Anonymous wrote:Wait MCPS is still using balanced literacy in 2024? How has there not been more outcry about this?
-parent of rising K kid who recently listened to Sold a Story

I think the last year or two they’ve been using phonics materials to supplement their reading curriculum and having great results, although their main curriculum had problems. I believe they’re replacing it with a new curriculum that should have a built-in focus on phonics instruction.


I was on the reading curriculum committee before Curriculum 2.0. People would ask the curriculum department directly if MCPS taught phonics. The curriculum department would assure them that they taught phonics despite the fact that kids were not given decodable books that they could sound out, but rather given books containing sight words they hadn’t been taught the letter-sound correspondences for yet and despite the fact that when kids encountered an unknown word they were given a list of strategies to use (including look at the picture and guess), with actually sounding out the word being their option as a last resort.

Their idea of teaching phonics was to do things like pick a letter of the day and circle it where it occurred in the story. Here’s a comparison from Reading Rockets of different types of phonics instruction. The practices this link describes as embedded phonics is basically what MCPS was doing as a part (not the primary focus) of their reading instruction.

https://www.readingrockets.org/topics/phonics-and-decoding/articles/phonics-instruction

Why wasn’t there an outcry?

Because everyone knew that “MCPS is one of the best school systems in the country”,

because the “experts” knew better and if parents agreed with the official reading orthodoxy it was because they were too ignorant to know better and obviously curriculum decisions needed to rest with the experts who had studied the subject (usually from ed schools that didn’t believe in phonics),

because some individual teachers may have taught phonics under the radar (among other skills they realized are necessary) in spite of the curriculum,

because some parents taught phonics at home or hired a tutor resulting in a capable reader with excellent test scores that MCPS could brag about - providing clear evidence that “MCPS is one of the best school systems in the country”,

because some kids eventually subconsciously internalized enough of the patterns on their own (even if inefficiently) to get the gist,

because some kids were able to memorize enough sight words that they were declared readers - even if they hated reading and later ran into problems when memorizing thousands of words became overly burdensome,

and because those who still had problems were probably just considered dyslexic.

Anonymous wrote:If it's possible to mess this up, MCPS will do so.

They'll buy some 3rd rate curriculum because it's the only one that has a version in Spanish instead of buying what will serve all children. Then two years from now someone will realize this is a horrible curriculum and the process will repeat.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They change up "curriculum" every few years, you know to say they are trying to improve, it's a different name but your kid will read if you read to them, with them, on their own and with some assistance from at the school.

If that were true, then why is Maryland in the bottom-10 US states for literacy education ? Worse than even Mississippi.

Where are you getting this statistic? In 2018, Maryland ranked second in the country in child literacy. (https://www.thinkimpact.com/literacy-statistics/#:~:text=The%20Top%203%20states%20for,order%20(highest%20to%20lowest).)

Using a different metric, Maryland ranked 25th (https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/rankings/education/prek-12/naep-reading-scores?region=MD) but 20th for literacy education.

Anonymous wrote:Wait MCPS is still using balanced literacy in 2024? How has there not been more outcry about this?
-parent of rising K kid who recently listened to Sold a Story

MCPS switched to Science of Reading 2-3 years ago. There is a new ELA curriculum being implemented this year for K-5.
https://amplify.com/programs/amplify-core-knowledge-language-arts/

Anonymous wrote:Wait MCPS is still using balanced literacy in 2024? How has there not been more outcry about this?
-parent of rising K kid who recently listened to Sold a Story

Science of reading is now the standard in all schools.

Wait MCPS is still using balanced literacy in 2024? How has there not been more outcry about this?
-parent of rising K kid who recently listened to Sold a Story

If it's possible to mess this up, MCPS will do so.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They change up "curriculum" every few years, you know to say they are trying to improve, it's a different name but your kid will read if you read to them, with them, on their own and with some assistance from at the school.

What an ignorant comment t

I’m the PP that wrote this. A child with dyslexia will not learn to read just by being read to and need specific types of assistance from teachers which requires a specific type of curriculum. MCPS has previously refused to adopt those kinds of curriculums. Spend some time in the Decoding Dyslexia Maryland meetings to understand how long parents have been frustrated with Maryland and especially MCPS

Phonics works for almost all students. Someone with severe dyslexia will benefit from the Orton-Gillingham method, but Phonics does no harm.

NP - the data on Orton-Gillingham isn’t particularly solid, though I know a lot of people insist it’s the “gold standard.”

