Susan Pendergrass speaks with Chad Aldeman, education policy researcher and founder of Read Not Guess, about Missouri’s early literacy crisis and why the legislature has struggled to address it. They discuss what it means for a fourth grader to be below basic in reading, why three-cueing may be harmful to early readers, the science of reading and what it actually prescribes, the case for third-grade retention policies, and more.

Learn more about Read Not Guess at www.readnotguess.com.

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Episode Transcript

Susan Pendergrass (00:00):
Looking forward to this conversation with you, Chad Aldeman. I just want to give you a little background on why I want to talk to you today. Missouri just wrapped up its legislative session in late May. This is the second year in a row that we have tried to make some inroads into what I consider to be a crisis, which is that 42 percent of our fourth graders are below basic in reading. We have tried to force the state education agency, the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, to improve how reading is taught and to create a system of guardrails around kids being promoted without knowing how to read, all of which have failed. What does it mean for a fourth grader to be below basic in reading? Given that more than four in ten Missouri fourth graders scored below basic, what does that mean?

Chad Aldeman (00:59):
Below basic is a very low level. It means that kids cannot read an unfamiliar passage and understand what it means. In fourth grade, maybe you’re not super worried about those kids, but you probably should be, because that is a key milestone. If you’re not reading in fourth grade, you’re really going to struggle with everything that comes next. You’re not going to be able to understand social studies and science. You may not be able to read owners’ manuals or instruction manuals when you’re trying to build things at your house. You’re really going to be dependent on other people interpreting words and language for you. YouTube is helpful, lots of things are helpful, but we’re still in a written culture, and there’s lots of information that’s written that if you can’t pass even the basic level you’re going to struggle with in life going forward.

Susan Pendergrass (02:02):
Yeah, so this is kind of the problem, which I consider to be basically a crisis. Forty-two percent of our kids are below basic. What we call it when we’re trying to fix it goes by a bunch of different names: early reading, early literacy, read to learn. But when my kids were little, about thirty years ago, I think it was called whole language, this language-rich environment where kids would just learn to read. But now there’s a thing called three-cueing. What is three-cueing? I assume it means that kids are supposed to look three different places for cues, but what specifically is it?

Chad Aldeman (02:37):
Three-cueing and whole language have a lot of similarities. They’re basically trying to get people to memorize words. Rather than sounding out, like my name is Chad, which is pretty phonetic, rather than understanding that the CH combination makes the ch sound, they want you to just memorize the picture in your head of what the word looks like. Really good readers do have a lot of memorized words. I don’t have to sound out my name. There are lots of words that my brain just goes to instantly because I’m so familiar with them. But taking what expert readers can do and using that as a method to teach kids is actually really harmful. Kids develop those skills by learning the core elements. The CH combination makes the ch sound, and they need to practice that when they’re learning to read. Over time they’ll just see it and recognize it quickly. English is quirky. English is not entirely phonetic, but it’s still quite phonetic, and phonics is still the building block of reading. There are cases when CH doesn’t make the ch sound, when it makes the hard C sound. Kids need to understand and recognize those as well. They need repetitions, and they need to understand what the normal rule is and what some of the exceptions are.

Susan Pendergrass (04:04):
So would three-cueing be considered part of the science of reading or not?

Chad Aldeman (04:08):
Three-cueing is not part of the science of reading. Three-cueing is saying, rather than teaching kids the building blocks of the language, have them guess at the words based on a picture they see. So there’s a picture of a horse, and they see a word, and they just guess horse. The text may actually say pony, and sometimes those differences really do matter.

Susan Pendergrass (04:29):
Ha.

Chad Aldeman (04:38):
The second cue is the first letter of the word, and the third is other context clues. So if it’s a story about horses, you might guess horse. And those cues are actually detrimental to learning how to read, to knowing what the words and letters actually translate into.

Susan Pendergrass (05:02):
Why? Why is it detrimental?

Chad Aldeman (05:04):
Because it leads to guessing. It might be harmless for a four-year-old to say pony when the word actually says horse. But as kids get older and start reading more complex texts, those types of mistakes really do matter. And if you haven’t learned the phonetic skills, you’re not going to be able to read a word like ribonucleic acid or something like that. When you start reading more complex words, all of a sudden you can’t break them down. Your mind doesn’t have the ability to understand how to break down a word that you’re not familiar with.

