yeah. And I think being transparent with them about like, "If you don't know how to read yet, it's because you haven't gotten the instruction and the amount of repetition and practice that you need. And there's this big variation from person to person about how difficult learning to read may be for them, but that it's never too late to learn how to read, that we can get you there." And I'm just imagining that it could be helpful for tutors or parents or teachers who wanna be able to try to talk to a kid who may feel like they've given up on learning ever being able to learn how to do this thing. And that there's a reset button we're trying to press so that the instruction can kick in and they can have a different experience from there on out.
Susan Lambert:Yeah, absolutely. And I think the way—so listeners, we'll link in the show notes to the launch episode, so that you can go back and sort of get behind the scenes, because that's what that episode is going to be. We haven't done it yet, but by this time, this episode airs, we will have done that. But just this idea of getting our misconceptions out. And so you guys, like, in the scope and sequence, you not only said, here's what we need to cover in each one of these episodes, but here's the kernel or the nugget of information that we need to cover. And here's some misconceptions that we need to uncover as well. And then being able to pull that together into a visual that wasn't little kiddish. And I really think that our creative designers did a pretty amazing job of making it very accessible for so many different age levels.
Margaret Goldberg:Well, I remember when you were talking about the vision for the project, at some point we were—we got on a tangent about Shrek <laugh> and how it's good for all ages <laugh> I was like, yes, that's it!
Susan Lambert:It's those layers, right? So not everybody gets the same meaning out of it. And when you know, more, you can get more out of it. So I do think that people will watch these over and over and over again. And I think they're going to be very popular with teachers.
Margaret Goldberg:I hope so. I hope so. I think one of the things that I'm really looking forward to it is finding out how people are using them. Like I have some visions in my mind for how I wanna use it at my school or how I can imagine doing it when trying to talk with a kid who's struggling in some way or another. But I wanna hear how people innovate to be able to use 'em .
Susan Lambert:Yeah, for sure. And I just wanna get it out there too, that one of the requirements from Margaret Goldberg is that these videos would be accessible to everyone, behind no subscription walls, no signup walls, no paid walls at all, just completely available on a website. And I think that's amazing that we were able to come together and offer that that all you have to do is click a button and you're in.
Margaret Goldberg:I feel like one of the things that I've tried to hold onto as much as possible is that I experienced so much frustration in trying to learn about the Science of Reading with things being behind paywalls or things being inaccessible to me, not being able to find the information that I was looking for. And it just has always felt important to me that you shouldn't have to pay for this information. I think it's wrong that as a teacher, I paid so much money to get my credential and I took so many tests and I don't get paid that much! I shouldn't have to then pay for my own professional development this far in my career to have access to information! So yeah, I'm pretty serious about things being free.
Susan Lambert:<laugh> I think that's a valid point. You paid all that money for college and then you still didn't learn what you were supposed to learn to be able to teach kids how to read! <Laugh> Anyway, I just wanna throw it out there that yes, these things are going to be freely available and they are as of the listeners listening to this now. So it was pretty fun. And I do wanna say this is—and I think you can echo this too: this is nothing about me and nothing about you. I literally had an idea that I launched out into the universe and ask some really smart people if they wanted to help and get it done. And after that, like I take zero credit for any of these, because the hard work that went into developing those, the detail and the conversations that happened between folks on this side and folks on the Right to Read side is, I mean, just a huge shout out to them.
Margaret Goldberg:Yeah, absolutely. I think so. For my own role, it was really working hard , with L onnie and with Kenni on the Right to Read Project side, thinking about the scope and sequence, what's most important, what's the most kid-friendly kind of explanation we can give for this very important concept? And what, from the Science of Reading, do we think is a worthwhile model to be held up as an explanation for kids a nd the adults around them? But then there's this amazing creative team that is all about animation, all about story, all about character, all about all of the beautiful side that makes this into a cartoon and not like a professional development session. < Laugh> And just seeing them negotiate and be like, "OK, this would be really fun and creative, but like we need words where the phonics works!" < Laugh> Like, w hen this can't be the word that they s ound out or whatever, it was—there was a lot of negotiation trying to pay attention to all of those details, and they just did it with such compassion for each other's roles.
