I have been thinking a lot about Lucy Calkins' Facebook post about how she is "rebalancing" Balanced Literacy. (Spoiler: My thoughts are not positive). So, I'm going to do a thread! Here we go! /1

Calkins says: "We have also refined and amended our thinking about the ways we suggest teachers prompt kids when they get stuck on an unfamiliar word. For example, when a child is reading a sentence such as, “It was cold, so I put on my jacket,” and the child gets stuck..." /2

"...on jacket, we now suggest the teacher nudge by saying, “Look at the letters, have a go with that word,” rather than saying, “Think about what’s happening. What might the boy put on?” By prompting students to use phonics at that moment of challenge, ...." /3

"...we encourage them to apply and practice the phonics they know. We also know that when they use phonics to decode a word, they are more apt to add that word to their sight vocabulary. Of course, the child may say something like jake-it in which case..." /4

"...the teacher will need to follow up the phonics prompt with a prompt for meaning, “Does that make sense?” Then the child will use their understanding of the context to correct the mispronounced word so that they can fully comprehend the passage..." /5

"...This correction, too, adds to their phonics experience. That is, even when phonics is centered, meaning will never not be important, as the goal of reading is to understand and to learn." (And that's the end of the Calkins quote. Now, to analyze it). /6

Basically, Calkins is saying: "I will tell teachers to tell kids to sound out words." And yes, this is a departure for her, because before she told teachers to tell kids that good readers don't focus on sounds. (AHH). So, that's an improvement. BUT!! (see next tweet) /7

There are a few problems here. Problem number one is the prompt: "Look at the letters, have a go with that word." The directions we give matter: I would say "Sound this word out. Tap out the word" (tapping out is a technique used in phonics instruction). /8

Saying "sound out"/"tap out" is better than saying "look" because it communicates to the students that letters represent sounds. Saying "look" encourages students to memorize word shapes instead of mapping sounds onto words. (This is called orthographic mapping). /9

Next, she says that if a student doesn't sound out the word right, THEN you should tell them to guess based on context. That's a hard no. If a student says "jake-it" instead of "jacket," that child is missing some very important phonics knowledge. Let's break it down. /10

1st thing I'd do would be to say: Nope, let's think about what we know about letters and sounds. How many syllables in that word? And b/c we teach that syllables = vowel groups (ex: 2 syllables in pouted, the groups are ou & e), my student would answer "2." /11

I'd have my student mark the syllable boundaries on the page. Then I'd say: "Sound out that first syllable." Them: "J-a-ck. Jack." Me: "Good. The second." Them: "E-t. Et." Me: Blend. Them: Jack-et. Jacket! Boom. /12

If we were still having trouble, I'd review with the student why the "a" in jacket makes the short /a/ sound (jacket) not the long /ay/ sound (jake-it). /13

General phonics rule: "If it's just one hop, usually the first vowel talks." Hence the "a" in "rage" says /ay/ (just one hop from the "e" to that "a" - over the "g" - means the "a" makes the long vowel sound), but the "a" in "jacket" says "a" (two hops from the e to the a). /14

If you do this, the student learns WHY it's "jacket" not "jake-it." They learn to be a reader, how to apply knowledge of sounds and spellings to read anything. If you follow Calkins' steps, the kid learns that he can't sound out that word, it's just "jacket." Just because. /15

So, what Calkins is really saying: "FINE, I'll teach the most basic things of phonics. Short vowel sounds, consonant sounds. And I'll ask kids to decode it once. But that's IT. Nothing deeper, nothing for multisyllabic words, and then we go back to telling them to guess." /16

And that is why I think this "rebalancing" of her curriculum is just a PR stunt. It's business as usual. I'm pretty upset, as you can see. /17, End.