Susan Pendergrass (05:33):
Mm-hmm. So two years in a row at least, the legislature has tried to ban three-cueing so that teachers would not be allowed to use it. They punted a little bit and said it can’t be the first thing they use, but could still be a tool in their toolbox. They’ve gotten a lot of pushback. In Missouri, legislators are sometimes former teachers, sometimes married to a teacher, sometimes their best friend is a teacher. And they’ll just say, you know what, we’re a local control state, so we can’t tell these teachers what to do. When they’re in the moment in the classroom, they know best, and that’s how we roll in Missouri. But what I hear you saying is it can actually be harmful.

Chad Aldeman (06:39):
Yeah, and there actually is a science about how kids learn to read. It’s been well documented for a long time through empirical researchers looking at whether kids do better under method A or method B. What they found is that teaching kids the building blocks of reading, the phonetics, is more helpful, particularly for students who might struggle, or who are dyslexic, or have other language issues. If you teach the three-cueing strategies, you’re teaching them the wrong thing and leading them down a side road. It can lead to bad habit formation, which is then really hard to kick later on. The other thing that’s relevant here is that reading is somewhat sequential, and kids need a lot of practice in the early grades in order to be proficient readers. If you use the three-cueing tactics, you will not be giving them the building blocks they need to develop. And it’s a challenge to get kids back on track if they’re off. There’s all kinds of data about delays in reading, and kids who aren’t proficient by third grade will struggle in the short and long term. So it’s really important to catch those issues as early as possible in K through two.

Susan Pendergrass (08:14):
Well, on that note, another component to the legislation that’s been considered and that we have been supportive of is that if a child at third or fourth grade has demonstrated that they are substantially behind in learning to read, they should not be promoted to the next grade. What do you think about that policy?

Chad Aldeman (08:34):
Some people may hear that policy and think it’s punitive and it’s going to be bad for kids, but it’s not really about what happens at the end of third grade. I see that policy as more of a threat to the adults in that student’s life about making sure that doesn’t happen. In K through two, those students are being flagged and identified as being at risk of potentially being held back.

Susan Pendergrass (08:39):
Mean.

Chad Aldeman (09:04):
And they’re given interventions and supports so that they’re ready to take and pass the assessment in third grade. That’s really my read of the evidence. In the states that have these types of policies, kids who are flagged as needing more help get the help. That is the key: this sort of threat of being held back, and then the interventions and all the adult behaviors it changes. Teachers then know which kids need extra help. They then communicate to parents, hey, your child is behind and they need to catch up, and here’s what we’re going to do to help them. I wrote about this in Mississippi. They have learning plans, specific, tailored, individualized instructional plans for children who are at risk of being held back. And parents are brought into the conversation. It’s pretty scary that your child may be at risk of being held back, and here’s what we’re going to do in the interim to get them ready. That is the key for me. It’s not what happens in third grade. It’s all the stuff that happens before and what the adults can do to make sure kids are ready.

Susan Pendergrass (10:19):
Yeah, because if I understand it correctly, Mississippi has that policy, but they don’t actually retain that many kids.

Chad Aldeman (10:26):
Yeah, that’s right. In state after state, the states that have these types of policies, the number of kids who are ultimately retained is not that high. There are screens that are identified earlier in K through two, and then interventions are put in place. There are oftentimes some exceptions for students with severe disabilities or English learners who are newly arrived, and chances for retakes if there’s something about stress on the day or they go through a summer program. There are other ways to get students ready. It’s not just the third-grade cut point.

Susan Pendergrass (11:07):
Yeah, it seems like one of those situations, and I doubt it’s unique to Missouri, where people in charge of teaching young children to read feel threatened or feel like they’re being criticized, because we have a real problem with 42 percent of our kids being almost illiterate. And the adults are taking it personally, and therefore they’re resistant to any policy that would force the hand of these districts or teachers. And to me that’s just a shame.

Chad Aldeman (11:47):
Yes, I agree. I think part of it goes to the culture in education where every teacher is supposed to create their own idea and method for how to teach. We don’t really give teachers the building blocks of here’s a well-scripted curriculum, and if you follow this your kids are likely to be successful. Some of the highest-performing schools, school districts, and countries do a much better job of being clear that here’s a well-defined, articulated curriculum, and we’re going to support teachers to do it. There’s still the question of how it gets implemented, but the what is pretty well articulated. And this goes back to the science of reading idea: there is a science. It is evolving in the sense that there’s still more research being conducted and we’re still learning new things, but we know a fair amount about how kids learn to read. So teachers, schools, and teacher preparation programs should be equipping their teachers to use those things.