Susan Lambert:<laugh> Yeah. Yeah. It's, it's interesting. You never know what goes into the making of a very short three- to four-minute animation, both on the writing side and on the illustration and animation side.
Margaret Goldberg:Totally. It was a fun project to see unfold. And one of the things that I'm looking forward to with the launch—which will have happened in the past now, but we're doing it next week, the launch, that we're looking forward to — is for people to be able to see some of the rough draft and the, like, work towards this product. Yeah . Because , that wasn't an experience I had ever had before.
Susan Lambert:Yeah. Yeah. Same. I mean, we've, you know, never done anything like this with, with anybody before. And I'm just really excited. Like I said, it's we do this work for the students, and to be able to get this information directly to them in ways that make sense, and hopefully motivate some kids to actually wanna learn more about what's happening post some of these videos or make some connections while they're learning to read.
Margaret Goldberg:Yeah. You know, one of the things — I don't know if I've ever told you this before, but when I first started learning about the Science of Reading, I was supposed to do this inquiry project where we were supposed to have our question and collect information from our students to try to find the answer to the question. And I wanted to find out what my students made of the kind of instruction that they were receiving. So I did all of these interviews with all these first graders asking them, like, what do you know about the process of learning how to read? Do you feel like a good reader? Why or why not? Asking them, like, what do you remember about life before you knew how to read <laugh> ? And it was so fun being able to hear their explanations and hear them and how they made sense of the instruction that I had been giving them day in and day out. Some of them did the greatest little impersonations of me too! Like, "then the teacher says...!" So anyways, that felt actually like the earliest iteration of this, like the earliest iteration of in kid-friendly language, to be able to explain what's happening for them, what it feels like. Because yes, sometimes it is joyful and exciting and you feel successful. And other times it is really hard work and they are deeply committed to trying to figure out how to make it happen...but you can feel discouraged. And I think it was important for us to make the main character and this series be a child who was old enough to explain that it had been hard up until that point. So the target was like a second creator who was having a hard time picking up the code .
Cartoony voice:Minh. How long did you stay up reading that long book your aunt wrote? Ugh , not long. I got maybe 50 words in before I wanted to take a nap. Remember what I told you about the Science of Reading? Our brains start out great at listening and talking and at seeing and recognizing. But reading asks us to do even more than that. We have to do all those things and also connect to the printed words. And that doesn't come naturally to humans. It can be a lot to dive right into.
Susan Lambert:And listeners, if you do show these Brain Builders—not if, when you show these Brain Builders to your students or children , we would love to get some feedback on them. And you can send that feedback through the Amplify email or to Right to Read Project. For sure.
Margaret Goldberg:Yes. Definitely.
Susan Lambert:Let us, let us know how you're using them and what the students think. You know, in the scope and sequence of your development, you too were sure to include critical elements of developing language and developing language comprehension.
Cartoony voice:The superpower of reading is all about letters and sounds. But that can't be all there is to reading. Nope, that's only the beginning. Ooh , the sequel! Because once your reading brain turns a written word into a spoken word, matching letters to sounds and blending them into a word, your brain can recognize the word and look up what it means. And also what the word means within a sentence. Because sometimes words can mean more than one thing.
Susan Lambert:You put those in strategically . And we're trying to, like, bust this myth that the Science of Reading people, all they think about is phonics or all they ascribe to is phonics. And they're killing the joy of reading. Can you talk to me a little bit about why it was important for you to include those language comprehension sort of elements in these Brain Builder videos?
Margaret Goldberg:Well, I feel like one of the things that people miss when they're tracking the conversation about the Science of Reading, is that the reason why so much conversation has been focusing on foundational skills is because that is actually the most easily fixed problem when it comes to instruction and fixing our literacy rates. Like we actually have some pretty solid information about some of the best ways to teach kids to learn how to decode. And if a kid is leaving the primary grades unable to lift the words up off the page , that's a problem. And it's a problem that is immediately fixable and there are good tools to be able to do that. But when it comes to the language side of things, which is actually the bigger task, when we think about like making sure that kids beyond grades 1 and 2 actually have access to the written text, that they understand language they may never have heard before in conversation, they're finding new words and new , complex sentence construction, and they're expanding their knowledge about the world, they're reading about information they've never had access to...that is all the rest of reading! <laughs> Like if we look at schooling, like that's a good chunk of the day for kindergartner's first graders, second graders, and it is m ost of the day for all of the rest of the grades. So the fact t hat our conversation has focused so much on primary grade foundational skills reading instruction is because it's like the easiest first step for us to take to be able to get better literacy outcomes. But there are so many steps to take after that. And I, r eally feel like maybe we haven't done as good of a job as we need to, to be able to focus the conversation on the part that's trickier.
