The Truth About Reading (2024)

CETICOS

The stories of a courageous activist, a teacher, and two American families who fight to provide our youngest generation with the most foundational indicator of life-long success: the ability to read.  Director: Jenny Mackenzie

Transcript

00:00:23Você lembra o filme Forrest Gump?

00:00:26And there's that moment where Forrest is asking Jenny

00:00:29If his son's like him

00:00:36Yeah

00:00:47I can

00:01:04I didn't want to do this

00:01:05But okay

00:01:25Oh my goodness

00:01:27That is a weighted question

00:01:32I

00:01:43Why is it so hard for you to talk about it?

00:01:47Because it's the biggest secret I've ever kept

00:01:50It is something that risks my hireability

00:01:56My likelihood to be employed

00:01:58My job status

00:02:00I have a best friend that always said

00:02:03Oh you know how hard it was growing up with a friend

00:02:05That was good at everything

00:02:06And anytime someone said something like that

00:02:09I felt like oh

00:02:10I was a fraud

00:02:12I was hiding something that

00:02:14I couldn't do at all

00:02:16And no one knew

00:02:17Everything about it felt so wrong

00:02:20But I mean also I was

00:02:23I think I was scared to death

00:02:25That my kids would experience life like I did

00:02:32Specifically school

00:02:33Tell me how many people you've talked about this to

00:02:37Five

00:02:37I have told five people

00:02:39About the challenges that I've had with reading before today

00:02:47So that's it

00:02:48I'm gonna go now

00:02:49Can I go?

00:02:50Yes, I'll take my phone out

00:02:51Okay

00:02:52Thank you

00:03:12Native alien

00:03:14I wrote this

00:03:16This was the first thing that I ever wrote in my life

00:03:20And I was about 50 years old

00:03:24And one of the things that people have asked our tutors

00:03:30A lot of adults that learn how to read

00:03:32The first thing they write

00:03:34The first thing they write is a poet

00:03:35Poem

00:03:36And the tutors will sometimes say

00:03:41There's

00:03:42New readers are poets

00:03:44But that's not true

00:03:46The truth is

00:03:47That we can't write a complete sentence

00:03:49So we find a way to write something

00:03:55And so

00:03:57And that's why we're poets

00:04:00Because we didn't know how to write a complete sentence

00:04:03The crisis hidden in plain sight

00:04:06About 20% of people here in the United States

00:04:09Cannot read at all

00:04:11And 50% of adults can't read past an 8th grade level

00:04:14One important and often overlooked segment of the population

00:04:18Are those who struggle to read or do basic math

00:04:21Unemployment rates can be two to four times higher

00:04:24For those with little schooling

00:04:25Compared to people with a bachelor's degree

00:04:27It's isolating

00:04:28Because you don't want your secret to be found out

00:04:3060,000 Milwaukee adults can't read at a 3rd grade level

00:04:34Many more aren't reading past 5th, 7th, and 9th grades

00:04:37What does it look like statewide?

00:04:40A million and a half

00:04:41A million and a half

00:04:42A million and a half

00:04:4336 million adults in the U.S. lack the basic literacy skills that they need

00:04:48Native alien here from there

00:04:50You can be found everywhere

00:04:52Going through the motions, showing your emotions

00:04:55Oh native alien, you are lame

00:04:58And literate society plays its game

00:05:00My next guest was illiterate until she was 28 years old

00:05:03And said it took a big toll on her life

00:05:06We sent a team out to the street

00:05:07To ask pedestrians to name a book

00:05:10Any book

00:05:12Can you name a book?

00:05:14And

00:05:18No

00:05:19They give us our promotions

00:05:20And they put us through the motions

00:05:22Bluebirds here, redbirds there

00:05:25And now we have jailbirds everywhere

00:05:27According to Begintoread.com

00:05:29Two-thirds of students who cannot read proficiently by the 4th grade

00:05:33End up in jail or on welfare

00:05:36Those who are filling the unemployment lines

00:05:39And the lines of the homeless shelters

00:05:41And the lines of some of these other social service agencies

00:05:44Are those who are not reading

00:05:47Oh how we tried

00:05:48Oh how we cried

00:05:50We were just past 5

00:05:51What was the last book you read?

00:05:52Um

00:05:54Probably Dr. Seuss

00:05:56Dr. Seuss

00:05:57Dr. Seuss

00:05:58Dr. Seuss maybe

00:05:59And how

00:06:01We had to hide

00:06:03Oh how we had to hide

00:06:04Oh how

00:06:05They stole our pride

00:06:07Skate goat

00:06:08Cover up

00:06:08Alibi 2

00:06:09Oh literate society

00:06:11Shame on you

00:06:12Sorry

00:06:13I am totally blanking out on books

00:06:15What do you do for a living?

00:06:16I was a librarian

00:06:19It's ridiculous

00:06:22It is ridiculous

00:06:22Like we have to resist these romantic notions

00:06:25That the educational establishment has been unbelievably good at selling and marketing

00:06:31Because it doesn't work

00:06:32And we have to learn from history

00:06:34And we have to act like scientists

00:06:36Which is

00:06:36What does the evidence say?

00:06:38You know

00:06:38Would I get on an airplane that a pilot has crashed

00:06:4060 to 80 percent of the time?

00:06:43Nope

00:06:44Why are we sending our kids into classrooms

00:06:47That fail to educate kids 60 to 80 percent of the time?

00:06:5090 percent for children of color and reading and mathematics

00:06:52For black kids

00:06:5390 percent

00:06:55Why would we do that?

00:06:57We do it over and over again in schools

00:06:58And when they fail

00:07:00What do we do?

00:07:00New classification for a child

00:07:02New learning disability

00:07:03New mythological disorder

00:07:05Rather than addressing the real problem

00:07:07Which is the teaching practices don't work

00:07:09Because they're not guided by science

00:07:11They're guided by traditions and beliefs

00:07:15I, about seven years ago

00:07:17I thought I knew a lot about education

00:07:19I had been working as an education journalist

00:07:22Basically covering stuff that was going on in Washington, D.C.

00:07:24Where I live

00:07:25And I read everything I could get my hands on

00:07:27I listened to all sorts of experts

00:07:28And I was really puzzled

00:07:31And very much struck by what has come to be called the achievement gap

00:07:35The gap in test scores between kids at the upper and lower end of the socioeconomic spectrum

00:07:40And it seemed to me incredibly important to figure out how to narrow this gap

00:07:44And so I started looking into it more as a journalist

00:07:48And also as someone who was involved in the education reform movement in a minor way

00:07:52I've been covering education for quite a long time

00:07:55Full time since 2008

00:07:59And all of that time I've been making long form audio documentaries

00:08:03And I've been really interested in the question of how people learn

00:08:06And what has been learned about that

00:08:08What cognitive scientists and others have figured out about how learning works

00:08:13And how that research and those findings are translated into practice or not

00:08:20And what seemed to me to be the problem and to other people was high school

00:08:24That's where scores were the lowest and the gap was the widest and the kids were the most disengaged

00:08:30And so that's where I started

00:08:32I started volunteering as a tutor in a high poverty high school

00:08:35And I was looking at the really shocking percentage of people who graduate from high school

00:08:43And are told they're ready for college and that's the next step

00:08:46And then they go to college and in many cases they take some sort of test

00:08:51Some sort of placement test

00:08:52And they're put in remedial classes

00:08:55Otherwise known as developmental classes

00:08:57And the shocking thing is that a lot of them never get out

00:08:59That becomes they get in these classes and they never get the college degree or the credential that they were