Susan Pendergrass (12:58):
So you have spent a lot of time studying and writing about this, and you decided to take a leap and start your own company?

Chad Aldeman (13:06):
Yes. I got interested in this because my own child was taught to read using three-cueing. He came home during the pandemic and I was oblivious. I kind of thought my son could read. We had been to school and celebrated his reading superpowers that the teachers had taught, and they were things like guessing at pictures, picture power.

Susan Pendergrass (13:26):
Yeah.

Chad Aldeman (13:33):
During the pandemic, he was a kindergartner and he came home, and we sent him up to his room to do silent independent reading. It turns out he was just guessing. He hadn’t been taught how to sound out words. After working with him, I came up with a program called Read Not Guess. It’s designed for parents to work with their kids, both to build early literacy building blocks like phonetic skills, and also as a way that they can spot early reading issues with their own children. It gives parents the tools to work with their kids, support them from home, and be an advocate by their side.

Susan Pendergrass (14:12):
And your son was in what’s considered to be one of the top school districts in the country, Fairfax County, Virginia.

Chad Aldeman (14:17):
Yeah, Fairfax County Public Schools. People move here for the schools, and yet we were using a balanced literacy three-cueing approach to teaching reading. To the district’s credit, partly because the state forced them to change, they have now moved to a more phonics-based approach and are using something called content knowledge building. So they’ve adopted a curriculum that’s also trying to build

Susan Pendergrass (14:22):
Yeah. Sure.

Chad Aldeman (14:47):
content knowledge along the way, which I’m supportive of. I’m sure there are people within the district who are upset, but the state said this is what we’re going to do, and so they’ve moved in that direction.

Susan Pendergrass (15:01):
You’re certainly not anti-teacher. You’ve been working on teacher issues for as long as I can remember, right?

Chad Aldeman (15:06):
No, I’m very pro-teacher. I’m pro-good policy. I’m pro-helping kids learn to read, and I think that’s one of the basic things that schools can do and that they should be doing.

Susan Pendergrass (15:08):
Yeah. Yeah. It really is frustrating to me that when something’s not going well in our state, we have 520 school districts, not county-based like Virginia’s, and it just feels like a throwaway line to say, well, we’re a local control state. As a matter of fact, somebody in our state education agency said out loud in a recorded meeting, it’s not our fault the kids can’t read, we’re local control. Everyone passes the buck and no one takes any responsibility. Some of them actively work against retaining third graders who can’t read or banning three-cueing. The last thing we were looking for was just that every student in the state would take essentially the same test with the same cutoff score so we could know consistently across districts which students are in that at-risk group so that we could identify them early. We got pushback on all of it. It’s baffling to me. We’re not trying to be mean to teachers. We’re trying to help little kids, because I see it ultimately impacting the Missouri workforce and everything else. We are graduating kids from high school who cannot really read.

Chad Aldeman (16:30):
Yeah, there’s a reason that the state created an education system in the first place, and the districts are entities of the state. They’re state standards, and so they should be teaching kids to those standards, and reading is a big essential building block of that. How far they get down into curricular choices is something that people can still debate, but the ultimate goal of teaching kids to read, and the argument that here are some methods that have been fundamentally disproven that we should as a state abandon, I think is a good and valid argument.

Susan Pendergrass (17:09):
Mississippi seemed to lead the way with this with the Mississippi Miracle, and then we have Louisiana and some other states. Do you see this spreading nationwide, this idea of forcing schools to use the science of reading?

Chad Aldeman (17:25):
Yeah. More states have science of reading laws, and they vary in their components. Last I saw it was 42 states. So Missouri is one of the last stragglers to not have one of these laws. The laws vary across the country in terms of how strict they are, what the state does versus what they put on districts, in terms of the third-grade retention policy versus state mandates on curriculum, whether they’re giving districts a menu of

Susan Pendergrass (17:37):
Right.

Chad Aldeman (17:56):
options or just saying they can’t use three-cueing. There are also other things around screening what happens for students in K through two, how much parents are notified, and what they’re given to help their children. All those things vary, but I think the most interesting point for Missouri is that most states have now adopted one of these laws and are pushing in this direction because they see the crisis as you’ve articulated it and the urgency for it. There’s still some important implementation work to get right if Missouri wants to see strong outcomes. Being focused on third-grade reading is very important, building it into accountability systems, building it into everything the state does, trying to simplify that and keeping it a priority. If the state is saying we don’t really care if it happens, then you’re not going to get outcomes. But if you focus on it and think about ways to drive it, there are levers that can be used.