Susan Lambert:Mm-hmm <affirmative> Yep. And lasts an entire lifetime too. Right? We're always developing , when it comes to background knowledge and vocabulary, that continues to develop throughout our lifetime.
Margaret Goldberg:Totally. And I was just leading professional development yesterday for the teachers at my school. And we <laugh> , we did this really fun activity where it was just a Venn diagram and it was word recognition on one side of it and language comprehension on the other side of it. And all of the teachers were at table groups and they had envelopes they opened up and they were reading little strips of paper that they needed to decide, where was that , item gonna go? So if t he strip of paper said "Teaching with the goal of student mastery," where does that g o on the Venn diagram? Versus "teaching with the goal of exposing students to content"? And we started having some really good conversations about how in our previous year of school, we had focused a lot on the word-recognition side of things like knowing this is a conquerable problem we can take on. And now that we've got that down and our instruction is solid when it comes to teaching kids how to lift the words off the page, we have to realize that language comprehension actually develops in a different way. And that some of the strategies that we've been using for foundational skills will hold up for language comprehension, but a lot of strategies we need to pick up are new. And that's where the really exciting work this year is gonna live.
Susan Lambert:So we probably should come back and talk to you at the end of the year, then, to find out how this language comprehension instruction has developed and how folks are looking at that differently.
Margaret Goldberg:Oh my gosh. It's like, once you start tuning into it, one of the quotes that we let , um, in PD, it was talking about how when we teach for language, we're trying to turn up the volume on language features. And so we turned up the volume on the word "because" and "since." We were doing some sample language dives. And then the teachers were reading the text that their students would get in the first few weeks of school and everyone was like, "Wait, I just found 'because' at the start of a sentence! Like we were just talking about that!" And like, "Wait, I totally see 'since,' and now it looks completely different to me, 'cause I didn't realize it was the sequence of events, not just a linking word!" There were all these insights we had. And we were kind of giddy about it.
Susan Lambert:<laugh> That's amazing. Well, it just goes to prove that when you are a skilled reader, you often don't have to think about these things because it just sort of flows naturally. But somehow, somewhere, that developed, and the more that you know about them, the better sort of meta-awareness and metacognition you can have as a reader.
Margaret Goldberg:Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And I think one of the things we had to talk about was like, with foundational skills, we are trying to get kids to automaticity. And so the way we do our instruction is super fast-paced. It's a lot of progress monitoring. Like there's kind of, there's a drill aspect to it. And I know I talked with you last time about like defeating the idea of drill and kill, but like this thrill of skill really being the focus of that work. But with language comprehension, there is no upper limit.
Susan Lambert:That's right.
Margaret Goldberg:Like just to be able to realize we are putting in as many words and as many complex sentence structures and as many pieces of information about the world, and like all of this literacy knowledge, like we can just keep going and extending and extending. And it's true for the adults too.
Susan Lambert:<laugh> Yeah, for sure. And that's the place where kids get really excited too, when you start to talk about developing content knowledge and really rich topics of science or social studies or the arts or, you know, music, dance, whatever it is, they get really excited learning those topics.
Margaret Goldberg:Yeah. And I think one thing that I wish is that a lot of teachers have gotten really excited about English spelling for very good reasons and like excited about morphology, excited about all these layers to our language. And we should be excited about it. Especially if we had in any way thought, you know , like English is too irregular or something like that. So if we're unlearning some things that we had thought about our language , there's joy in that learning. But < laugh> I really think we should spend at least that amount of energy on the language comprehension side of things. And realize that there have been so many things that we've just learned through exposure to language, and that once we really start trying to teach kids how our language works, we start realizing things about it we never knew before. And we start realizing all of these ways in which our spoken language and written language are amazing. And you can get giddy about that side of things, if not even more < laugh> than the word recognition side. For sure.
