New Zealand: Prof James Chapman's reviews of the past and present Reading Recovery prog + Emily Hanford interview

[Debbie_Hepplewhite]

The Reading Recovery intervention programme is known throughout much of the English-speaking world but its methodology has caused concern for many people. Professor James Chapman is one of those people, and so he (and Professor Bill Tunmer) have undertaken professional reviews over many years.

Dr Michael Johnston recognises the sustained dedication of James Chapman in this article (August 2023):

IN PRAISE OF A KIWI ICONOCLAST

https://www.nzinitiative.org.nz/reports ... conoclast/

Do read the full article, link above, it isn't long but it sets the scene.

I've added a link to this article via another thread featuring some of our 'Giants' who have, in their own ways, dedicated themselves to achieving evidence and practice-informed reading instruction in the English language, see here:

viewtopic.php?t=1172&start=10

[Debbie_Hepplewhite]

James was invited to write a blog for the Lifting Literacy Aotearoa site of the modifications to the Reading Recovery intervention programme - 'additions' written in response to the growing international criticism and worries about the methodology and efficacy of Reading Recovery, see here:

‘And + And’ rebrand won’t hide stale practice

Jul 2023

Introduction and summary by Lifting Literacy Aotearoa

In this blog post, Professor Emeritus of Educational Psychology, James Chapman provides his response to details about the Reading Recovery (RR) “refresh” that were posted on the University of Auckland Tui Tuia Learning Circle website and published on their LinkedIn page on 27 April 2023. This was titled “Reading Recovery refresh: unpacking the AND + AND approach”.

Download a pdf of the blog here. Or read on below.

James Chapman is one of New Zealand’s most well respected and cited researchers on the science of reading and understanding the causes and responses to reading difficulties for children.

His main points are:

https://www.liftingliteracyaotearoa.org ... e-practice

Do read James's review of the re-branding of Reading Recovery and check out the electronic links to further content!

About Professor James Chapman, a founding committee member of the International Foundation for Effective Reading Instruction:

https://iferi.org/team-members-profile/ ... ew-Zealand

[Debbie_Hepplewhite]

Here is the link to a thread featuring a number of international reviews of the Reading Recovery programme:

viewtopic.php?t=861

[Debbie_Hepplewhite]

Here is a good interview of American journalist, Emily Hanford, visiting New Zealand where awareness for the need for 'structured literacy' which includes explicit phonics teaching is discussed:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yLP_KJ1ztDU

Hopefully, this marks New Zealand moving away from Marie Clay's Reading Recovery programme which diminished the role and importance of systematic synthetic phonics provision for reading instruction - and promoted the multi-cueing reading strategies instead which is, as Emily states, 'how poor readers read'.