Susan Pendergrass (19:03):
Yeah. Well, I hope we do it. Read Not Guess, where do folks find out more about that?

Chad Aldeman (19:10):
Read Not Guess is a website. It’s an email-based program. Parents can sign up for free at any time. There are three levels, starting with a beginner level, level one, then level two and level three. They’re all 30-day sequences. When parents sign up they receive

Susan Pendergrass (19:17):
Free, right?

Chad Aldeman (19:32):
a sequence of 30 emails for each of the levels. I also have one for slightly older kids who just need more practice, called a daily decodable program. There’s an app version of that program as well, or a workbook if parents want it in print form.

Susan Pendergrass (19:43):
Well, that’s great. Way to jump in and try to solve the problem yourself. I appreciate that. Thanks so much, Chad. Always great to talk to you. This was fairly narrow. We might need to have you come back and talk about school finance and teacher pipelines, but I’m going to reserve you for early literacy today. Thank you so much.

Chad Aldeman (19:52):
Thanks for having me.

Produced by Show-Me Opportunity

The post Missouri’s Reading Crisis with Chad Aldeman appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

If passed, HB 2872 would have created a mandatory third-grade retention policy for students who could not read effectively and established an enforcement mechanism to align Missouri’s teacher preparation programs with the science of reading.

One of the reasons cited by opponents of the bill was that we needed to wait and let Missouri’s 2022 early literacy reforms take “full effect.” The earlier legislation had some positive aspects, but HB 2872 would have filled important gaps that are clearly seen in a new 2026 report from the National Council on Teacher Quality (NCTQ).

The NCTQ report evaluates colleges and universities across the United States on how effectively their curriculum addresses the five core components of the science of reading: phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension. It also considers whether programs teach practices found to be ineffective, such as the three-cueing method.

Among the 50 states, Missouri ranks 44th in addressing the core components of the science of reading, with an average of just 2.3 out of 5.0 components. Half of all states scored 4.0 or higher, while often-praised Mississippi scored 4.7.

Even more alarming, Missouri ranks 2nd in the nation, behind only Maine, in teaching ineffective reading practices. Our participating programs taught almost four times more ineffective practices, on average, than the national average.

These results suggest Missouri cannot afford to simply wait for our prior literacy reforms to “take effect.” Today’s students in Missouri’s teacher preparation programs are the teachers of tomorrow’s children, and many are not learning how to teach reading correctly.

Nearly half of the universities in Missouri evaluated by NCTQ received an “F” in teaching the science of reading, including Northwest Missouri State University, Truman State University, and Missouri Southern State University. By comparison, 73% of Mississippi’s programs received an A and none earned an F.

It’s also concerning that 52 percent of Missouri’s programs either refused to participate, provided heavily redacted materials, or were otherwise unresponsive to the survey. These institutions partner with the state to prepare future teachers, and there should be transparency about how they train teachers.

The success stories of early literacy reforms are well known. Mississippi, Louisiana, Tennessee, and Indiana have posted meaningful gains in reading achievement after implementing reforms, while Missouri continues to slide in national rankings. We fell from 27th to 38th in fourth-grade reading on the National Assessment of Educational Progress between 2013 and 2024.

In 2023, Indiana required teacher preparation programs to be aligned with the science of reading and prohibited the use of the three-cueing method. Any unaligned program loses the right to be called “accredited.” In a previous NCTQ report from 2023 based on data from before Indiana implemented reforms, 33 percent of Indiana’s programs received an A+ or an A. In 2026, 96 percent received an A+ or A.

The reforms in HB 2872 were modeled on Indiana’s policy and would have helped ensure that future Missouri teachers are trained in the science of reading. Early literacy reform would have built on past successes and helped more students become confident, capable readers. All we can do now is try again next year.

The post Missouri Missed an Opportunity on Reading Reform appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

For years, the education establishment in Missouri has relied on a predictable playbook. Whenever state test scores drop or national rankings look bleak, we are told that the data don’t capture the whole picture, or that a new bureaucratic report card will soon show things are turning around. We are urged to wait, to invest more taxpayer money, and to trust the system.

