Fwd: [LiteracyForAll] Good News

[Susan Harman <susanharman@igc.org>]

Begin forwarded message:

> From: Susan Ohanian <susano@gmavt.net>
> Date: Wed Apr 12, 2006  8:27:49 PM US/Pacific
> To: LiteracyForAll@yahoogroups.com
> Subject: [LiteracyForAll] Good News
> Reply-To: LiteracyForAll@yahoogroups.com
>
> After some technical glitches, /Examining DIBELS: What it is and What 
> it
> Does /starts shipping  tomorrow.
> The Vermont Society for the Study of Education is proud to have
> published the nation's first critical look at DIBELS (Dynamic 
> Indicators
> of Basic Early Literacy Skills) titled, /Examining DIBELS: What it is
> and What it Does./
>
> The book's main contributor and editor is the nationally and
> internationally renowned reading authority Ken Goodman, Professor
> Emeritus from the Department of Language, Reading and Culture at the
> University of Arizona. Goodman is past president of the International
> Reading Association and the National Conference on Language and
> Literacy. Expertly evoking the DIBELS landscape, Goodman sees it as "a
> set of silly tests" that "misrepresent pupils" and "demean teachers."
> However, his ultimate depiction of DIBELS is as the "pedagogy of the
> absurd."
>
> Sweeping across America on the coattails of the Reading First
> Initiative, a component of the No Child Left Behind Act, DIBELS,
> according to the official website, was in use, during the 2004-2005
> school year, in 8293 schools across 2582 districts in 49 states and
> Canada affecting the lives of over 1.7 million children in grades K
> through 3. Its momentum has not slowed down.
>
> With erudition, insights and sagacity, Goodman and his contributors
> illuminate how DIBELS narrows the aims not only of reading but also of
> education itself. Reading is far too rich an experience to be reduced 
> to
> the competence of a trained-seal-response within an arbitrary period of
> time. Such antediluvian thinking turns teachers into compliant
> technicians, literacy into a race for time, and students into test
> taking robots. DIBELS is another form of high-stakes tests, in that
> failure brings about drastic effects. Sprinkled throughout the text are
> comments from teachers who have worked with DIBELS, revealing first 
> hand
> accounts of its effects on students, parents and teachers. The
> introduction is by a parent who stood up to DIBELS.
>
> Copies may be purchased from VSSE for the cost of shipping and 
> handling,
> $5.95. Make your check out to VSSE.
> VSSE
> P. O. Box 186
> Brandon, VT 05733
>
> VSSE maintains the anti-DIBELS Clearinghouse
> <http://www.vsse.net/dibels> at http://www.vsse.net/dibels.
>  We welcome contributions.
>
>
>
> VSSE would like to thank Ken for making his important work freely
> available. It is now our job to see that this information gets
> distributed as widely as possible. Please help. Please pass this good
> news on.
>
> Susan Ohanian
>
>
>
>
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
>
>
>
>
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