Susan Lambert:Yeah, for sure. I was just reading an article, and I hope I'm quoting this right, I'm pretty sure that it was an article by Gina Cervetti and Freddy Hiebert, where they talked about this learning to read and then the transition to reading to learn. And that it really has set up a false dichotomy. That we can start this figuring out how to use text to increase our knowledge base before we actually can decode words. S o how do we strategically use text for kids before they get to that place where they can decode it themselves?
Margaret Goldberg:Totally. And one of the things that we talked about with this Venn diagram that I was explaining to you was , there were slips of paper that we're talking about matching students to text according to their ability and grade level text. And we had a really good discussion about the fact that with the foundational skill side of things, you do need to match kids up with texts that they can read accurately. And that's gonna be determined by their decoding ability. But when it comes to language comprehension, when it comes to being able to have those discussions, like, "What do you think the author meant here with this word choice ?" Or "If we were to remove this word from the sentence, how would that change the meaning of what's being said?" Like all of those conversations about English syntax or anything like that, you wanna use grade-level text. And it's significantly above the ability of most of our kids decoding, when you work in the primary grades or when you work in a school like mine, where a lot of kids haven't gotten off to a good start with decoding. And so I think one of the things that we start realizing is that this idea that we have from balanced literacy about the importance of rich read-alouds and the importance of developing a joy of reading and, like, a great classroom library and all of those things, like, that has a place in the Science of Reading classroom.
Susan Lambert:Absolutely. Absolutely. I love how you said that. And I use this example all the time in my work is: I remember my dad taking me to the library, and I remember getting interested in topics, and he didn't take me to the kids' section in the picture-books section. I went to the adult section, right? And pulled out what I was interested in. And maybe I could learn something from the picture, or from a few words, or maybe he would read it to me to help me learn and help me understand. But we shouldn't be afraid to put texts in front of kids maybe that they can't even read yet. But give them scaffolds and supports to help them.
Margaret Goldberg:I was just talking with the kindergarten teachers at my school and we were planning our literacy centers. And we were talking about the—we wanna have a center that's focused on book browsing and that kids would be able to get books and open them up and explore them and see what's there. And yes, they can't read them yet. <laugh> We're not actually gonna call that reading. <laugh> We're not gonna say that, like, when I make up a story and turn the pages, that that's reading. We're gonna call it book browsing. And it's a really valuable thing to give motivation to learn how to read.
Susan Lambert:Yeah. Oh, that's great. I love it. So you do a lot of thinking, you do a lot of professional development, you are in the trenches , and you're very well respected by the way. What are you thinking about these days about the Science of Reading movement or some of the research that's coming out?
Margaret Goldberg:I was thinking the other day about how the focus has been maybe too much on the word recognition side of things. And I say that reluctantly, because we still haven't gotten that right. And it is an attainable goal. So I'm not saying that we need to stop talking about phonics. In fact, we need to continue talking about it and get it right. Get really good. at being able to ensure every kid leaves the primary grades able to read the words on the page. So it's not that I want us to put that off to the side and like give up on it. But what I really want us to realize is that the Science of Reading topic that got cracked open for this big national debate that's been happening for several years now, in a lot of different ways, it got started by parents who a re advocating because their children weren't being taught how to read in school. A lot of families where their children have dyslexia or other reading difficulties and that they were really campaigning for higher quality foundational skills instruction. And they got the opportunity to have their voices heard. And as a result, teachers started thinking about how they were providing that instruction. And a lot of change has happened as a result of it. And that's a good thing, but we have many, many families who could be advocating because their children haven't been taught the academic language necessary to be able to reach grade-level standards. And if we had all of the families of our English language learners, or all of the families of our students who speak a dialect at home that's different than the dialect in books or at school, like if we had all of those families talking about how they want their kids to be taught in school, we would be talking about the language comprehension side of things a lot more too. And so what's been coming to my mind is that I think it's important for us to realize why we are where we are, who has been cracking this conversation open, who's been participating in the conversation, whose values are being seen and addressed, a nd also r ealize all the other people who should be thought of as we're thinking about the students we serve and the instruction we deliver and the tools we use and the reflecting that we do. Because I don't think that we should have a conversation on one side about foundational skills instruction, on the other side about our English language learners, and on another side about equity and restorative practices. Like, that all should be part of the literacy conversation in a way that hasn't happened yet. It's felt fragmented.