But a newly released look at the numbers from a joint Harvard and Stanford project strips away the capacity for spin. According to the report, Missouri’s reading scores, which declined substantially during COVID, have continued to fall since 2022. We now rank 26th of 38 states (with usable data) in academic growth in math and 28th of 35 states in reading. In both reading and math, Missouri students are more than a half of a year behind where they were performing in 2019 (0.58 grade equivalent and 0.66 grade equivalent, respectively).

The authors point out that the pandemic slide was actually the acceleration of a trend that started around 2013. The pandemic simply poured gasoline on a fire that was already burning.

This scorecard release comes at a critical time for Missouri education policy. Recently, we’ve watched efforts to implement clear, transparent A–F school report cards go sideways in Jefferson City, bogged down by attempts to shift focus away from academic achievement and instead prioritize ambiguous school climate surveys. Fortunately, the governor’s executive order mandating report cards with letter grades will still be implemented.

Similarly, efforts to bring real accountability to early reading were derailed this legislative session. Lawmakers couldn’t commit to rigorously applying the science of reading or to making sure that students who can’t read aren’t socially promoted to grades where they will struggle to understand their textbooks.

If we want to reverse this generation-long decline, we must stop protecting the status quo. The folks in charge of public education need to be held to the highest standards of accountability. Furthermore, we must empower parents with robust educational choice, forcing the state system to compete and innovate rather than take families for granted. If we don’t make changes, we’ll only continue to fall further behind.

The post Missouri Students Continue to Fall Behind appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Recently, Show-Me Institute analysts have been sounding the alarm on Missouri’s literacy crisis. The data are sobering—42 percent of our state’s fourth graders can barely read, representing some of the worst results we have seen in two decades. When a child reaches the end of third grade without the ability to decode text, they do not just fall behind. They are essentially locked out of the rest of the curriculum.

Some rural Missouri students, fortunately, are beginning to make breakthroughs with help from The New Teacher’s Project (TNTP) and its Rural Schools Early Literacy Collaborative. This program helps educators move away from the discredited balanced literacy models of the past and encourages them to embrace the science of reading. This signals a return to proven, evidence-based instruction that prioritizes how the human brain actually learns to process language.

For too long, Missouri classrooms have relied on the three-cueing system, which is a method that encouraged students to guess words based on pictures or context rather than sounding them out. As Institute analysts have argued repeatedly, reading is not a natural skill like speaking; it must be explicitly taught. Focusing on phonemic awareness helps students identify individual sounds and connect them to written letters, building the accuracy and speed necessary to make sense of the text as a whole.

While it is heartening to see individual districts taking the lead, Missouri’s recovery requires systemic policy changes. We need essential reforms to ensure this new approach becomes the standard rather than the exception. First, we need universal screening to identify struggling readers in the earliest grades so no child slips through the cracks. Second, we must address accountability in teacher preparation. Currently, too many Missouri universities fail to train new teachers in evidence-based methods, and we must ensure our educators enter the classroom equipped with tools that work. Finally, we must make sure that students who are far behind in reading skills are not promoted to fourth grade.

If we fail to get the foundation right in the early years, we are setting our students up for a lifetime of struggle. The TNTP program is just one example of how we can prioritize research over rhetoric and turn the tide on literacy.

The post Why the Science of Reading Is Missouri’s Path Forward appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Momentum for early literacy reform continues in Jefferson City, as House Bill (HB) 2872 recently passed out of committee.

While this version removed several provisions from the original bill, it retains the core components necessary to meaningfully improve early reading outcomes. As HB 2872 continues to move through the legislative process, it is critical to preserve two elements.

#1. A Clear, Firm, and Objective Third-Grade Retention Policy

Under HB 2872, a student who scores at the lowest level on a state-approved Missouri reading screener will be retained unless the student completes a summer reading program and scores above the lowest level on a retest opportunity, or qualifies for a good-cause exemption. Good-cause exemptions apply only to students with limited English proficiency, disabilities, or students who have already been retained.

Having a firm third-grade retention policy is important. An analysis of multiple states’ literacy policies found no consistent evidence that reading scores increase in states without a retention component. Critically, the value of the retention component is not just for students who are retained—it is also for all the students who are not retained because their reading scores improve. In most states with retention policies, the retention rate ends up being low; it is the threat of retention, more than retention itself, that spurs widespread literacy gains.

A number of states—Mississippi, Louisiana, Indiana, Florida, and Tennessee—use a rule-based retention policy. These states have seen significant gains in reading, and all have higher test scores than Missouri.