00:09:04hoping for

00:09:05But what I stumbled across and I did not figure this out by myself

00:09:08It was explained to me

00:09:09Was that the problems that become so apparent in high school

00:09:13Really have their roots in elementary school

00:09:15And mostly in the way we teach reading

00:09:19All across the country

00:09:20I was hearing the same story over and over again from parents

00:09:23Who were saying

00:09:25My kid's really having a hard time learning how to read

00:09:28And I'm going to the school and I'm saying

00:09:30He's having a hard time learning how to read

00:09:32And they're saying to me

00:09:33Don't worry about it

00:09:34It'll be fine

00:09:35It'll work out

00:09:36We need to find him a good book

00:09:37Once we get him a good series

00:09:39You know

00:09:39And sometimes this kid's now

00:09:40You know

00:09:40Second grade

00:09:41Third grade

00:09:41Fourth grade

00:09:42Fifth grade

00:09:42And the parent's saying

00:09:43I think there's something wrong here

00:09:44If you were to look it up

00:09:48It's everywhere

00:09:48You will see over 60% of children

00:09:52Are not reading at grade level proficiency

00:10:01And why when you look across the world

00:10:03Smaller countries, Caribbean islands

00:10:06Have a 90% literacy rate

00:10:08I mean, these are governments that don't have half of the budget

00:10:12Or the legislation power

00:10:16I really didn't understand what was going on

00:10:22My feeling is these kids can't all be dyslexic

00:10:26She needs quite a little practice on this following the target

00:10:30They were getting her ready to follow a line of print

00:10:33This young lady, Lacey Golden, has a problem

00:10:36A problem she shares with millions of other children

00:10:40A problem called dyslexia

00:10:42In a dyslexic person, all we know is that some sort of general blockage occurs

00:10:48The retrieval machinery of the brain ceases to function

00:10:52They suffer mix-ups with all kinds of words and letters

00:10:56Both written and spoken

00:10:58I met a bunch of people who told me they had dyslexia

00:11:00They hadn't necessarily been identified that way by their school

00:11:05Or diagnosed or had any kind of diagnosis of that

00:11:07But they had sort of figured that out about themselves

00:11:10So in third grade, I was diagnosed with a learning disability

00:11:15But I was in my late 30s before I'd ever heard the word dyslexia

00:11:21I just heard disability

00:11:24It was never really broken down

00:11:25I knew that I was behind in reading, spelling, and writing

00:11:30I'm an English teacher

00:11:31I've been an English teacher for 33 years

00:11:34And my daughter, when she hit third grade

00:11:39Her teacher, who is also a friend of mine

00:11:42Because I work in the same school district

00:11:45Said, hey, Haley is not making progress in reading

00:11:50Very concerned

00:11:52You know, we think she has a reading disability

00:11:54They pulled out a burlap cloth

00:11:58With, you know, the little

00:12:01You know how burlap is

00:12:02It's very thickly woven

00:12:03And they started kind of pulling it apart

00:12:05And they told me that I was missing some things

00:12:08And as a, you know, a third grader

00:12:12I kind of looked at this adult

00:12:13That was, you know, she was very nice, very kind

00:12:15And she was telling me, explaining to me

00:12:17That I was missing something

00:12:19That something was wrong

00:12:20And that I wouldn't be like the other kids

00:12:22As you move up, teachers will call on you to read

00:12:27But they, very rarely, they would call on me to read

00:12:32Unless we just went up and down the rows

00:12:35And the teacher would realize, like, who would read the best

00:12:39They would eventually just continue calling on that person to read

00:12:43And most of the teachers didn't really try to teach the kids individually

00:12:49They would just try to teach as a whole

00:12:51And it wasn't very effective that way

00:12:53All through school

00:12:55I would say all through my childhood

00:12:58I never heard any positive aspects

00:13:01Of my diagnosis

00:13:05Or the fact that I couldn't read

00:13:06Or spell

00:13:07Or write very well

00:13:11It was all negative

00:13:12There were things that I knew in comparison

00:13:15That I couldn't do as well as others

00:13:16So obviously you felt less than

00:13:18Right?

00:13:19A lot of shame again

00:13:21It's a very condemning feeling

00:13:23I obviously kind of hid my emotions

00:13:25But came home and was very devastated

00:13:28And I carried that through for multiple years after that

00:13:31That I was different

00:13:32And I could not read

00:13:34And there was nothing that anyone could do about it

00:13:36And I went, oh, okay

00:13:39Well, let's get some data

00:13:42Let's do some testing and see what happens

00:13:45Why is education and learning so important?

00:13:47It's correlated with every single positive outcome

00:13:50My lab does a couple different things

00:13:51One of our core interests

00:13:53Is in the neurobiological foundations of literacy

00:13:57Literacy, I always tell my students

00:13:59When I'm giving talks

00:14:00That literacy is one of the most fascinating things

00:14:02The brain does

00:14:03Your mind has learned to transform

00:14:05These arbitrary visual symbols into language

00:14:08Like what a crazy thing

00:14:10For us to expect the child's brain to learn to do

00:14:13And in fact, it does it incredibly well

00:14:16For many children

00:14:17So as scientists, we know a number of factors

00:14:19That support reading development in all children

00:14:22So what is dyslexia?

00:14:23The word dyslexia itself is confusing

00:14:26It's a clinical term that's poorly defined

00:14:28In 1996, they created a definition

00:14:32And they focused on phonological processing

00:14:35That was the main thing

00:14:36Phonological processing is the ability to manipulate sounds

00:14:40The sounds of language

00:14:41This is important because sounds are natural to us

00:14:44We, speech is natural

00:14:46But reading is not

00:14:47It's a relatively new invention

00:14:49So in order to read fluently

00:14:52We need to pair the sounds

00:14:53Which are natural to us

00:14:55To something that's unnatural

00:14:56Which is the written language

00:14:57If it's hard for you to understand

00:14:59That the word cat can be broken down

00:15:01Into c-a-t

00:15:03Then the idea of assigning symbols

00:15:07To represent each of those sounds

00:15:08Just fundamentally doesn't make sense

00:15:10Children who struggle to have an awareness of that

00:15:13Tend to struggle learning to read

00:15:14Some of the best, most efficacious intervention programs now

00:15:19Take a multi-pronged approach

00:15:21That weave in phonological awareness

00:15:23Along with vocabulary instruction

00:15:26Spell it correctly

00:15:27Remember here's your s

00:15:28So write that letter and say s

00:15:29Put a smiley face under it

00:15:31Two eyes and a mouth

00:15:32Thank you

00:15:33And remember that pattern

00:15:35That's a strong pattern in our language

00:15:37If there's an i in your y after him

00:15:39He's going to be s

00:15:39So write those and say ooh

00:15:41Say ooh

00:15:42Ooh

00:15:43Ooh

00:15:44Ooh

00:15:44Okay

00:15:45Along with instruction in the structure of print in English

00:15:49Take these different factors and weave them together

00:15:51And individualize that based on a child's needs

00:15:54When I switched from Flushing Schools

00:15:57Which was a public school

00:15:59To Genesee Christian

00:16:00Which was a private school

00:16:03I noticed my grades

00:16:06And my GPA going up almost double

00:16:08It was smaller classrooms

00:16:10But also the teacher would spend his or her time

00:16:13With individual students

00:16:15You know

00:16:15They would teach the class as a whole

00:16:17And then they would also go around

00:16:19After they taught the whole class

00:16:21And like make sure the student was doing

00:16:23What they're supposed to be doing

00:16:25If they had any questions

00:16:26You know they would answer them

00:16:28And so forth

00:16:29There are some kids who have parents who notice that

00:16:32And who figure out that they can do something about it

00:16:36Often with the assistance of a huge amount of time

00:16:40I've met a number of mothers who've quit their jobs

00:16:42To help their children learn how to read

00:16:44And a tremendous amount of money

00:16:46We're talking like thousands and tens of thousands of dollars

00:16:48To get the tutoring, get the help, get the testing

00:16:50It's just like

00:16:52Knowing you have

00:16:54The cure for cancer

00:16:55And you got it right there

00:16:57Like we know what to do

00:16:59We know now

00:17:01What works

00:17:02And what doesn't

00:17:03And so it's like having a cure for cancer

00:17:05And waving it

00:17:06In front of us

00:17:09And saying

00:17:10Get it for yourself

00:17:12Figure it out for yourself

00:17:15And I think that that's a shame

00:17:17To live in the United States of America

00:17:21And not be able to compete

00:17:25Not be able to be successful

00:17:28Not to be able to have the freedom

00:17:33Literacy is strongly correlated with socioeconomic status

00:17:37So when we say literacy is too low

00:17:41What we're actually saying is

00:17:43In a free country as wealthy as the United States

00:17:46Why do we have so many poor people

00:17:51Over 30% of people who are categorized as impoverished in the United States

