Are your beliefs about reading instruction a simple story?
How to embrace the complexity of teaching readers
“How in the world does this lovely story — and it is a beautiful story — come to be seen as fact?”
- Dr. Thomas Hobbs, professor of natural resource ecology at Colorado State University, “Yellowstone’s Wolves: A Debate Over Their Role in the Park’s Ecosystem”, The New York Times, April 23, 2024
Are you familiar with the short film “How Wolves Change Rivers”?
I’ve seen it several times. An educator played it during a coaching training. I’ve used it myself for professional learning. Here is a short summary:
Wolves were re-introduced to Yellowstone National Park.
The wolves killed deer and elk, which were eating too much vegetation.
Less deer/elk allowed for tree saplings and other plants to regrow.
The increase in vegetation led to more birds, beavers, and rabbits in the habitat.
These herbivores brought a greater balance to the ecosystem.
Regenerated vegetation along rivers led to a more stabilized and healthy narrowing of these waterways.
This is referred to as a “trophic cascade”: the wolves’ presence and behaviors were attributed with widespread change.
The story: the introduction of one factor can correct an out-of-balance system.
This is a nice narrative. It’s one that I believed and presented as fact to colleagues.
The only problem: it’s not true.
In this New York Times article, researchers have pointed to several findings that have refuted this simple story.
129 beavers were also introduced to the park around the same time as the wolves. The dams they built created habitats for other animals, which helped bring balance.
Humans have killed more deer and elk than the wolves have since they were first re-introduced. Grizzly bears have also kept populations down.
With the decline in deer and elk populations, bison numbers grew. (Wolves are not as dangerous a predator to them.) Subsequently, some areas continue to struggle with overgrazing.
Due to these new problems, including climate change, Yellowstone National Park has not returned to the well-balanced ecosystem portrayed in the video.
To be fair, scientists are not saying the wolves lacked influence in the park’s restoration. What they are finding is that wolves were not the factor.
You can see where I am going with this.
Many educators have bought a somewhat similar story about reading instruction. The wolf in our context is phonics. For example, Emily Hanford’s podcast series Sold a Story referenced phonics 48 times. What about the benefits of motivation and engagement in becoming a reader? Or self-efficacy? Or executive functioning? Not so much.
Because Sold a Story was packaged and produced in such an appealing narrative format, with emotionally-laden stories along with “villains” to blame, people bought it. Now we have state legislation that amplifies phonics instruction at the expense of other effective instructional strategies.
Why do we get caught in these narratives? In her book Unlocking Leadership Mindtraps: How to Thrive in Complexity, Jennifer Garvey Berger shares what research has found are some reasons we are susceptible to simple stories.
Our brains have developed to create patterns of a beginning, middle, and end; we connect causes and effects.
We take what we’ve learned from the past and project it into the future; any missing pieces are filled in with what we “know”.
We create simple characters and narratives, and select data to support these beliefs.
Any of us can become trapped by simple stories. I could be wrong, but I believe the producers of these narratives are counting on it.
How can we free ourselves from these simple stories and embrace the complexity of teaching readers?
Berger offers the following recommendations (p. 39):
Notice your simple stories.
Remember they are simple.
Believe in them less.
Use this thinking routine to consider additional stories and multiple your options.
Just as the wolves did not single-handedly change Yellowstone’s ecosystem, phonics is not going to alter reading instruction for the better by itself. It’s going to take highly knowledgable teachers along with ample resources, professional trust, and many more points of influence and support to achieve our collective goal.
How have you responded to these simple stories about teaching readers?
Related Recommended Reading
For a deep dive into the “sciences of reading”, check out Peter Afflerbach’s professional resource Teaching Readers (Not Reading): Moving Beyond Skills and Strategies to Reader-Focused Instruction. Peter cites many studies that find motivation and engagement, self-efficacy, executive functioning, and other factors support readers.
I just finished Revival by Stephen King. In this sci-fi/horror novel, a pastor suffers a tragic loss early in his life. He eschews religion and his spiritual beliefs in favor of science to understand what happened. The limits and consequences of adhering to one set of beliefs over another is a central theme of the story.
Creative Visualization: Use the Power of Your Imagination to Create What You Want in Your Life by Shakti Gawain offers several exercises for helping people move beyond their limiting beliefs. I especially appreciated the author’s explanation of affirmations for helping one see what they want as something they already have. (Note: I committed an entire chapter in my latest book to affirming promising practices with teachers during classroom visits.)
Great post! Teaching reading is complex and pushing a simple narrative will do more harm than good. Phonics is important, but so are many other factors that contribute to a literate individual.
I appreciate your reminder that there is always more to any story and that nothing complex is ever about one simple solution. Thank you for this important thinking, Matt!