Without a rule-based policy, teachers and parents talk themselves into promotions that are ultimately to the detriment of children. It feels mean to hold a child back. But it is no kindness to promote a child from the third to fourth grade if the child cannot read. It is not setting the child up for success.

HB 2872 requires that parents be notified if their child is identified as having a reading deficiency at any time during grades 1–3. This level of transparency can help parents be part of the solution for their children.

Retention can be a difficult experience, but research shows it is much easier on young children; it is primarily students in later grades who are negatively impacted when retained. Younger students who are retained under these types of policies benefit tremendously in terms of on-grade academic achievement, even years after retention.

#2. Accountability for Teacher Preparation Programs

It is also critical to align the training in teacher-preparation programs with evidence-based reading instruction. In 2023, the National Council on Teacher Quality evaluated teacher-preparation programs nationwide and awarded nearly half of Missouri’s participating institutions with an “F” for their coverage of scientifically based reading instruction.

HB 2872 allows the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE) to bring teacher preparation programs into alignment with the science of reading for the benefit of our students. Specifically, it allows DESE to review teacher preparation programs for compliance with evidence-based reading instruction and prohibit noncompliant programs from certifying new teachers.

The new version of HB 2872 that emerged from committee has changed in the following ways. The new bill:

• Has no explicit ban of the use of three-cueing (a reading method relying more on cues, guessing, and memorization rather than systematic phonics) in K-12 classrooms.
• Eliminates the proposed $500 incentive to districts for students who remediate a substantial reading deficiency.
• Redefines the Missouri Reading Screener to include multiple DESE-approved assessments rather than a single (new) statewide test.

These changes weaken the bill, but are secondary to the structural pillars of reform: an objective, assessment-based retention rule and stronger accountability for teacher preparation programs. As long as these pillars are in place (especially retention), HB 2872 represents meaningful progress.

We encourage our Missouri lawmakers to continue to take our literacy crisis seriously and to enact policies that help more Missouri students become confident, capable readers.

The post Early Literacy Reform Advances in the House appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Susan Pendergrass is joined by Cory Koedel, director of education policy at the Show-Me Institute, and Avery Frank, policy analyst at the Show-Me Institute, to discuss Missouri’s early literacy crisis. They walk through the need for a universal reading screener, the evidence behind third grade retention, why banning three cueing matters, how teacher preparation programs must change to align with the science of reading, what successful states like Mississippi have done, what Missouri’s current laws get wrong, and more.

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Timestamps

00:00 The Literacy Crisis in Missouri
04:42 Strategies for Improvement
09:37 The Role of Testing and Accountability
14:21 Retention Policies and Their Impact
19:08 Legislative Solutions and Future Prospects

Produced by Show-Me Opportunity

The post Why Missouri Needs Early Literacy Reform with Cory Koedel and Avery Frank appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Too many Missouri students are struggling to read at all grade levels.

The Solution

Adopt evidence-based early literacy policies that have a proven track record in other states.

Key Facts

• On the 2024 National Assessment of Education Progress, 42% of Missouri fourth-graders scored “below basic” in reading, up from 30% in 2015.

• Missouri Assessment Program (MAP) scores have not returned to prepandemic levels.

A Key Study on Early Literacy

John Westall and Amy Cummings at Michigan State University released a comprehensive national analysis of state early literacy policies in 2023 in which they identified 16 policies that consistently showed evidence of improving literacy. States with all 16 saw significant and sustained increases in reading scores, indicating a path forward for Missouri.

Third-Grade Retention for Struggling Readers

Westall and Cummings found no evidence that reading scores increase without a retention policy to hold back struggling readers.

Missouri technically has a form of third-grade retention on the books, but it is not based on objective academic benchmarks, and it is rarely used.

In the fourth grade, reading instruction shifts from learning to read to reading to learn. Students who cannot read effectively struggle to keep up. While retention is a difficult experience, it is less so when the retention occurs early, and research shows that retained students do benefit. Ideally, prospective fourth-grade students would take a state literacy assessment for reading. Those who do not meet the established reading benchmark would receive summer remediation and another chance to pass the test.

Good-cause exceptions could be made for some students. In other states, these include students with some types of disabilities, English language learners, and previously retained students.

Elimination of the Three-Cueing Method

Three-cueing is an approach to teaching reading that relies on text (the letters on the page) as little as possible and instead uses language cues.