00:17:59They're children

00:18:00The largest individual group of people in poverty in the United States are children

00:18:06Asking them to walk through the doors

00:18:08And magically pretend their lives don't exist

00:18:11So they can read a book

00:18:13Is cruel

00:18:15I think that's unfair

00:18:16That doesn't mean we ignore their literacy

00:18:19But I think it is

00:18:21It's just a maze of complexity

00:18:26When statistics like this come out

00:18:28I ask myself

00:18:28Is that a coincidence

00:18:29Or is it intentional

00:18:31And when I look at the history of America

00:18:34Whether it's been the American

00:18:36The Native Americans

00:18:37Whether it's been black or brown

00:18:39Or even poor people

00:18:40Rural poor people

00:18:41There have been things that have been done to us

00:18:44That history has proved were wrong

00:18:46In the black community

00:18:47They pump drugs in our community

00:18:48When you look at places around the country

00:18:50And you heard about the white flight

00:18:52You heard about people running to the suburbs

00:18:54And you saw how our government funded that to be able to give them suburbs

00:18:58And then the inner city is where you created the slums

00:19:01And so as a man myself

00:19:03Someone who grew up here

00:19:05Someone who has been incarcerated

00:19:07Someone who has been the victim of racism

00:19:10I was a product of my environment

00:19:12If I was on the corner

00:19:13And it was gang related

00:19:15I could be the best gangster

00:19:16If I was in a corporate office

00:19:18And needed to wear a suit

00:19:20I could become that best person

00:19:22And so when you have people going to school

00:19:24Kids going to school at a young age

00:19:26When your brain is a sponge

00:19:28And they're going backwards

00:19:30When your brain is a sponge

00:19:31You have to ask yourself

00:19:32How can that be humanly possible?

00:19:35Is it intentional or is it a coincidence?

00:19:38We're sort of creating the problem

00:19:40It's not that dyslexia isn't real

00:19:43But there's a whole bunch of kids

00:19:44Who are struggling with reading

00:19:45And many of them are getting dyslexia as a label

00:19:48And that's helping them in some cases

00:19:50Not in all

00:19:51Access services

00:19:52Like in some cases in some schools

00:19:54If someone will say

00:19:56Well you have a learning disability

00:19:57You have dyslexia

00:19:58It can open up access

00:20:01To the kind of instruction

00:20:02That you need to be able to read

00:20:03And I think we end up in a situation

00:20:05Where there are some people

00:20:07Who are better able to advocate

00:20:08For their children

00:20:09And get that label for them

00:20:12This is a literacy film

00:20:14Or an illiteracy film

00:20:15And sadly

00:20:16You know kids who are classified

00:20:18With reading disabilities

00:20:19You know it is

00:20:20If there's one thing

00:20:22I can communicate to the public

00:20:24Is that dyslexia

00:20:25Has never been directly measured

00:20:26Not once

00:20:27Never

00:20:27Not in the history

00:20:29Of that term being invented

00:20:30But a bunch of cognitive scientists

00:20:32And others got super curious

00:20:34About that

00:20:34Back in the 1970s

00:20:35And they started studying it

00:20:36In all kinds of different ways

00:20:38Not just in labs

00:20:39But in classrooms

00:20:40They studied reading

00:20:41And how we do it

00:20:42And how to teach it

00:20:43And what works best

00:20:44In terms of teaching it

00:20:45And they figured out

00:20:46A gigantic amount of stuff

00:20:47If a student is two

00:20:48Or more grade levels

00:20:50Behind in language skills

00:20:51That's a good indication

00:20:52That he or she

00:20:53May have a problem

00:20:54If the student also has

00:20:56Average or above average

00:20:58Intelligence

00:20:58Normal motivation

00:21:00A culturally adequate home

00:21:01And no gross neurological

00:21:03Or physical defects

00:21:04The odds are quite high

00:21:06That the child has

00:21:08A specific language disability

00:21:09And we're in a situation

00:21:11In this country now

00:21:12Where all of that stuff

00:21:13That scientists have learned

00:21:14About reading

00:21:14And how it works

00:21:16And how to teach it

00:21:16Just a whole lot of teachers

00:21:18Don't know that

00:21:19Unfortunately the behavior

00:21:20Of the selected kids

00:21:21Is such that

00:21:23It's very easy for a teacher

00:21:25Sometimes just to think

00:21:26He's a bad boy

00:21:28Or an unattended child

00:21:30Or something of that sort

00:21:31It takes special instruction

00:21:35That we're finding

00:21:36That educators themselves

00:21:39They were never equipped with

00:21:40It's like sending a surgeon

00:21:42Into the operating room

00:21:43And not even showing them

00:21:44How to use a scalp

00:21:45I taught then fourth grade

00:21:48And fifth grade

00:21:49And really there was no talk

00:21:52Of phonics

00:21:53And teaching kids

00:21:54How to push these sounds

00:21:56Together to read words

00:21:58We had between 28 children

00:22:01And 32 children in a class

00:22:03And I would say

00:22:05I had a good third

00:22:08Of the children

00:22:09Who struggled with reading

00:22:14I really just felt

00:22:17That they were parroting

00:22:18Everything I was saying

00:22:19They were very good

00:22:21At just going along with me

00:22:23Getting good at memorizing

00:22:25The books

00:22:26But I knew

00:22:27That they were not truly reading

00:22:29I decided to get

00:22:32A master's in reading

00:22:34And thinking that

00:22:35That was going to help

00:22:37I already had a bachelor's

00:22:39In special ed and elementary

00:22:41I dual majored

00:22:42Now a master's in reading

00:22:44I ended up becoming

00:22:47A reading specialist

00:22:48In the same district

00:22:49Where I taught

00:22:50Doing everything

00:22:51That I was told would work

00:22:53I had my group

00:22:55The kids had their little books

00:22:57I had mine

00:22:58We went around

00:23:00We shared

00:23:01We did the pre-reading activities

00:23:03By doing a picture walk

00:23:05Going through the vocabulary

00:23:08Everything I was told to do

00:23:10And I knew

00:23:11That I wasn't effective

00:23:13Which made me wonder

00:23:15How could anybody else

00:23:17Not see this

00:23:18I went through my program

00:23:19And never even heard

00:23:20The word dyslexia

00:23:21That's crazy

00:23:22That's insane

00:23:23People are working in silos

00:23:24And so special ed

00:23:26Is doing their thing here

00:23:27The curriculum and instruction

00:23:28Department here

00:23:29Leadership here

00:23:30But people aren't really

00:23:31Talking to each other

00:23:32And creating coherence

00:23:33And working smarter

00:23:35Not just harder all the time

00:23:36At the right work

00:23:38Say puh

00:23:39Puh

00:23:41Ool

00:23:42Pool

00:23:43Hotel, restaurant, and pool

00:23:45Read that

00:23:45Rest

00:23:47Rest

00:23:48Rest

00:23:49We're not done yet

00:23:51R

00:23:52Ah

00:23:54Ah

00:23:55Ah

00:23:56Ah

00:23:57Ah

00:23:58Ah

00:24:05It's always a match

00:24:06Between an instructional style

00:24:08Or a teacher

00:24:09And a child

00:24:12Even if you've been diagnosed with dyslexia

00:24:14You can still learn how to read?

00:24:16Of course

00:24:16I mean

00:24:17Can anyone diagnosed with dyslexia learn how to read?

00:24:19Yeah

00:24:21Everybody who is diagnosed with dyslexia

00:24:24Or a specific reading disability

00:24:26Can be taught how to read

00:24:28This is really just dys-teachia

00:24:32Not dyslexia

00:24:33And it's not the teacher's fault

00:24:35Look, I was a dys-teacher

00:24:37You know

00:24:38And I think I worked really, really hard

00:24:41But you don't know what you don't know

00:24:45You know

00:24:46Teaching's the only profession

00:24:47Where you're in a room all day

00:24:50With no adult contact

00:24:52It's not their fault

00:24:54It's not their fault

00:24:55Until

00:24:57They know better

00:24:59The teacher told me that my daughter would probably never read

00:25:02She wasn't learning no way, no how

00:25:05And she had already made up her mind

00:25:08And that

00:25:12That was

00:25:15Sobering

00:25:16To say the least

00:25:17My mother in particular

00:25:20Decided that that was not the case

00:25:21That I was

00:25:22A bright, intelligent, young lady

00:25:24And she did not want to give up on that

00:25:27Even though I already had

00:25:29Okay, so what we're

00:25:30I'm gonna do two more

00:25:31A little bit of assessment

00:25:31And

00:25:32We

00:25:33Found

00:25:34Ebley

00:25:35I'm just gonna have you write the alphabet

00:25:36Starting with lowercase letters

00:25:38Print

00:25:39Mm-hmm

00:25:40A through Z

00:25:41And then if you get to Z

00:25:42Keep going

00:25:42You're just gonna see how many

00:25:43Are there more?

