What+is+Reading?

=**What is reading**= http://www.childrenofthecode.org/Tour/index.htm This is a resource for understanding the problem of illiteracy and the nature of literacy in English in terms of the structure of the language. There are sixty-seven videos and more coming online. If you watch one video per day, in a little over two months, you will have an excellent background in the challenges of literacy in English as well as some ways of approaching those challenges. To get to the videos, click on the link "67 Videos Now Online."

**We have a problem**
This is the first set of videos and this set reviews not only the extent of the literacy problem in terms of how many people struggle to read, but the implications for those problems in our society and in the lives of individuals. We cannot underestimate the effect of people not being able to read, particularly the emotional effect on the lives of people. We have an underclass of people who have not achieved in school and this group of people is vulnerable because they cannot get good jobs and because they typically have very low self esteem, often as a result of experiences they have had in schools.

**Causes and contributing factors**
This set of videos is an overview of issues that contribute to difficulties with reading for individuals and as a society.

**Read-i-ness**
Many factors contribute to a person's readiness to read, from cognitive development to environmental factors.

**Shame**
These videos explore the emotional impact of the shame people feel at not being able to read. Most of us teachers have had some kind of success with learning and we may not really understand how our students feel when they struggle. Additionally, the culture of school is often cruel to people who struggle with literacy. These videos give first-hand accounts of how students feel.

**Brief History of the Code, parts 1 and 2**
Literacy in other languages, where spelling is more consistent (Italian, Spanish, Finnish), is much more easily acquired than in English. Because of its history, English is an incredibly rich and expressive language. Yet because English has borrowed so much from various languages (French, German, and Greek predominantly), English spelling often reflects a word's history. For example, words with a ph (/f/ sound) in them often come from Greek where the letter phi makes that sound. Words that have an /f/ that are not Greek in origin spell the sound with the simple letter f. If you understand the history of the code, you are more likely to be able to help students learn to use the code because you can give sensible explanations for why things are as they are in English. It is a lot easier to deal with something when you understand why it exists.

**Other videos**
There are plans for other groups of videos on other pertinent topics--check back to see if those have been uploaded yet.

**Reading as simulation in the brain**
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=100109043

The above link describes some interesting research using brain scans. They have discovered that if you read about eating an ice cream cone, the same parts of your brain get activated as if you really are eating an ice cream cone. What this means is that reading is a form of virtual reality. That is, when we read, we experience things as if they were really happening, as far as the brain is concerned. That's why I cried when Jane's friend died in Jane Eyre. In order for people to experience this virtual reality aspect of reading, they have to be technically good enough at reading that the technical process doesn't get in the way. It's like driving standard shift--when you first start, you focus on the clutch and the gear shift and you have a hard time focusing on directions. When you get to the point of not having to think about shifting, then you can enjoy the ride. We scaffold kids to experience the virtual reality aspect of reading when we read to them and give them other experiences where language brings ideas to life. So, the experience of being read to is critical for kids to practice the virtual reality aspect of reading. We need to help kids who are experiencing technical difficulties with reading--to understand that they aren't getting the virtual reality part of reading. If you are asking them to read about a culture, they are not having the experience of being in that culture because the letters and sounds are getting in the way. If you want them to understand something, they need to get that information in some other way besides reading it themselves. When I was learning French, (Carolyn here), I had a hard time reading novels because I was constantly having to check my understanding of the words. Finally, I read a book in French that I had read in English (Fried Green Tomatoes, as a matter of fact). It was really neat--when I read that in French, I finally had that virtual reality experience in French because I knew more or less how the story went. I think this is something to pay attention to--to figure out how to scaffold reading so that kids can get to the pleasure of reading.

Readers reading--a slide show about a model of reading

The metacognitive aspects of literacy that students need to know about.