However, reading is not an intuitive skill—rather, it is a technique to be learned. Research shows that skilled readers learn to read each letter rapidly and fluently as they connect the letters’ sounds with their oral vocabulary (phonics instruction). Three-cueing relies more on how the “whole word” looks, along with other context, like pictures. Fluency and decoding, rather than guessing and memorization, should define reading instruction.

Last year, Senate Bill 68 came close to banning three-cueing instruction. It needs to be fully eliminated in classrooms.

Align Teacher Preparation Programs

The National Council on Teacher Quality (NCTQ) released a report on how well teacher preparation programs across the country teach the science of reading. Half of Missouri’s participating universities received an “F.”

Indiana requires programs that certify teachers to include science-of-reading content and prohibit three-cueing. Missouri should follow suit.

Policy Recommendations

• Establish a mandatory third-grade retention program based on objective academic benchmarks with multiple opportunities and good-cause exceptions.

• Fully eliminate the three-cueing method.

• Ensure that Missouri’s teacher preparation programs train prospective teachers in the science of reading.

The post Early Literacy appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

The premise is simple: if you can effectively teach students to read in their early years, then they will be better at reading to learn for the rest of their years.

While there is of course need to continue reforming education practices at all grade-levels, the research literature and recent real-world examples show the positive outcomes that can result from focusing on helping students learn to read effectively at a young age.

This report explores the beneficial effects of a focus on early literacy. Drawing on the findings of a 2023 study by John Westall & Amy Cummings at Michigan State University, it provides a road map for Missouri: establishing a mandatory, academic-based third-grade retention policy, fully eliminating the three-cueing method for teaching word reading, and aligning teacher preparation programs with the science of reading.

Click here to read the full policy brief.

The post Third-Grade Retention and Early Literacy Policies appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

The premise is simple: if you can effectively teach students to read in their early years, then they will be better at reading to learn for the rest of their years.

While there is of course need to continue reforming education practices at all grade-levels, the research literature and recent real-world examples show the positive outcomes that can result from focusing on helping students learn to read effectively at a young age.

This report explores the beneficial effects of a focus on early literacy. Drawing on the findings of a 2023 study by John Westall & Amy Cummings at Michigan State University, it provides a road map for Missouri: establishing a mandatory, academic-based third-grade retention policy, fully eliminating the three-cueing method for teaching word reading, and aligning teacher preparation programs with the science of reading.

Click here to read the full policy brief.

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Kansas City Public Schools (KCPS) is focusing on boosting reading instruction for this upcoming school year. Specifically, KCPS is requiring all early elementary teachers, reading specialists, and other reading-adjacent teachers to learn evidence-based reading methods through LETRS. LETRS, passed in 2022, is a program designed to retrain Missouri’s K–5 teaching force in the science of reading.

The director of elementary curriculum at KCPS stated: “Teachers that are coming into the profession just don’t have the science of reading background from universities.” According to the National Council of Teacher Quality (NCTQ), this is a valid claim.

The NCTQ conducted a survey to evaluate which universities are implementing scientifically based reading instruction into their curriculum for future teachers—and the results are concerning. Per the survey, only 25 percent of higher education institutions nationally adequately address all five core components (phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension) of reading instruction. Missouri is no better, as nearly half of our participating universities received an F grade on the NCQT’s report.

There are still 70 districts and charters that are not participating at all in the LETRS program, and many more are not embracing evidence-based reading instruction. Reading achievement has improved in states that embraced this practice. If reams and reams of research support the use of evidence-based reading instruction, then why are districts ignoring it? How are our students learning instead? Why are our universities neglecting to properly educate prospective teachers? These are questions that Missouri parents deserve to have answered.

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In a few states around the nation—particularly South Carolina, Tennessee, and Mississippi—dedication to the science of reading (explicit phonics instruction) has done more than solve Wordle puzzles. It has helped English/language arts (ELA) scores in these states surge past their pre-pandemic levels.

If you’re wondering if other states are experiencing a similar surge in scores, the answer is no. Researchers at Brown University have examined scores from nearly 30 states (data are not available for all states yet) and only Iowa, Mississippi, South Carolina, and Tennessee have exceeded pre-pandemic performances in reading.

With Missouri’s ELA scores continuing to decline post-pandemic (29% of Missouri 3rd graders had a below basic understanding of ELA), I believe that our new science of reading program, LETRS, will help our students, and I am happy that DESE is using it. However, I also think there is reason and opportunity to further commit to the science of reading.

