Schools Still Waiting for New Reading Plan

Last spring, state Supt. of Public Instruction Delaine Eastin sounded like a no-nonsense field general, marshaling her troops for an assault on reading test scores that are the worst in the nation.

She convened a task force of educators, reading experts and business leaders, and gave them four months to produce a “strategic battle plan” she could champion. In response, the task force delivered in September just what she’d asked for--marching orders for fixing a “crisis . . . that demands our immediate attention.”

But, five months later, the attack has yet to be launched in classrooms and school districts throughout the state, and has created more confusion than cohesion in the battle against the costly enemy of illiteracy.

To be sure, the task force report, called “Every Child a Reader,” and its most publicized finding--that phonics and other basic skills are crucial parts of a comprehensive beginning reading program--are beginning to influence policymakers in Sacramento.

The commission that licenses teachers, for example, is reexamining its rules to make sure new instructors understand that concept. New, more skill-oriented reading books are supposed to be available to school districts beginning next year. And a panel of educators will soon begin rewriting the state’s controversial 1987 guidelines on reading instruction, which many interpreted as a ban on the teaching of phonics, spelling and other basic skills.

But many worry that even those changes will have little effect on classrooms unless the state mounts a major effort to get out the word. And that is the score on which Eastin and her department are being criticized--mostly in private but increasingly in public--by some members of the reading task force and the State Board of Education, as well as teachers and superintendents throughout the state.

Instead of being inspired by the report’s rousing rhetoric, teachers say they have only a vague idea of its conclusions. And while some worry that districts will go overboard in responding to the call for basic skills, others say schools are more likely to make no changes at all.

Teachers “are calling and saying ‘We’re confused. . . . Which way does the state want us to go?” said Billie Jean Telles, a reading consultant with the Los Angeles County Office of Education.

The problem is that reading instruction, more than almost any area of schooling, has undergone sudden and severe swings in philosophy. The task force stressed the importance of avoiding another such swing, but the balance it tries to strike--teaching students basic skills along with an appreciation of the joys of good literature--is not only unfamiliar but unprecedented.

“We need phonics, we need skills, but how do we actually do that in the classroom?” asked Victor C. Chavez, the principal of Cesar E. Chavez Elementary School in Bell Gardens. “I don’t think the state is at the point of agreeing what that should look like, so schools have nothing to measure themselves against.”

Chavez said the state needs to issue clear and concise directives on reading instruction and back them up with training and textbooks.

Without that, as well as leadership from local superintendents, many educators will conclude “there’s no need to do anything” to improve instruction, even though 60% of California fourth-graders are not able to read at basic levels, Chavez said. Or, he said, every school will see the report’s conclusions differently, discarding parts and embracing others.

State education officials acknowledge that the reading campaign has been slow to get going. The task force, for example, asked the Department of Education to send schools information on successful reading programs, issue a summary of key research on how children learn to read, write a call-to-arms letter to every teacher and hold a summit of universities to examine how they prepare teachers in reading. None of that has been done.

The State Board of Education asked for a detailed follow-up plan in October but did not receive it until this month. By contrast, a plan to implement the recommendations of a parallel task force that Eastin convened in math was agreed on last fall, and a memorandum on recommended instructional changes has been issued.

State officials explain the delays by citing budget cuts in recent years that have left the Department of Education without a reading specialist and starved for enough money to follow through on many of the report’s recommendations.

Ruth McKenna, Eastin’s top deputy and the person responsible for running the reading effort, said that will change and progress will accelerate next year if Gov. Pete Wilson’s budget, which now includes $100 million to improve reading and math, is approved next summer. About half of that money will be used to fund state-level efforts on reading and math, and the rest will go to school districts for training and textbooks.

More immediately, she said, the department is working on a guide for teachers, describing teaching methods that build skills without relying on endless drills on isolated letter-sound combinations.

