Curriculum is not the answer to better education.
I said what I said. I think a good curriculum is necessary for continuity of learning and ensuring equitable instruction across classrooms. I think that a good part of the day should be spent implementing the curriculum to the greatest extent possible. BUT, I wish I had a dollar for every time a teacher said, "I don't have time in my day for the students to independently read."
The sad part is, no none listens to that. LISTEN TO THAT. We are so busy teaching students all the things they need to be good readers (which is always the goal) and never giving them the chance to actually be readers. In my 24 years in the classroom, my students have excelled in reading and if I have to cut something in my day, independent reading time is NOT an option. Luckily for me, my administration trusts me and aren't checking to be sure every workbook page is complete and every lesson taught exactly as the curriculum mandates. Every year my student test scores are exemplary, my kindergartners read more than some first grade classes, and my kids love reading time and are voracious readers. But no one asks my why. No one comes to watch me working on independent reading with the kids. Why? Because they watch me teach the curriculum. That's what our school asks them to do so we can check all the boxes. And I get it. They spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on our two major curricula. We need to be using it. But not as much as anyone thinks.
At our school, we focus almost entirely on the curriculum: training on the curriculum, grade level norms for the curriculum, common assessments for the curriculum, formal observations for the curriculum. No one talks about independent reading at my school. No trainings or professional reading is on independent reading and its power. No one discusses how to engage students in independent reading. No one is talking about new releases in children's literature, award winners, book circles, setting reading goals, reading challenges, or diverse authors. And, I would bet my salary that most school goals would be accomplished faster and better by paying less attention and time to the curriculum and much more time and focus on growing readers.
There is nothing curriculum can do for students that compares to actually reading books. The research is clear. Not only does the more students read improve their test scores, but it helps them as human beings and right now, our kids need everything possible to help their social and emotional well being. We know most kids don't read at home and we can only encourage it, but we can control what happens in our four walls.
"No matter how ling students spend engaged in direct reading instruction, without time to apply what they learn in the context of real reading events, students will never build capacity as readers." -Donalyn Miller, The Reading Whisperer.
Teacher burnout is so real and no one I know in education gets renewed by curriculum training. Or finding out we have a new curriculum. Or aligning curriculum with standards. But I do see teachers energized as readers themselves, making their own reading goals, or when their kids are reading well. This is what we are here for.
In classrooms where the teachers are fully on board with encouraging independent reading and involved in what their students are reading, the test scores reflect it. I have done enough data digs to know it for a fact. My wish is that I could impact decision makers and school leaders to taking a chance and changing the focus of the school for a couple years just to see. I know with all my being what the results would be.
