Het vergeten fundament van expliciete directe instructie

Re: blog ‘Explicit Instruction: Also for preschoolers’ (September 13, 2024) by Paul Kirschner and Mirjam Neelen 3starlearningexperiences.wordpress.com. 

Comment by Renée Laqueur-van Gent, posted 14th Nov. 2024

1. Start your lesson by reviewing what has already been learned.
2. Present new learning material in small, manageable steps.

These essential conditions are being named in your blog of Sept. 13, 2024 about Explicit Instruction, which, by the way, I fully support. You advocate teaching these small steps, with clear explanation, that should start even in preschool. 

In this comment I propose to add, and to make explicit, a requirement that to my idea cannot be missed in the list of principles for Explicit Instruction.

‘Clear explanation’ what does that in your opinion mean? 

Would explanation lose its clarity if the explanation is based on ‘misconception’ as described in your blogs of July 10, 2019 and June 4, 2019? I quote from the latter: Misconceptions form when prior knowledge conflicts with to-be-learned concepts. 

In these blogs you give examples of misconceptions (in the mind of the learner!) concerning physics or blood circulation, both outside your own expert discipline. May I invite you doing that as well regarding the way learning to read and write the Standard Dutch language by the prevailing standard is being presented to pupils of all ages? 

Could it be that not only misconception in learner’s brain becomes apparent when starting school education, but that (for a certain period of time) misconception is deliberately offered to and installed in the brain of pupils by the explanations their teachers give? 

I presume that you are familiar with the fact that in the phase of ‘preparing to learn to read’ in kindergarten and in the phase of ‘initially learning to read’ (‘aanvankelijk leren lezen’) teacher’s instruction since 1960 with the introduction of ‘Veilig Leren Lezen’ started to differ fundamentally from the knowledge accomplished readers and writers in Dutch, like you, possess. 

Allow me to clarify my propositions:

You and I know that ‘a sound’ is an auditive element, and differs from ‘an alphabet letter’, which is a visual element. We know a lot of similar speech sounds can be coded in more than one letter or letter combination (e.g. au/ou/auw/ouw have all the same sound). Therefore we use the ABC (the official names of our 26 letters in our alphabet) to spell unambiguously how words are written. 

We are aware of the fact that a consonant gets a sound only in combination with a vowel. Hence the fact that writing down the alphabet name of a consonant in Standard Dutch requires at least one added vowel (e.g.: b – bee, k – ka, m – em). No consonant bears a schwa sound as part of its own ‘sound’. E.g.: “bee” minus that ee-sound leaves us with just ‘lips closed with a specific pressure behind them’, a bit more than with the m, a bit less than with the p. We don’t pronounce ‘bee’ as “buh-ee”.

We know that the speech sound we make when naming each vowel in the alphabet (a, e, i, o, u; so each single standing vowel), is officially called the ‘long vowel sound’ of that letter sign. We know that the sounds represented by aa, ee, ie, oo, uu (double vowels) have identical long sounds as a, e, i, o, u. 

We recognise the so-called ‘short vowel sound’ in a one syllable word by the fact that it is being represented by ‘single vowel + consonant(s)’ and by ‘consonant(s) + e’ as well. In other words, the short vowel sound never is the intrinsic value of a single vowel letter, but requires a specific placement of a consonant next to this vowel.

It would strike us as incomprehensible if we were compelled to read in a letter-by-letter pronouncing, slurring way of talking.

We are aware that a ‘more letters vowel’ (meerletterklinker, my terminology) like e.g. ‘oe’, ‘aai’, ‘ieuw’ should not be named ‘the letter oe/aai/ieuw’ as these sounds consist of respectively 2, 3 and 4 characters. 

Do you agree that scientifically valid reasons are needed to justify a technical instruction method which tells the learner for a considerable amount of time a story in conflict with what we apparently see as the basic ‘laws’ of our (de)coding of texts, and of course in conflict with extracurricular experience of the learner as well? 

What if those valid reasons were not and are not there, the method simply became ‘in fashion’, and became so prescriptive that discussion about its contents is almost inconceivable?

Would it therefore not be sensible to discern 11 principles of explicit instruction, with number 1. applying to all school disciplines:

1. The contents of passed on knowledge is based on evidence informed insights that remain valid.
2. Start your lesson by reviewing what has already been correctly learned.
3. Present new learning material in small, manageable steps.
4. etc.

Concerning written language the smallest step of course would be learning the lasting name together with the lasting sound of a single vowel letter and its form: seeing, hearing, feeling combined together with its meaning in speech. The next smallest step would be combining the single vowel with one consonant (making a two letter word), showing how the placing of the consonant influences or not the sound of the vowel: o mo om …. .

I refer you for the rest of my teaching suggestions to my website www.logischlerenlezen.be or for a short impression to Wikipedia page Logisch Leren Lezen. 

But first of all, dear Mrs. Neelen, Mr. Kirschner, and blog reader, I would be very pleased receiving your opinion concerning my propositions and questions. You can reach me via e-mail renee@laqueur.eu.

Comment by Renée Laqueur-van Gent, 

info@logischlerenlezen.be, www.logischlerenlezen.be, www.zokanhetook.academy