00:25:45We're gonna go start back at A

00:25:46Okay

00:25:47We're just gonna see how many

00:25:48This is a processing speed here

00:26:01I think I'm confusing upper and lower

00:26:03Great job

00:26:08How do you do a Q?

00:26:09I couldn't remember

00:26:10Yep, yep

00:26:11I do it like this

00:26:12It's a hook around down with a hook

00:26:14That's a weird one

00:26:15Whoever writes it down, right?

00:26:16Yeah, yeah

00:26:16Okay

00:26:17We're gonna start out with this thing

00:26:19Called phonemic awareness

00:26:20Blending sounds together

00:26:21Pulling sounds apart

00:26:22Moving them around

00:26:23It's really important as far as for reading

00:26:24Okay?

00:26:25Tell me the sounds on this word

00:26:26Tell me each sound

00:26:28D

00:26:29D

00:26:29Yep, that's the letter name

00:26:30You're right

00:26:30So the sound that goes with it is D

00:26:32D

00:26:34R

00:26:35I

00:26:36P

00:26:37Drip

00:26:37Okay, so what would drip be if we took away the D?

00:26:40Rip

00:26:41What's drip without the P?

00:26:44Dry

00:26:44Now that could be I

00:26:45Tell me those sounds in drip again

00:26:48D

00:26:48R

00:26:49I

00:26:49P

00:26:50And what sound did you say there?

00:26:51Yeah

00:26:51So when we take away that P, keep that as an I, okay?

00:26:54What is drip without the P?

00:26:56Drip

00:26:57Beautiful

00:26:57What's drip without the R?

00:26:59Dip

00:26:59Awesome

00:27:00Now we're gonna do the same thing but we're just gonna have dots

00:27:02Eblee was born in 2003

00:27:05And we have trained thousands of teachers all over the country

00:27:09Anywhere from preschool teachers to high school teachers to even college

00:27:14People who teach college kids and adults

00:27:17Okay, cricket, tell me the sounds in bunny

00:27:20Uh

00:27:21Uh

00:27:22Uh

00:27:22E

00:27:23Research shows, and our experience has been, 95 to 100% of anybody of any age

00:27:30Can learn to be a highly proficient reader, writer, and speller with instruction that works

00:27:34If he can't read at all, I don't want

00:27:38It's possible if we work together and if people are open to what can happen instead of what can't happen

00:27:46If you can talk, you can learn to read. If you can talk, you can learn to speak.

00:27:50Our next word

00:27:52What's this word?

00:27:54Way

00:27:55What's your first sound in way?

00:27:57Wuh

00:27:57I gotta do it here

00:27:58You can just say wuh

00:27:59Wuh

00:27:59What's your next sound in way?

00:28:01A

00:28:01How many letters do you think are gonna go here?

00:28:03All the rest

00:28:04Yes, exactly right

00:28:05See how quick you learn?

00:28:06Yeah

00:28:07David is from Canada

00:28:08He's 62 years old

00:28:10He's been a multi-millionaire

00:28:11Very successful man

00:28:13Great in technology and all kinds of good stuff

00:28:15Hi, I'm David Chalk

00:28:17I am a serial entrepreneur, a business owner, mentor, and a coach

00:28:22By the time I was 29, I had made my first 50 million dollars

00:28:26I am a business person who has started many, many companies

00:28:31Done hundreds of millions in business

00:28:34Yet, I have to say it, I can't read

00:28:37And I certainly can't spell, which makes it a real challenge to write

00:28:41So I've come here to Ebley

00:28:43He had some difficulties over the past decade or so

00:28:47And is starting to come out of those, especially emotionally

00:28:50Just read me those words from the top to the bottom

00:28:52And we were just in the midst of, you know, trying to find an adult

00:28:56Who was successful that we could actually teach and show what the difference could be

00:29:00With a small amount of teaching

00:29:02So David agreed to come to Michigan

00:29:05I agreed to do it, got on the plane, which was another story

00:29:08Arrived there, and then realized that I had agreed to do it in front of cameras

00:29:12No laughing at me

00:29:15This is, this is craziness

00:29:20How are you feeling?

00:29:22Yeah, I'm feeling okay

00:29:23I feel embarrassed

00:29:25It's probably the main thing that anyone seeing this is going to wonder how I survive

00:29:32But if I don't have to spell it or read it, I'm fine with it

00:29:38And that includes reading contracts, reading documents, reading letters, anything

00:29:42But the result of that was debilitating anxiety

00:29:45Okay

00:29:46I'm very frustrated internally right now

00:29:49That I'm just not going through these quickly

00:29:51I know the challenges I have, but this seems like elementary school stuff

00:29:56I want to show you this

00:29:57So many adults are terrified to even speak and say that they're a struggling reader

00:30:02Much less to search out and try to get help

00:30:05But to put it on camera and let the world see it

00:30:08Is unbelievably courageous

00:30:10And very difficult for anybody

00:30:13And even he, who is very articulate, brilliant man

00:30:18Is being very traumatized this week by it, but he's doing it anyway

00:30:25Yeah, that one's kind of a one letter, two sound

00:30:27Like flat tire sound

00:30:28Okay

00:30:29To X E

00:30:31Yeah, what's your E spelling?

00:30:35Can it be just an I?

00:30:36Sure it can

00:30:37Yeah, we borrowed that from Spanish

00:30:38They use that as their spelling for E actually

00:30:41And remember that guy, small down first

00:30:43I'm here to remind you, okay

00:30:44You've been doing that for a lot of years

00:30:45Yeah, I hide all my writing so that you can't read it normally

00:30:51I'm at the Vancouver airport

00:30:53Just returning from an overnight trip to Toronto

00:30:55I didn't need that much with me

00:30:56My notebook computer

00:30:58Some CDs

00:30:59There were so many things I couldn't do

00:31:00I became fairly well known

00:31:03I created a television show and radio show

00:31:05Because that was speaking

00:31:06There was no reading, no scripts

00:31:08People would say, how do you do all that without a script?

00:31:10Well, that was my secret

00:31:11Done

00:31:12Doing points one and four

00:31:14And then we're going back to the studio

00:31:16Where you're going to join my

00:31:17When I would go to conferences

00:31:19And they would hand you materials to read

00:31:22And they'd say, you know

00:31:23Why don't you read through that

00:31:24And then we can look at this

00:31:25Straight in the garbage

00:31:27And I would wing it on everything

00:31:30Emails

00:31:33People would say to me

00:31:34I sent you that email last week

00:31:35Did you get it?

00:31:35I'd go, yeah

00:31:36And then I would wait for some sign from them

00:31:38Of what it was about

00:31:39And I got so quick at figuring out

00:31:42What the point was of it

00:31:43I didn't read them

00:31:44My success only came from my willingness

00:31:47To be bold

00:31:48And to get out there

00:31:49But I do look at it this way

00:31:51If I had learnt to read as a child

00:31:54As successful as some people might say I have been

00:31:57I only wonder what could have happened

00:31:59If I could have learnt

00:32:03By not teaching myself

00:32:04Taught myself to fly

00:32:06Taught myself computers

00:32:07Business

00:32:08Everything I did

00:32:09I taught myself

00:32:10But if I could have learnt from others

00:32:12By reading

00:32:13I don't know

00:32:14I was always

00:32:16Not always

00:32:17But most of the time

00:32:18I couldn't get up to the next step

00:32:19I was always held back

00:32:22Because I couldn't

00:32:23I couldn't read the contracts

00:32:25Or if somebody sent me a blueprint

00:32:27I couldn't read it totally through

00:32:28I wouldn't get promoted

00:32:30I'd stay as a labourer

00:32:31Or a helper

00:32:33And you know

00:32:34After a while

00:32:35When you see the guys

00:32:36That were laboring with you for years

00:32:38Turn around

00:32:39And they're up there

00:32:40Running the job

00:32:41Or running the equipment

00:32:43Which I ran equipment too

00:32:44But there was always

00:32:46Something in my heart

00:32:47Wasn't something wrong with me?