All kids benefit from structured approaches to teaching phonics, phonemic awareness, decoding, fluency, comprehension, etc. For kids with dyslexia, it’s essential.

Where can I see a copy of this draft literacy policy?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They change up "curriculum" every few years, you know to say they are trying to improve, it's a different name but your kid will read if you read to them, with them, on their own and with some assistance from at the school.

If that were true, then why is Maryland in the bottom-10 US states for literacy education ? Worse than even Mississippi.

Perhaps, MD is but MCPS definitely isn't. My kids score 99% on their MAP-R and I'm not doing anything.

Maryland is not in the bottom 20 states for literacy education. They are #25 for the NAEP reading.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have been telling people for years how embarrassing it is for Maryland, and specifically MCPS, to be so far behind in reading compared to states like Mississippi and Alabama. Glad our new state superintendent is known as the Mississippi Miracle and is bringing the science of reading to Maryland. This is long overdue!

Well, you've been telling them wrong. No wonder they have not been paying attention to you.

How is it wrong? Other states have figured out how to successfully teach ALL students to read by using methods proven by science since the Vietnam era except for Maryland.

Umm what. Plenty of states and districts had been wrongly doing balanced literacy. And if with implementing Science of reading that it still only one piece of Balanced Literacy.

“Balanced Literacy” is that Lucy Calkins crap. it has repeatedly been shown to be ineffective in multiple studies. Thank God we are doing Science of Reading instead of BL.

No. Balanced Literacy was turned into the Lucy Calkins. Balanced literacy should always have included phonics for teaching kids to read. It should also include a balance amount ans appropriate of all the components of literacy(reading, grammar, spelling, comprehension, analysis, verbal and written expression).

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They change up "curriculum" every few years, you know to say they are trying to improve, it's a different name but your kid will read if you read to them, with them, on their own and with some assistance from at the school.

What an ignorant comment t

I’m the PP that wrote this. A child with dyslexia will not learn to read just by being read to and need specific types of assistance from teachers which requires a specific type of curriculum. MCPS has previously refused to adopt those kinds of curriculums. Spend some time in the Decoding Dyslexia Maryland meetings to understand how long parents have been frustrated with Maryland and especially MCPS

Phonics works for almost all students. Someone with severe dyslexia will benefit from the Orton-Gillingham method, but Phonics does no harm.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have been telling people for years how embarrassing it is for Maryland, and specifically MCPS, to be so far behind in reading compared to states like Mississippi and Alabama. Glad our new state superintendent is known as the Mississippi Miracle and is bringing the science of reading to Maryland. This is long overdue!

Well, you've been telling them wrong. No wonder they have not been paying attention to you.

How is it wrong? Other states have figured out how to successfully teach ALL students to read by using methods proven by science since the Vietnam era except for Maryland.

Umm what. Plenty of states and districts had been wrongly doing balanced literacy. And if with implementing Science of reading that it still only one piece of Balanced Literacy.

“Balanced Literacy” is that Lucy Calkins crap. it has repeatedly been shown to be ineffective in multiple studies. Thank God we are doing Science of Reading instead of BL.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They change up "curriculum" every few years, you know to say they are trying to improve, it's a different name but your kid will read if you read to them, with them, on their own and with some assistance from at the school.

If that were true, then why is Maryland in the bottom-10 US states for literacy education ? Worse than even Mississippi.

Perhaps, MD is but MCPS definitely isn't. My kids score 99% on their MAP-R and I'm not doing anything.

Anonymous wrote:Simply put, is this new adopted curriculum better or worse for rising kindergardener in the fall? He is likely to have some reading disorder or dyslexia. Any advice? He knows all letters & some phonics, but he can't decode to read any words on books, except he memorizes a few word spellings. We have tried for many years.

This new curriculum is excellent news for all rising Ks. Systematic, explicit instruction in phonics (what PPs describe as the science of reading) is the most effective way to teach reading. If your son has a reading disorder, he may need extra help, but a phonics based curriculum will give him a good start.

I wouldn’t worry yet. A Kindergartner really only needs to have the spellings for his name and the appropriate bathroom door memorized. Everything else will come as he learns to sound out words. While some of his classmates may be reading fluently, others may be starting from scratch. If you’ve been trying for many years, he just may not have been developmentally ready yet. With phonics instruction at school and an extra year of maturity, he may yet surprise you.