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Purpose statement: The reader will become more effective in evaluating online sources related to reading instruction.

Behavioral objective: Readers will be able to identify instances in which confirmation bias results in an over-use of quotations and a misrepresentation of authors’ original ideas.

Important Terms

• Word recognition – encountering a word in print and instantly knowing what it is.

• Word identification – encountering a word in print that is not recognized and using a strategy to figure out what it is.

• Decoding – identifying a word using letters and letter patterns.

• Strategy - a cognitive process that one consciously applies to a task.

• Skill - a cognitive process that has become automated.

• Penguin - a bird living in the Antarctic that is thought to be the cause of most reading problems.

• Confirmation bias – starting with a belief and selection only information that supports that predetermined belief.

• Academic discourse – sharing and evaluating ideas using reason and research.

• Context – something that matters.

If you’re looking for accessible, research-based information that slices through the endless loads of overly worded baloney, I would encourage you to subscribe to my free Substack, The Reading Instruction Show.

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• Purpose: Readers will understand how the three cueing system is used to recognize words.

• Behavioral objective: After reading this chapter, the reader will throw a pie in the face of any clown who suggests that the three-cueing system (a) is a strategy, (b) is an approach to reading instruction, or (c) that it teaches students to guess at words.

The NAEP proficiency levels were arbitrarily defined (Bracey, 2008; Ravitch, 2012; Reinking, Hruby, & Risko, 2023). These levels should be interpreted with extreme caution (Vaulton, 2025). The National Center for Education Statistics website provides three reasons for this (NCES, 2025):

1. Proficiency levels are based on desired expectations. Meaning that these levels are aspirational not mathematical.

2. These proficiency levels are currently being used on a trial basis.

3. Further evidence is needed to determine if these proficiency levels are “reasonable, valid, and informative”.

If you’re looking for accessible, research-based information that slices through the endless loads of overly worded baloney, I would encourage you to subscribe to my free Substack, The Reading Instruction Show.

Substack: The Reading Instruction Show

https://thereadinginstructionshow.substack.com/

Reading is a thinking process, not a responding-to-stimuli process or a sounding-out-words process. And since cognitive psychology studies human thinking; it makes good sense to examine the reading process from a cognitive or thinking perspective using the information processing model.

• Purpose statement: The reader will develop a basic understanding of reading from a cognitive perspective.

• Behavioral objective: After reading this chapter, the reader will be able to explain why penguins continue to insist the Dr. Johnson doesn’t believe in direct and explicit phonics instruction.

https://thereadinginstructionshow.substack.com/p/reading-and-the-information-processing

Important Terms

• Round-robin reading – going around the table or around the room and having each student in turn read a section of text out loud. This is a teaching strategy that should very rarely (if ever) be used.

• Popcorn reading – a form of round-robin reading except that the teacher randomly selects students to read a section of text out loud. This is designed to keep all students paying attention and on their toes. This is a teaching strategy that should very rarely (if ever) be used.

• Metacognition – thinking about thinking. In the context of reading, it means to pause and check for understanding. Does it make sense? Does it fit in the paragraph?

• Word recognition – you see a word in print an instantly know what it is.

• Word identification – you see and word in print that you don’t recognize. You must consciously employ some strategy to recognize it.

• Clown – a humorous circus performer. In the context of reading, it’s the term used to denote one who thinks they know a great deal about something when in fact, they know very little.

• Penguin or phonics penguin - one who thinks that heavy phonics and decoding should be the primary focus of early reading instruction. Every reading problem becomes a phonics problem and every solution becomes a phonics solution because that’s all they know.

• Lexicon – the dictionary in your head. These are all the words in your vocabulary. These words are known at various levels.

If you’re looking for accessible, research-based information that slices through the endless loads of overly worded baloney, I would encourage you to subscribe to my free Substack, The Reading Instruction Show.

Substack: The Reading Instruction Show

https://thereadinginstructionshow.substack.com/