00:32:49You know

00:32:49Am I stupid?

00:32:50And I know I wasn't

00:32:52But I kept saying

00:32:53Well

00:32:55If people only knew

00:33:00It just

00:33:01Just totally tears you apart

00:33:06I don't think people understand

00:33:09Painful it is

00:33:10How could they?

00:33:12People who have experienced it

00:33:14They do

00:33:15Like you

00:33:15They understand that

00:33:17Sorry

00:33:17You didn't

00:33:18Well please do not say that

00:33:19No

00:33:20Letting this out

00:33:22Is always a really

00:33:23Really really good thing

00:33:24Because you're holding it in

00:33:26And you're just protecting yourself

00:33:27My dear

00:33:28You're trying to protect yourself

00:33:30From the lions

00:33:31That are coming after you

00:33:32The most important fact

00:33:34About these children

00:33:35Is also the least understood

00:33:36Unless they receive meaningful

00:33:39Effective instruction

00:33:41The sense of failure

00:33:42They experience

00:33:43Will literally shape their lives

00:33:45I have both

00:33:47I do have some outcome

00:33:48That you could

00:33:49You could focus on

00:33:50To show some of the movement

00:33:51If you wanted

00:33:52But basically

00:33:53We assess the kids in

00:33:54And look at here

00:33:55We have a 10th grader reading

00:33:57At a 2nd grade level

00:33:58Showing up to high school

00:34:00We have another one

00:34:01A 3rd grade level

00:34:02A 3rd grade level

00:34:03A 3rd grade level

00:34:04This is real people

00:34:05Yes

00:34:0849 year old

00:34:09Chadwick Fletcher

00:34:10Reads at a 5th grade level

00:34:11I felt like I was nothing

00:34:13I felt

00:34:13I felt so ashamed of myself

00:34:15Fletcher isn't alone

00:34:16One in four adults

00:34:18In San Antonio

00:34:19Reads at a 5th grade level

00:34:20Or lower

00:34:21We will graduate

00:34:22High school kids

00:34:24This year

00:34:25Across America

00:34:26That do not read

00:34:28More than a 2nd

00:34:29Or a 3rd grade level

00:34:30We'll expect them

00:34:31To be able to be employed

00:34:33And to build a life

00:34:35For themselves

00:34:36And their families

00:34:37And there's no way

00:34:38They're going to be able

00:34:39To do that

00:34:40We cripple them

00:34:41It's a death sentence

00:34:42And it's a lifelong one

00:34:44How did I graduate

00:34:44From high school?

00:34:45Because I didn't

00:34:46Really

00:34:46I couldn't pass the high school

00:34:48Graduation test

00:34:50I did eventually

00:34:51After taking it 3 times

00:34:54But I wonder like

00:34:55How did that happen?

00:34:56How did I get to a place

00:34:57To where I could graduate

00:34:59Or advance in grade

00:35:02And not be able to read

00:35:04And how did I get to a place

00:35:06In my career

00:35:06To where I advanced

00:35:08And I couldn't read

00:35:09I don't know

00:35:10If that isn't an indictment

00:35:12One could argue

00:35:13On our system of education

00:35:14Yeah

00:35:15That a teacher

00:35:16Doesn't know how to read

00:35:17How did this happen?

00:35:18And being a teacher

00:35:19That couldn't read

00:35:20There's more of a

00:35:21Greater moral dilemma

00:35:23For me to tell that story

00:35:25Sure

00:35:25I have to take the responsibility

00:35:26For that

00:35:27That was wrong for me

00:35:29As a little boy

00:35:30I went to school

00:35:31With high hopes

00:35:32And it's the adults

00:35:33That have the responsibility

00:35:34And imparting the skills

00:35:35And values

00:35:35And reading is one of them

00:35:37And I was just passed along

00:35:38Social promotion's been here

00:35:40For a long time

00:35:44Seventeen years

00:35:45I taught public high school

00:35:47In California

00:35:49I could not read, write, or spell

00:35:52Our next guest at our studios

00:35:53In Los Angeles

00:35:54Is John Corcoran

00:35:55Corcoran graduated from high school

00:35:57Got a college degree

00:35:58Taught school

00:35:59Made a million dollars in real estate

00:36:00He was a success story

00:36:01By anyone's standards

00:36:02A happy family man

00:36:03A former school teacher

00:36:04But his entire life

00:36:06Was based on a lie

00:36:07The secret he kept hidden

00:36:09For 40 years

00:36:10This is John Corcoran's story

00:36:11I'm 83 years old

00:36:15Everybody has a life story

00:36:17I was blessed to have

00:36:19My parents tell me every day

00:36:22First six years of my life

00:36:24They told me I was a winner

00:36:28When I was six years old

00:36:30My parents sent me off to school

00:36:32To learn to read

00:36:36And I ended up in the dumb row

00:36:38The teacher didn't call it the dumb row

00:36:40But all the kids knew

00:36:43When a teacher put you in a dumb row

00:36:46They've kind of given up on you

00:36:49And you get that message

00:36:51A child gets that message

00:36:52That first week

00:36:53As the students began to get used to their new school

00:36:56Miss Dewey was beginning to know her students

00:37:00Achievement not up to what he could do

00:37:03Hmm

00:37:04Two full years below his grade in reading

00:37:07He'll make his own decisions

00:37:12I didn't learn how to read

00:37:17By the time I was eight years old

00:37:19I was a loser

00:37:21I was in a hostile environment

00:37:23Early in my life

00:37:25By the time I was in the fifth grade

00:37:27I didn't have a reading problem anymore

00:37:29I had a behavior problem

00:37:31I would rather turn my desk over

00:37:34When called on to read

00:37:35Than be embarrassed

00:37:36I was a truant

00:37:38By the time I was in the ninth grade

00:37:40I was expelled from school

00:37:43For some kids it becomes very, you know, inward

00:37:47They become self-esteem problems

00:37:50Depression

00:37:52Some kids really act out

00:37:54Or they do both

00:37:55They start to act up in school

00:37:57To try to deflect attention away from the fact that they can't read

00:38:04This is a matter of life and death in some cases

00:38:07We had a 25-year-old that came to us

00:38:09He was hanging from a rope in his garage committing suicide

00:38:12And his dad walked in and cut him down

00:38:14He had been

00:38:15You can stay in school until you're 26 if you, you know, are really disabled

00:38:19Which they called him

00:38:21And they would lock him out of the school

00:38:23Because of his anger

00:38:24This kid wanted to die

00:38:26Little kids say

00:38:27I just don't want to live anymore

00:38:28They say that

00:38:29Little kids will say to us

00:38:30I just don't want to live anymore

00:38:33How did you manage to keep your grade point average

00:38:35All through school

00:38:37While you went through

00:38:38Without other people knowing?

00:38:40The system has been passing illiterate people

00:38:42Through the system for over 40 years

00:38:45And it's just

00:38:46It's just catching up with society now

00:38:49And I also cheated

00:38:54As often as you could

00:38:58The question was, how did I do it?

00:39:00I was passed through the system

00:39:03And today, if you behave yourself

00:39:06You can get a high school diploma

00:39:08Hi Eddie

00:39:09Can I see you for a second?

00:39:10Well sure, come on

00:39:10When I got to high school

00:39:12My behavior changed

00:39:13My personality changed

00:39:15By the time I was a junior and senior in high school

00:39:17I was a respectable student

00:39:19I ended up dating the valedictorian

00:39:23I ran around with college prep kids

00:39:25I was an athlete

00:39:26And I behaved myself enough to get that degree

00:39:34I got an athletic scholarship

00:39:35To go to a Division 1 school

00:39:38I remember I went on a train

00:39:41From Phoenix to El Paso

00:39:44And I got off the train

00:39:46And I said, oh my god

00:39:48You know, I'm here but I can't do this

00:39:51I don't, you know

00:39:52How am I going to get through college, you know?

