Elementary Teacher Preparation in Reading
Instruction: Alaska
Delivering Well Prepared Teachers Policy
Analysis of Alaska's policies
Alaska does not require teacher candidates to pass an assessment that measures knowledge of scientifically based reading instruction prior to certification or at any point thereafter.
Alaska also does not require that teacher preparation programs for elementary teacher candidates address the science of reading. The state has neither coursework requirements nor standards related to this critical area.
Elementary teacher candidates must be prepared for the key instructional shifts related to literacy that differentiate college- and
career-readiness standards from their predecessors. Regrettably, Alaska's preparation and licensure requirements for elementary teachers do not reflect these shifts. Alaska's elementary teacher certification assessments—either the Praxis
II Elementary Education: Content Knowledge (5018) test or Elementary
Education: Curriculum, Instruction and Assessment (5017) test—are not
required until after teachers have been in the classroom for three
years.
The Content Knowledge test requires teacher candidates to be able to "use key ideas and details to comprehend literature and informational text" as well as compare "two or more informational texts on the same subject" and interpret visual elements in informational texts. Candidates are also required to "know the role of text complexity in reading development." The Curriculum, Instruction and Assessment also incorporate some of the instructional shifts in the use of informational text, including requiring candidates to know:
- How to develop students' ability to comprehend literature and informational text
- How to help students integrate and compare written, visual, and oral information within and among texts and multimedia sources
- Strategies and tools to help students compare and contrast texts and/or integrate information from multiple texts on the same topic
Neither teacher standards nor the certification assessments address incorporating literacy into all academic subjects.
While the Content Knowledge test does not address struggling readers, the Curriculum, Instruction and Assessment test indirectly addresses the topic by requiring teachers to "design instruction that differentiates for diverse needs." However, it does not specifically address the ability to either identify struggling readers or to provide appropriate intervention.
Recommendations for Alaska
Ensure that new elementary teachers are prepared to incorporate informational text of increasing complexity into classroom instruction.
The frameworks for Alaska's elementary content tests fail to capture the major instructional shifts of college- and career-readiness standards. The state should therefore—either through testing frameworks or teacher standards—ensure that all elementary childhood candidates have the ability to not only build content knowledge and vocabulary through careful reading of informational and literary texts, but also to challenge students with texts of increasing complexity. These requirements should be a condition of initial licensure.
Ensure that new elementary teachers are prepared to incorporate literacy skills as an integral part of every subject.
To ensure that elementary students are capable of accessing varied information about the world around them, Alaska should also—either through testing frameworks or teacher standards—include literacy skills and using text to build content knowledge in history/social studies, science, technical subjects and the arts.
Support struggling readers.
Alaska should articulate specific requirements ensuring that elementary teachers are prepared to intervene and support students who are struggling. The early elementary grades are an especially important time to address reading deficiencies before students fall behind.
State response to our analysis
Alaska recognized the factual accuracy of this analysis.
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Alaska
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Delivering Well Prepared Teachers
- Admission into Teacher Preparation
- Elementary Teacher Preparation
- Elementary Teacher Preparation in Reading Instruction
- Elementary Teacher Preparation in Mathematics
- Early Childhood
- Middle School Teacher Preparation
- Secondary Teacher Preparation
- Secondary Teacher Preparation in Science and Social Studies
- Special Education Teacher Preparation
- Special Education Preparation in Reading
- Assessing Professional Knowledge
- Student Teaching
- Teacher Preparation Program Accountability
Expanding the Pool of Teachers
Identifying Effective Teachers
- State Data Systems
- Evaluation of Effectiveness
- Frequency of Evaluations
- Tenure
- Licensure Advancement
- Equitable Distribution
Retaining Effective Teachers
Exiting Ineffective Teachers
Pensions
Research rationale
Reading science has
identified five components of effective instruction.
Teaching children to read is the most important task
teachers undertake. Over the past 60 years, scientists from many fields have
worked to determine how people learn to read and why some struggle. This science
of reading has led to breakthroughs that can dramatically reduce the number of
children destined to become functionally illiterate or barely literate adults.
By routinely applying in the classroom the lessons learned from the scientific
findings, most reading failure can be avoided. Estimates indicate that the
current failure rate of 20 to 30 percent could be reduced to 2 to 10 percent.
Scientific research has shown that there are five essential
components of effective reading instruction: explicit and systematic
instruction in phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary and
comprehension. Many states' policies still do not reflect the strong research
consensus in reading instruction that has emerged over the last few decades.
Many teacher preparation programs resist
teaching scientifically based reading instruction. NCTQ's reports on teacher
preparation, beginning with What
Education Schools Aren't Teaching about Reading and What Elementary Teachers
Aren't Learning in 2006 and continuing through the Teacher Prep Review in 2013 and 2014, have consistently found the
overwhelming majority of teacher preparation programs across the country do not
train teachers in the science of reading. Whether through standards or coursework
requirements, states must direct programs to provide this critical training. But relying on programs alone is insufficient; states must only grant a license to new elementary teachers who can demonstrate they have the knowledge and skills to teach children to read.
Most current reading
tests do not offer assurance that teachers know the science of reading.
A growing number of states, such as Massachusetts,
Connecticut and Virginia, require strong, stand-alone assessments entirely
focused on the science of reading. Other states rely on either pedagogy tests
or content tests that include items on reading instruction. However, since
reading instruction is addressed only in one small part of most of these tests,
it is often not necessary to know the science of reading to pass. States need
to make sure that a teacher candidate cannot pass a test that purportedly
covers reading instruction without knowing the critical material.
College- and career-readiness standards require significant shifts in literacy instruction.
College- and career-readiness standards for K-12 students adopted by nearly all states require from a teachers a different focus on literacy integrated into all subject areas. The standards demand that teachers are prepared to bring complex text and academic language into regular use, emphasize the use of evidence from informational and literary texts and build knowledge and vocabulary through content-rich text. While most states have not ignored teachers' need for training and professional development related to these instructional shifts, few states have attended to the parallel need to align teacher competencies and requirements for teacher preparation so that new teachers will enter the classroom ready to help students meet the expectations of these standards.
Elementary Teacher Preparation in Reading Instruction: Supporting Research
For
evidence on what new teachers are not learning about reading instruction, see NCTQ,
"What Education Schools Aren't Teaching About Reading and What Elementary
Teachers Aren't Learning" 2006) at:http://www.nctq.org/nctq/images/nctq_reading_study_app.pdf.
For
problems with existing reading tests, see S. Stotsky, "Why American Students Do Not Learn to Read Very Well: The Unintended Consequences of Title II and Teacher Testing," Third Education Group Review, Vol. 2, No. 2, 2006; and
D. W. Rigden, Report on Licensure Alignment with the Essential Components of Effective Reading Instruction (Washington, D.C.: Reading First Teacher
Education Network, 2006).
For
information on where states set passing scores on elementary level content
tests for teacher licensing across the U.S., see chart on p. 13 of NCTQ "Recommendations for the Reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, Removing the Roadblocks: How Federal Policy Can Cultivate Effective Teachers," (2011).
For an extensive summary of the research base supporting the instructional shifts associated with college- and career-readiness standards, see "Research Supporting the Common Core ELA Literacy Shifts and Standards" available from Student Achievement Partners.