Dear Readers: This represents an opinion based on anecdotal data and experience. I know there's quantitative research out there, and I welcome it.
As a reading specialist, I taught at several independent schools, where most students have language-based learning disorders. One year, high school students in one of my reading intervention classes asked if we could work on a book they'd been assigned in English class. They were frustrated by the novel and thought it was "stupid." I was puzzled because the book House on Mango Street, by Sandra Cisneros, was within their Lexile range, depicted a coming-of-age story, and the setting, Los Angeles, was familiar to them.
I had not seen this type of reaction since the beginning of my career when I taught at public schools, similar to the one depicted in Sandra Cisnero's classic. A traditional U.S. framework was embedded into these public schools' standards-based curricula. Unlike the mostly wealthy and white students at the independent schools I taught, these pupils lived in households where their language and dialect were incongruent with the instructional models in the schools.
Around the same time my students were reading House on Mango Street, I attended the International Dyslexia Association conference in Los Angeles. One speaker, Dr. Washington, a professor from the University of California, Irvine, spoke about the intersection between dyslexia, dialect, and culture. Her research examines the disproportionate number of non-white students in special education or with an Individualized Education Plan (IEP).
Washington argues that non-white students carry a larger cognitive burden because they must process multiple dialects and are being mistakenly labeled with a learning disability.
I instantly connected to my class and their experience with The House on Mango Street as she spoke. Although most students have dyslexia and processing differences, they could broadly comprehend books like Fahrenheit 451, Animal Farm*, and The Night Diary (books above their Lexile level). Faced with literature outside their identity, they quickly deemed Cisnero's book less than or "stupid." However, these students came from affluent families who could afford to pay for outside evaluations, mostly avoided public schools and special education, and were often connected to the culture depicted in the curriculum.
The Orton-Gillingham is an evidenced-based structured literacy approach that addresses the needs of a diverse community because it focuses on inclusiveness in the mechanics of reading. This program and many others are born from a Greek, Latin, and Anglo-Saxon linguistic lineage. Absent are the other dialects and devices varying cultures use to teach language; absent is the art of learning. For example, many civilizations employ rhyming words, rhythm, and song to build a strong foundation. Dialectal differences exist within neighborhoods, communities, regions, and countries. Although we might see the elements in Prek through 2nd grade, structured literacy programs need to find a way to include these devices appropriately beyond the stage of phonemic awareness.
I see an opportunity to integrate the diverse components of language acquisition into Reading Intervention programs. Perhaps your child or student will feel valued, understood, and motivated if they can authentically connect with the context, thus allowing them to reach their full potential.
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