00:39:56And

00:40:00I hate telling

00:40:02How I cheated

00:40:03I hate

00:40:04I hate

00:40:05One of the things I hated about

00:40:07Not knowing how to read

00:40:08Was

00:40:10Was being dishonest

00:40:12And deceitful

00:40:13Well I have a question for John

00:40:15First of all

00:40:15I don't believe

00:40:16That you did not go to college

00:40:19Because you couldn't pass an SAT exam

00:40:21I didn't

00:40:21You did go to college, you graduated

00:40:23You couldn't pass an ACT exam

00:40:25And if you cheated

00:40:25You had to read somebody's paper

00:40:27Did you take written exams?

00:40:29Can you read past the third grade level?

00:40:32I don't believe you whatsoever

00:40:34It's not possible

00:40:35And now you're a builder?

00:40:36Wait, wait, wait

00:40:38You're me

00:40:40I'm 53 years old

00:40:42I did not take one

00:40:44I went on an athletic scholarship

00:40:46I never took an entry exam

00:40:50The world is different

00:40:51If I were the only person

00:40:53In America

00:40:55That got through high school

00:40:57That couldn't read

00:40:58I'd understand that

00:40:59Or

00:41:00People that have gone through college

00:41:03I

00:41:04I was creative

00:41:05I cheated

00:41:06It was corporate finance

00:41:07Class

00:41:08That I was taking

00:41:09And

00:41:10I needed

00:41:11And I had this professor

00:41:13Would say

00:41:14He had midterm and final

00:41:15I would know

00:41:16That he

00:41:17Had the test

00:41:18Ready

00:41:19It was printed

00:41:20It was somewhere

00:41:21And

00:41:22How did I get my hands on that?

00:41:24So I went by his office one night

00:41:26It was about midnight

00:41:28And

00:41:29I

00:41:29Went up to the second floor

00:41:32Outside

00:41:33Where his office was

00:41:34And I had a butter knife

00:41:36And I opened his window

00:41:38And I went inside

00:41:39And now

00:41:40I crossed

00:41:41The line

00:41:41From being a cheater

00:41:43To being a burglar

00:41:44Being a criminal

00:41:45And

00:41:46I

00:41:47Went in his office

00:41:48And I looked around

00:41:49And

00:41:49And I looked in his desk drawers

00:41:51And

00:41:52And he had a four drawer file cabinet there

00:41:54And it was locked

00:41:55So I looked for the keys

00:41:56And

00:41:57In all the places

00:41:59I would think

00:42:00He might hide his keys

00:42:01Couldn't find them

00:42:02So

00:42:03I got

00:42:03A

00:42:05Couple of my buddies

00:42:06Together

00:42:07And

00:42:08We went over to the professor's office

00:42:11And

00:42:12Carried out a four drawer file cabinet

00:42:15Carried them down the steps

00:42:17Put them in the vehicle

00:42:18Took them off campus

00:42:19To

00:42:20My friend's apartment

00:42:23Checked out

00:42:23A

00:42:24Locksmith

00:42:26And

00:42:26There were three of them in town

00:42:28That worked

00:42:28All night

00:42:29He

00:42:30Opened the file cabinet for me

00:42:31And I said

00:42:32Oh thank you very much

00:42:33You

00:42:33You just

00:42:34I had to go to LA

00:42:35And I needed to go to this paper

00:42:37I was behaving like a businessman here

00:42:39And I needed those papers

00:42:40And

00:42:41I

00:42:41I needed that

00:42:42The whole thing was

00:42:43My academy award

00:42:45I mean

00:42:45I carried it out

00:42:46Like people were watching me

00:42:47And

00:42:48I got the key

00:42:50And

00:42:51I opened the file cabinet

00:42:52And got the exam

00:42:53And

00:42:54We took

00:42:55We took the four drawer file cabinet back

00:42:57This is about three o'clock in the morning

00:42:59Got it back

00:43:00And

00:43:01This is what's insane

00:43:02When I think about this story sometimes

00:43:05This is insane

00:43:06This is really insane

00:43:07But it also tells you how desperate I was feeling

00:43:12I passed the exam

00:43:14And I even took another course from the good professor

00:43:17Because I had his key

00:43:18I was feeling mission impossible

00:43:21Feeling pretty clever and creative

00:43:23And I got upstairs and laid down on my bed

00:43:26And

00:43:27And

00:43:27And I started weeping like a baby

00:43:30Because

00:43:31What I had just done

00:43:33Was a crime

00:43:34And

00:43:35Which was

00:43:37An insult

00:43:38To my parents

00:43:42And

00:43:42When I continued doing that

00:43:45I couldn't stop it

00:43:46I had to finish it

00:43:48And

00:43:49I can say that

00:43:50Every course that I took

00:43:52At the university

00:43:53I cheated

00:43:55There is so much pain

00:43:57And shame

00:43:58And trauma

00:43:59Around

00:44:00Subliteracy

00:44:01Around the inability to read

00:44:03Around people thinking it's their own fault

00:44:06They think they're broken

00:44:07They think they're stupid

00:44:08They think part of their brain is missing

00:44:09And

00:44:10That is kind of perpetuated

00:44:12They don't think that they're capable

00:44:14Of learning to read

00:44:15I bought into the big lie

00:44:17That something was wrong with my brain

00:44:19And I couldn't learn to read

00:44:21The university that I was at

00:44:23I had reached out

00:44:24To them to see if they had a reading program

00:44:28And their admissions office was basically

00:44:30Said

00:44:31If

00:44:32People that are enrolled in college

00:44:34They all have the competency of reading

00:44:37So we don't offer that service

00:44:38People say

00:44:39Why didn't you ask for help

00:44:40Where?

00:44:41There's a hotline

00:44:42You pick up a phone

00:44:43You go somewhere

00:44:44I'd be expelled from the university

00:44:47In two minutes

00:44:47If they found out

00:44:48What reading level I was at

00:44:50I was probably

00:44:51Reading at the second grade

00:44:52Reading level

00:44:53When I made the decision

00:44:54To

00:44:55Start

00:44:56Cheating

00:44:57It was more out of survival

00:44:59So I had asked for help

00:45:01Many times

00:45:02And there was just

00:45:03The stakes just got a little bit high

00:45:08I had one experience

00:45:09Where I was in a Sunday school class

00:45:11And ironically

00:45:13The person who was teaching the class

00:45:14Was also a school teacher

00:45:16She had asked me to read

00:45:17And the Bible is a very hard read

00:45:19It's a very technical read

00:45:21You know

00:45:22I'd wear my hair down

00:45:23And I'd kind of like

00:45:24Push it over my face

00:45:25And I kind of mumbled

00:45:26And read fast

00:45:27And at the end of it

00:45:29She looked at me

00:45:29And she said

00:45:30Do you have any idea

00:45:31What you just read?

00:45:32And I said back to her

00:45:34Like I just shook my head

00:45:36And I walked out the door

00:45:38In hindsight

00:45:38I look back at that moment

00:45:41And the person that was facilitating

00:45:43The class

00:45:44Didn't ever even attempt to help me

00:45:48Didn't ever sit down and say

00:45:50Hey

00:45:51Like

00:45:51Like let's work through this

00:45:53Like let's get you someone

00:45:54Who can

00:45:54It's like everyone kind of just

00:45:56Wanted to look the other way

00:45:58And I let them

00:46:00I went on and graduated from college

00:46:04And I could not read

00:46:06Or write

00:46:07Or spell

00:46:08I couldn't write a sentence

00:46:10You were a teacher too, right?

00:46:12I taught school, yes

00:46:13Without knowing how to read

00:46:14I did not know how to read

00:46:16And I taught my students

00:46:18The way I learned

00:46:19And I learned by listening

00:46:22And watching

00:46:23And I had a library

00:46:24Of audio-visual tools

00:46:27How did you grade your papers and stuff?

00:46:29And what kind of grades

00:46:30Did you give your students?