For background, Missouri’s new LETRS program provides optional training opportunities for teachers in “evidence-based reading” and requires comprehensive reading examinations for K-3 students. Any student who is diagnosed or at risk for dyslexia must be provided evidence-based reading instruction. While this in itself is a good program, there is a key lesson from South Carolina, Tennessee, and Mississippi that we could adopt: Fully commit to the science of reading—for all students.

As I have discussed in previous posts, commitment to explicit phonics instruction could be key to making Missouri a leader in reading. Phonics instruction has a proven track record in independent research, in other states, and even in our own backyard. Back in 2019, the Greenville School District in South Carolina, with 77,000 students (largest in the state), failed to meet state literacy standards. Due to this, teachers in the district had to receive two years of training in the “science of reading” and use a new curriculum rooted in explicit phonics instruction. However, this “punishment” actually turned into a blessing: district scores on the SC READY state assessment have risen past pre-pandemic levels.

All three of these states have committed to the science of reading being the core of literacy instruction, while Missouri appears to emphasize it only after a struggling student is identified. When breaking out the scores by demographics, the data show that the science of reading was useful to all groups. While data were not available for Mississippi, ELA scores for every ethnic group improved at a near-equivalent rate in Tennessee and South Carolina.

In Tennessee, school districts with poverty levels between 0–10 percent and 15–25 percent saw the largest gains. In Mississippi, districts with poverty levels between 10–15 percent and more than 25 percent saw the largest gains. In South Carolina, districts with poverty levels between 15–25 percent saw the most improvement. These numbers demonstrate that students of all different backgrounds benefit from the science of reading, and it should not be compartmentalized into one particular group.

These states understand that our institutions of higher education are not adequately instructing our teachers how to teach reading. Mississippi requires that all prospective elementary school teachers pass a test in the foundations of reading (which largely includes phonics). Tennessee requires that all K-5 teachers complete at least one approved foundational literacy skills course. South Carolina requires classroom teachers to use evidence-based reading instruction that includes phonics. These states have also tied the science of reading to their third-grade retention strategy, which may be valuable for Missouri to evaluate. Missouri should strengthen LETRS by creating a requirement for all elementary teachers to participate in the program, and further commit by targeting science of reading instruction to all students, not just the ones struggling.

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Why should we care about phonics instruction? Because it works.

There are typically two views when discussing early reading instruction: emphasis on phonics instruction involving daily lessons, and a “balanced literacy” approach which puts an emphasis on understanding meaning (three-cueing method) with occasional phonics sprinkled in. Numerous studies from independent researchers, the National Literacy Institute, and the Congressional-sponsored National Reading Panel have indicated that systematic and explicit phonics instruction is more effective in helping students learn to read than non-systematic (balanced literacy) or no phonics instruction. These results can be seen in schools that implement it, such as in Richmond or in our own backyard at KIPP Victory Academy—whose recent, explicit emphasis on phonics helped it obtain the highest English/language arts growth rate in the entire state from 2018–2021.

So why aren’t all schools using this method? Many teachers believe this approach is incredibly boring and drives the love of reading out of children. Additionally, it is hard for teachers to learn and teach; Missouri’s new phonics training program (LETRS) in Missouri takes 160 hours to complete. Finally, universities are simply not instructing future teachers to use this method effectively, or even hardly at all.

The NCTQ conducted a survey to evaluate which universities are implementing scientifically based reading instruction into their curriculum for future teachers—and the results are concerning. Per the survey, only 25 percent of higher education institutions nationally adequately address all five core components (phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension) of reading instruction. Missouri is no better, as nearly half of our participating* universities received an F on the NCQT’s report.

*Central Methodist University (F), Hannibal-LaGrange University (F), Lincoln University (B), Lindenwood University (B), Lindenwood University Graduate (D), Missouri Southern State University (F), Missouri Western State University (D), Northwest Missouri State University (F), Southeast Missouri State (F), University of Central Missouri (F), University of Missouri-Kansas City (A), University of Missouri-St. Louis (C), University of Missouri-St. Louis Graduate (C); all other Missouri universities declined to participate

Many universities in Missouri seem to be shying away from a strategy that can help teachers become better reading instructors. The LETRS program was a good start, but that law is primarily about identifying and addressing problems in early childhood reading, along with some additional professional development opportunities for existing teachers. We need Missouri universities to get on board and give teachers all the tools they need to effectively teach kids how to read right from the start.

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