Susan Lambert:Hmm . So you were just with teachers, delivering that professional development about language comprehension. I know I'm taking a step back here, but I hope there's a connection—
Margaret Goldberg:<laugh> Let's find out!
Susan Lambert:<laugh> Let's find out. How receptive were they to that professional development , in terms of changing their practice or thinking about ways to do things different in the classroom?
Margaret Goldberg:So receptive. So one of the things that we did today was we grounded in our purpose. So we have a vision for literacy at my school, and we also talked clearly and honestly about... <Laugh> My position is grant-funded. I'm a literacy coach. And I'm funded by the California Early Literacy Support block grant. And so that money came as the result of a lawsuit. Kids filed a lawsuit against the state of California, 'cause they had not been taught to read. And there was a settlement that was reached for $53 million . And so that money is going to the 73 lowest-performing schools in the state. And my school is one of those. And so we looked at the profiles of those students today. We looked to be able to read about Ella T. who is seven years old and what happened and why, like, we were looking at each one of those kiddos and we had a really great conversation about like, pretty much all of our kids match the profiles of those children. And s o we are doing this work because we have—there's a moral imperative. We need to get this right. And then we looked at our plan. It's a three-year grant. Our first year, we really focused on word recognition and foundational skills. We're gonna continue that work. But this year we're focusing on language comprehension. And we looked at Scarborough's rope and talked about how like you can't just teach one side of things. If we're really focused just on word recognition, we're not gonna get all of our kids to where they need and deserve to be. So teachers are really open to the idea of taking language comprehension on, in t his second year, because I think what they're realizing is that we did see improvement. So our students who a re most at risk, we saw a 15% decline there. And we also saw improvement in the amount of kids who scored proficient on comprehension measures. But in order to get all of our kids there, we actually need to, to teach comprehension. Like we need to get our language comprehension instruction down so kids are really able to raise the roof of their reading abilities. So I think it actually comes as a relief to anybody who had any sort of worry about just like, "What if we create word callers? What if we create kids who can decode, but they can't comprehend? Or what if I lose the joy of teaching because I am following a scripted program? Or what if like all of those worries that maybe no one really complained last year, but I can see if we were just focusing on one s ide of Scarborough's ro pe, it was gonna pe rcolate a t some point up to the top. So this actually feels like relief. Like finally we've got our attention on all of the things that matter, the whole school da y's f ocus.
Susan Lambert:So then the connection here is in the national conversation where we have people hyper-focused on word recognition—and again, I'm with you; not that we throw that out; we don't; it's really important; it's really attainable—others are talking about language comprehension. Others are talking about other areas. What do you think it's gonna take to bring folks together to recognize and affirm that thing that you just said, as following the Science of Reading, we have to do all of the things, not just one or the other.
Margaret Goldberg:Well, I don't know what it's gonna take for other people, but I can say what it took for me. OK. <Laugh> So what it took for me was to realize a very humbling realization. Which was yikes, I have no idea how English spelling works. I have no idea how to explain it to children. I have a lot of adult learning that I need to do. And so I did that work. And then realizing, huh, I don't actually know English grammar either. <laugh> Like, I just ask myself, like, does it sound right? And I'm privileged enough to be able to say that I have the voices of my parents and other teachers along the way who established what sounds right in my subconscious. But if I really need to be tasked with explaining how our language works to kids, I needed new strategies. And it was really helpful for me this summer, I did a lot of professional development; I did a series that was called Learning How English Works, and it was so helpful to be able to talk about linguistically responsive routines, so helpful to think about how we think about answering students' questions that come up about our language as we're doing close reading, and also very humbling. Like, I felt as nervous exploring that side of things as I had originally about English spelling. So I think what it took for me was to realize, "I have a lot of learning to do, I'm gonna do what I can right now. And then I'm gonna realize there's a whole other level that I need to get into." And feeling ready to be able to take that on in a similar way.
Susan Lambert:So do you feel like this is gonna be a real learning year for you as well as for the teachers that you're supporting in terms of language comprehension?
