Simple is as Simple Does: An Introduction to the Simple View of

ReadingJoe Magliano

Department of Psychology

Overview of Discussion

• Simple view of reading, 101– What is it?– Why should I believe in it?

• Flies in the ointment

Evidence-Based Instruction and Assessment

• Ideally, instructional and assessment practices should be based on theory:– Cognitively oriented theories of proficiency– Theories of instruction and measurement

• Are there cognitively oriented theories of reading proficiency that should inform instruction and assessment?– Of course there are, but which one?

A Components Perspective of Reading

• Decoding– Orthographic processing– Phonological awareness]– Fluency

• Lexical access - morphological awareness • Syntactic processing• Inference• Comprehension

A Simple View of Reading(Gough & Tummer, 1986)

Oral Language ComprehensionD

ecod

ing

Reading Comprehension

Reading Comprehension = Decoding X Oral Language comprehension

What is attractive about SVR

• “Old” and “New” skills– Reading is a newer skill than processing oral

language

• Clear predictions regarding changes in importance of skills over time.

• Simplifies the instructional and assessment landscape

Evidence: D X L X T(Florit & Cain, 2011)

Grade

Dissociable Constructs(Kendeou, Savage, & van den Broek, 2009)

• Studies using factor analyses support the assumption that decoding and oral language comprehension skills are dissociable, latent constructs

Flies in the Ointment: Over interpretation of D X L X T interaction

• What is the right dosage of decoding and comprehension instruction over time?

• Oakhill and Cain have shown convincing evidence that decoding skills should not be emphasized at the EXPENSE of comprehension skills (e.g., causal inference) during early literacy education.

Flies in the Ointment: Generalizing to Other Languages and Second Language Learners

• Florit and Cain showed that the D X L X T interaction is dependent on the orthographic nature of a writing system.– Ambiguity of the orthographic system matters

• What about second language learners?

Flies in the Ointment: What is reading comprehension?

• SVR - comprehension IS performance on a standardized test.

• Cognitive science– Simple Comprehension arises from a series of

mental processes and products that lead to a durable mental model of what a text is about

– Complex comprehension involves reasoning, critical evaluation, reflects about how a text is related to a task.

Flies in the Ointment: What is academic reading literacy?

Flies in the Ointment: The Common Core Standards

• The common core standards emphasizes both simple and complex comprehension and as such, what does this mean for the SVR?

Final Thoughts for Discussion

• There is COMPELLING empirical evidence for the SVR

• Support for the SVR should have an impact on educational practices

• But, is that all there is?• What does this mean for second language

learners