00:46:32Or did you just pass them on

00:46:33Like you got passed?

00:46:34No

00:46:35I didn't grade papers

00:46:37I had an oral participation

00:46:41He was pretty good at it

00:46:43But

00:46:44I married him

00:46:46I think he had all of his tactics down

00:46:48When the first year we were married

00:46:50He only taught PE

00:46:51He was always getting whoever the clerk was

00:46:54Or something to fill

00:46:55I don't know

00:46:56I don't have my glasses

00:46:58Fill out the paper

00:46:59Or you know

00:46:59Can you fill it out for me?

00:47:01And things like that

00:47:03I concentrated on blending in

00:47:05Looking like everyone else in my class

00:47:08So I developed a bunch of different ways to do that

00:47:12I essentially would Google a word

00:47:16And press the sound icon next to the word

00:47:19Confirmed

00:47:20And then I memorized the word

00:47:22And then would continue reading off

00:47:24I memorized a lot of stuff

00:47:26Tried to memorize things

00:47:28And then I would read by memory

00:47:30I'm pulling from my memory

00:47:33Versus sounding out a word

00:47:35I used to actually rewrite the textbooks

00:47:37Or rewrite the entire material myself

00:47:39And then create algorithmic images in my head

00:47:42And then when I see the question

00:47:44It's the image right there

00:47:45I have a very good memory

00:47:46When I finally found a reading tutor that could help me

00:47:49She said that my memorization is one of the highest that she's ever seen

00:47:53But obviously you can't memorize every word on the page

00:47:56So that didn't work well

00:47:57I got by actually doing it this way

00:48:00And I kept passing things and moving on

00:48:03As long as I had the time to create the algorithmic method

00:48:06That I used to always do

00:48:07I did fine

00:48:08I knew that you read from left to right

00:48:11I didn't know that you read each individual word from left to right

00:48:15So I looked at one word all

00:48:18All at once at the same time

00:48:20And the way that my memory worked

00:48:22I could hold about six to eight letters within my memory at the same time

00:48:26And I would pull from the beginning and the end of the word

00:48:29So if you took a word

00:48:31I would look at the first three letters I would have memorized

00:48:34The back three letters

00:48:35And then everything in the middle would become really fuzzy

00:48:38Manager, for example

00:48:39I noticed that I would use the word manger in place of manager

00:48:43Because the first three, the last three letters are the same

00:48:46Only difference is that manager has an extra A

00:48:49I would be able to identify that it was manager based on the context of the words around it

00:48:55But when I was writing it, it added a different level of challenge

00:48:59I'm going to right click on that word that's misspelled

00:49:02And I'm going to have a drop down menu

00:49:03And this is where it becomes a game of guessing

00:49:07Because there's no context of what any of those words are

00:49:12All the words look pretty similar to me

00:49:14And I'm going to make my best guess of which one of them is the word that I'm looking for

00:49:20to use in this email

00:49:22So if we go back to the example of manger versus manager

00:49:25Let's say I've misspelled the word

00:49:27Let's say I select manger based on my memory

00:49:30And I put it into the email

00:49:32I've made mistakes so many times for so many years

00:49:34I don't trust myself that I've selected the right word

00:49:37So I have to copy and paste that word

00:49:39Put it into Google

00:49:41And then search the word

00:49:44And then all of a sudden now I have the context around the word

00:49:47And I have identified I'm using the wrong word

00:49:50But I'm still in a terrible position because I don't know how to spell manager

00:49:56So I still don't have a solution

00:49:59So then I have to in Google basically give the word some context

00:50:03So then I'll search something like business manager

00:50:05Which I will misspell both of those

00:50:07Google will come back and say something like

00:50:10Did you mean business manager spelled correctly?

00:50:13I'll take the spelling for the word manager

00:50:14And then I try to imprint in my brain

00:50:16Okay manager has two A's

00:50:19Manger has one

00:50:20Manager has two

00:50:21Manger has one

00:50:22Okay copy paste

00:50:23Move on

00:50:27The energy and the effort it took me to do it

00:50:30That's really where I knew what I was doing wasn't the same as what everyone else

00:50:37My family had two medical emergencies in my house going on at the same time

00:50:42Life's running

00:50:43So I had to be really there for my family

00:50:46I didn't have the time that I usually have to do things in a way

00:50:52And prepare in a way to pass the boards

00:51:01Filled the boards and when I did I was really shocked

00:51:05And this is when I stopped and said

00:51:07You know

00:51:08I need help

00:51:11My wife is the only person that I told that I couldn't read

00:51:16We were sitting on the couch one evening

00:51:18And I said I couldn't

00:51:19I

00:51:20Kathy I can't read

00:51:21And she

00:51:22You know love is blind

00:51:24It's deaf too

00:51:25She didn't get it

00:51:28It didn't compute at all to me that he couldn't read

00:51:32It was like he wasn't a reader

00:51:34It wasn't a big reader

00:51:35When he was reading to Colleen

00:51:38Looking at a book

00:51:39If it was a familiar book

00:51:41You know

00:51:41The Three Bears or something

00:51:42He was pretty close

00:51:43But when he read

00:51:46Rumpelstiltskin

00:51:46I knew that that thing was made up

00:51:48You know

00:51:51I didn't really know he couldn't read

00:51:53I thought he was more being an actor

00:51:55You know

00:51:56Playing with his kids

00:51:59Hello

00:51:59I'm Mrs. George Bush

00:52:01It is a pleasure to greet all of you

00:52:04Who are participating in today's conference

00:52:06Building a Kentucky Coalition for Adult Literacy

00:52:10What made me decide to learn to read

00:52:14Barbara Bush was on television

00:52:16And she was talking about adults learning to read

00:52:20I am not a literacy expert

00:52:23But I am an enthusiastic cheerleader for proven programs

00:52:27And I am absolutely convinced that this is a problem our country can conquer

00:52:33And one Friday afternoon

00:52:35I had my pinstripe suit on

00:52:37And I drove my Cadillac over to the library

00:52:41And I said I wanted to talk to the director

00:52:43And when I got in her office

00:52:45We had a conversation

00:52:47And that was

00:52:48This is the first person that I ever told other than my wife

00:52:51That I couldn't read

00:52:52And she said it's a confidential program

00:52:54I know just the volunteer tutor for you

00:52:57I saw John's story printed in the newspaper

00:53:01I read about it

00:53:02And when I read that with 13 months of effort

00:53:06With a volunteer tutor

00:53:08That he had developed some ability to read

00:53:10I knew that there was still a factor in his situation

00:53:15That had not yet been addressed

00:53:17And I knew that

00:53:19And when I went to San Luis Obispo

00:53:20It was like an explosion with Pat Lindemuth

00:53:23She changed my life

00:53:24In knowing that there was science there

00:53:28And it wasn't just me being lucky

00:53:29I'm having so much fun

00:53:31Because I know I'm getting close

00:53:33If that's

00:53:35If that's

00:53:36That's

00:53:36OOB

00:53:37OOB

00:53:38Okay

00:53:39Good

00:53:39If that's OOB

00:53:41Show me OOF

00:53:42OOF

00:53:45OOF

00:53:46That's

00:53:48That's a

00:53:57All the volunteers have the heart

00:53:59They have the heart

00:54:00And they have the arts

00:54:01But they just don't have the science

00:54:03And we're not going to solve

00:54:05We're not going to solve our illiteracy epidemic

00:54:08On the backs of volunteers

00:54:10Good

00:54:11If you had

00:54:11If you're

00:54:12There is a science

00:54:13We have the science now

00:54:15We know

00:54:16That we can teach 97%

00:54:19Of humans

00:54:20To read

00:54:21And we just have to close that gap

00:54:24Between what we know

00:54:25And what we do

00:54:27Oh

00:54:27So

00:54:28Wow

00:54:30That was

00:54:31All the way up to touch

00:54:32Yes

00:54:33Yes

00:54:34Oh yeah

00:54:35Please smoke on this

00:54:46In 2000 Congress convened a panel

00:54:48And said how do students learn to read best

00:54:51This is called the National Reading Panel

00:54:52And some people feel that this was a political thing

00:54:56And maybe because it was Congress in 2000

00:54:59That we could say it was part of politics

00:55:01But in truth

00:55:02The work of that panel was to review all the research

00:55:05That had been done in previous years

00:55:07They released their findings

00:55:09And their findings show that

00:55:10The most effective way to teach children to read

00:55:13Is through systematic and explicit manipulation of phonemes in words

00:55:17In a balanced reading program

00:55:19Say fan

00:55:20Slowly

00:55:22And

00:55:23It's most effective when it is integrated with instruction in phonemic awareness