Margaret Goldberg:Totally, totally. I think one of the things that I'm most looking forward to is, because now I've been in this for several years, I feel a lot more confident when someone, whether it's a kid or a teacher is like, "Why, blah, blah, blah?" And to be able to say, "Seriously good question! Let's find out." <Laugh> And I'm just really looking forward to being able to do that without quite so much imposter syndrome! <Laugh>
Susan Lambert:So should I throw it out there to our listeners? If you have any kind of question about language comprehension, send it to Margaret and she'll see if she can answer it! <Laugh>
Margaret Goldberg:And if you can find an answer to your question, definitely send it to me 'cause I probably need your answer! <Laugh>
Susan Lambert:We're in this together. It takes a village, Margaret. It takes a village.
Margaret Goldberg:Absolutely. So I think, yeah, part of when you were asking, like, "What's it gonna take to be able to bring all these conversations together?" I think for me it was realizing I've been let down by my training, by my curriculum, by my PD, on both sides, on the word recognition and on the language comprehension side of things, I turned out to be a skilled reader because of luck. <Laugh> And because of the background that I have. Word recognition came relatively easily and I had a high level of exposure to language. And that actually, when I look back, I realize that that's why it's particularly hard for me to be able to answer questions. 'Cause I never had someone who made me diagram sentences, < laugh> right? But I'm really excited about doing this learning and I hope that what will end up happening is more conversation about all the parts of reading and the best practices for it.
Susan Lambert:Yeah. Yeah. I'm, I'm with you on that for sure. Well, this season on Science of Reading: The Podcast—and again, this has been awesome to be able to launch our new season with you—we're centering our conversations on students. It's the reason we're doing this work. So when I say the phrase, "it's all about the students," what does that mean to you and to your work?
Margaret Goldberg:Well, for me as a literacy coach, I think I always it's the student data that determines how effective I've been as a coach. So I can build strong relationships with the teachers and the admin at my school. I can love the interactions I'm having with people. I can be really excited about the PD I'm doing and the learning I am doing. All of that stuff matters. And when it actually comes down to the efficacy of my coaching, it's if our reading scores go up. And I think one of the things that I've really realized is that I have to take myself out of the equation. It's not about how I wanna spend my time, not about the things that I like, not about my own personality or my own opinions or theories, like it really is "my work is good when it works for kids, and it works for kids when it works for teachers." So I think one of the things that I've really tried to do is to have focal students in my mind every year. So I have a couple of focal students, where I'm watching to see how my work impacts them, and I'm like so eager to look at their progress monitoring data and be like, how am I doing <laugh> ? But yeah, that's, that's what comes to mind for me. It's the nervousness of looking at our reading scores and trying to see if I need to humble up and figure out, "Yes, I tried something and it's not working the way that it should and I need to then try something else." Or if it's like, "Hey, we're headed in the right direction. I'm tired, but I have to keep going 'cause it looks like it's working."
Susan Lambert:Well, I don't know if you realize that , but in our entire—what, we've been talking for about 40 minutes now?—many of your sentences include "students." And I heard you say that word, "student" or "students," over and over and over again.
Margaret Goldberg:I mean, honestly, if we were talking about instruction and the Science of Reading, and theory and practice and I wasn't talking about students, I think actually I would have—I would have an identity crisis. <laugh> They're on my mind all the time.
Susan Lambert:That's very clear. And we are so happy to have you here again, to both launch our Brain Builders in another venue, but also to just remind our listeners that it's all about the students and the things that we need to do for them to ensure they're off to a great successful start and beyond, becoming literate. So thank you, Margaret. Thanks for joining us.
Margaret Goldberg:You're so welcome! Good to see you! Good to see you too. Thanks so much for listening to my conversation with Margaret Goldberg. Check out the show notes for links to the Brain Builders video series, as well as the video of our recent launch party. Please let us know what you thought about this episode in our Facebook discussion group, Science of Reading: The Community. There's much more to come on season 6 of Science of Reading: The Podcast. Next time we're going deep into NAEP with former U.S. Assistant Secretary of Education, Chester Finn.
Chester Finn :The national assessment, which I continue to call the most important test you probably never heard of, did start in the '60s, when the U.S. Commissioner of Education—we didn't have a department in those days—suddenly discovered that his office of education had a lot of data about quantity stuff in education—how many teachers, how many schools, how many kids—but didn't have any information on whether anyone was learning anything.
Susan Lambert:Stay tuned for all that. And thanks so much for listening.