That document is crucial because districts need it to shape their applications for about $2 billion in federal aid that will be available next fall to fund remedial reading programs.

But writing the memorandum has been stalled by a paralyzing debate among members of the task force, the State Board of Education and Eastin’s department over how to implement the recommendations to preserve the balance the task force recommends.

“It’s our job to hammer out a consensus,” McKenna said, acknowledging that the task force report failed to stifle the professional debate among members of her department. “The big interest is in making sure it is crystal-clear at the kindergarten-grade one level how to recognize and intervene if kids are not getting the basic skills.”

Some critics, as well as some education department insiders, offer another reason for the delays. They say the task force recommendations have been overshadowed by an unrelated reform plan promoted by Eastin.

In September, one week before she released the reading report, Eastin announced her “challenge” program, which would free school districts from the strictures of the state’s Education Code in return for a commitment to a list of academic, safety and technology goals.

To get that effort going, Eastin’s staff has written hundreds of pages of regulations, guidelines and other materials, including a 600-page compendium of what students should learn in every grade in every subject. That rankles the critics.

“It’s not that Delaine doesn’t care about reading, it’s just that she cares about [her challenge plan] more,” said one Department of Education insider who is concerned about the handling of the reading issue. “We’ve lost a year at least, and there’s nothing that can be done at this point that will help.”

McKenna argued that the work on the academic standards for the “challenge” plan was directly related to the reading issue because they will provide a temporary but important framework for improvements. But, she acknowledged, the standards developed by Eastin’s staff ultimately will be superseded by those produced by an appointed commission.

Those standards will be the foundation of a new state academic test, which will not be ready for several more years. Many educators believe that the test, perhaps more than any other factor, will lead to changes in how reading is taught because it will force teachers to focus on those skills that are measured by the test.

However, absent a clear message from the state, the approach to reading instruction varies widely from district to district.

The 12,000-student Merced elementary school district, for example, is far ahead of most. As part of the district’s $1-million “Read to Succeed” campaign, every primary grade teacher has been retrained, classrooms have new books, the local newspaper publishes weekly updates, and citizens sport supportive lapel buttons.

Supt. Donald V. de Long said the task force added impetus to what was already underway. “We’ve refocused as a district and said the most important thing is we have to have readers,” he said.

Although the state can help, he said, school districts have to do it themselves. “Saying the state is not clear on what it wants . . . is a cop-out,” he said.

Some districts, such as the Los Angeles Unified School District, are rewriting reading standards to conform with the new emphasis. Other districts have simply ordered phonics and spelling books, which had disappeared from classrooms in recent years because of the state’s emphasis on stories instead of skills.

And in some districts, administrators are telling teachers to do nothing, predicting that the interest in basics will evaporate.

But most districts have done very little because they are reluctant to move too far in any direction until the debate over teaching methods is settled in Sacramento. And many believe that an important opportunity is being squandered.

The reading task force report “opened the doors and made us evaluate what we are doing,” said Patricia Alvarez, who teaches kindergarten at Cesar E. Chavez Elementary in Bell Gardens. “If we don’t take off now, we’re in real danger of the illiteracy we’ve been having continue. It’s time for a real breakthrough.”

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Reading Recommendations

Here are the recommendations of the California Reading Task Force report, “Every Child a Reader.”

* Every school and district must have a comprehensive, balanced reading program that is based on current research and combines skills development with literature and language-rich activities.

* Teachers must know how to diagnose and correct students’ reading problems.

* Schools must help children who are falling behind by the middle of the first grade.

* The state must have clear standards for reading at every grade level and tests that measure whether students are meeting those standards.

* Teacher training and licensing programs should be redesigned to put more emphasis on reading. All teachers must receive ongoing training.

* All children should attend preschool.

* Schools should have enough high-quality books and other instructional resources.

* Reading should have first call on all district resources.

* Communities should be enlisted to help.

* All arms of state government should make reading the top priority and allocate the necessary resources to make sure children learn.