00:55:28Reading fluency

00:55:29And reading comprehension

00:55:31Phonemes are one of the most foundational skills

00:55:34You

00:55:34In order to be able to read

00:55:36You have to be able to decode the word

00:55:37And understand what the words mean

00:55:39You have to look at the word

00:55:40And tell me what those letters

00:55:41The sound each letter makes

00:55:42And when I put them together

00:55:43It makes a word

00:55:44The panel also found that children

00:55:46As young as those in preschool and kindergarten

00:55:49Are capable of learning the sounds of their language

00:55:51And how the sounds relate to print

00:55:53This knowledge of phonemes

00:55:55As part of the beginning literacy program

00:55:57Is critical in early reading development

00:55:59Reading is not like language

00:56:01It is not a natural evolutionary process

00:56:04Where you simply need exposure

00:56:06In order to develop the brain's capacity for language

00:56:10Okay, check your J

00:56:11Some of you had a different letter there for J

00:56:13Okay, check your J

00:56:15What happens early really matters

00:56:17Children becoming aware that our oral language is made up of sounds

00:56:21And they have to learn what those little squibbles are

00:56:26In terms of that they represent those sounds that we say

00:56:29The panel concluded that systematic phonics instruction

00:56:32Integrated in a balanced reading program

00:56:34Should become part of the reading curriculum

00:56:36At that time everybody was using the term balanced literacy

00:56:40Which I don't know if people have mentioned to you before

00:56:43And so yeah, the idea of balance sounds pretty nice

00:56:52The dove dove out of the tree when we dropped breadcrumbs on the sidewalk

00:56:58There's no way to know the pronunciation of dove and dove using just phonics

00:57:03You can see the wind wind through the valley because of the fog

00:57:07Wind and wine are pronounced differently

00:57:09They're spelled exactly the same

00:57:11Phonics does you no good there

00:57:12It is contextual language is very complicated

00:57:15For many children there are more phonics rules for pronunciation

00:57:19Than there are sight words they need to be proficient in reading

00:57:22We take the joy out when we make it more mechanical than it needs to be

00:57:26Students are struggling in specific areas

00:57:28We tend to just in general kind of just drill and kill and it becomes very rudimentary

00:57:34Here at Burbank Elementary we knew that if we wanted to implement balanced literacy

00:57:39We had to teach our teachers all the different components

00:57:43All the different types of literacy routines

00:57:45Read alouds, shared reading opportunities, interactive read alouds, guided reading

00:57:51Strategy groups, when to do a phonics small group, word study

00:57:56And it's not something that you can just open up and do that day

00:57:59And expect to be the master of it

00:58:01It's really a craft that takes time to develop

00:58:04From taller trees around them

00:58:06You will find in some areas that they're going to say

00:58:09Oh that doesn't work for us

00:58:11However, at our particular school we are a sign

00:58:15And a testimony that it does work

00:58:17What we find is

00:58:19Is that teachers will crack open the lessons

00:58:24And will decide to gut the lesson of the rigor

00:58:27Or the grade level intention of it

00:58:29In lieu of, well these kids just can't

00:58:32Although those ideals are, you know, admirable

00:58:36And, you know, we all share those values

00:58:39But sadly ideas and effective action to produce a result

00:58:44Are two vastly different things

00:58:47It has to do with this disjunction between the world of cognitive science

00:58:51And the world of education

00:58:53And they really are very different cultures

00:58:55They don't really communicate

00:58:57You know, teachers were trying to teach a little bit of

00:58:59Some explicit phonics

00:59:01And then they were doing the rest of their day

00:59:03Doing all this other stuff

00:59:04And there were a number of kids who came my way

00:59:07Who were really struggling

00:59:08The issue is it's not being implemented in practice

00:59:11And it's not being implemented in practice

00:59:13Out of this sort of perpetuating idea

00:59:16That it's best for children to learn through implicit methods

00:59:20And through just consumption of reading, etc.

00:59:23And that gets passed on from teacher to teacher

00:59:26A lot of teachers have felt

00:59:28When they've been adopting this skills and strategies approach to comprehension

00:59:32That there was something missing

00:59:34I didn't feel like I had all the right tools to help them move faster

00:59:39It seemed like it was still a really slow process

00:59:41I remember speaking to the Education Senate Committee

00:59:44The point I was trying to make to them is that our schools of education

00:59:48Are not connecting to practice

00:59:51To the practice that needs to happen to the science of reading

00:59:54I'll never forget this

00:59:55I remember sitting there and I looked at all of them

00:59:57And I said, you know, I'm going to write a book one day

00:59:59And it's going to be called The Science of Reading

01:00:01What I Should Have Learned in College

01:00:03I never wrote the book

01:00:04But that summer I was sitting down looking at my Facebook

01:00:08And I realized there's this thing called groups

01:00:10And I'd never heard of them before

01:00:13I don't know where I've been, but I didn't know about them

01:00:15So I pressed the button and it says, oh yeah, you could start a group

01:00:19And I'm thinking, hmm, I'm going to start this group

01:00:21And I started the group and within a month I had several hundred members

01:00:27And it just kept growing and growing and growing

01:00:30So the word was getting out

01:00:32Today we're at 137,000 members

01:00:34We're in, last count, 99 countries

01:00:37People are getting the information that they didn't get in college

01:00:41They just didn't know

01:00:44And so many of them knew there was something wrong

01:00:50They knew there was something missing in their teaching

01:00:53But they just didn't know what it was

01:00:56Not a day goes by

01:00:58And this is going to make me cry

01:01:00That I don't get thanks every single day

01:01:06Someone will write to me and say, you've changed my life

01:01:09You've changed my children's life

01:01:11And I thank you and don't stop your work

01:01:14That was my 19th year of teaching

01:01:16And everything, it was just, it was such a mind-boggling year

01:01:21Because everything I was taught to do that, you know

01:01:23I thought I was the queen of, was wrong

01:01:25We take a test iReady, it's a national test

01:01:29And my principal came to me in January and said

01:01:32Why are your scores so much better than your partners?

01:01:35And I said, well, I can lie to you

01:01:37And tell you what you want to hear

01:01:39Or I can be upfront

01:01:41And he's like, tell me the truth

01:01:42And I said, because I'm not using our district's curriculum

01:01:45He's like, well, what are you doing?

01:01:47There was a whole other group of approaches

01:01:48That came at it from what people call speech to print

01:01:52Which is really working from oral language

01:01:55And trying to teach kids the connections between the sounds that we make

01:01:59And how they're represented in letters

01:02:01And it sounded like a very subtle difference

01:02:03But I quickly realized that it was more efficient to do it that way

01:02:08At first, when I started recognizing this

01:02:11I thought, this is ridiculous

01:02:13Just stop what you're doing and do something different

01:02:15But it's so much more complicated than that

01:02:18Because schools are such complicated places

01:02:20It's 50% mindset and 50% practice

01:02:24The school in the poor neighborhood got all the government funding

01:02:26They got all that money, all those resources

01:02:29But performance didn't improve

01:02:31Because basically, we had all those resources

01:02:33And we set them up to confirm what we think we already decided in our heads

01:02:39That's half the problem, it's the mindset

01:02:41And over the years, there's even a certain amount of hostility

01:02:45That has grown up between them, unfortunately

01:02:47You know, in this sort of reprise of the reading wars

01:02:54Phonics versus now balanced literacy

01:02:57I think whenever you take a stance on anything

01:03:00There's always the other stance to take

01:03:02The state assembly passed the bill in June

01:03:04With most Democrats voting against it

01:03:06Citing concerns about teachers' curriculums

01:03:08Sparking what some have dubbed the reading wars

01:03:11One side is taking more of an approach of

01:03:16We just have to emerge children in literacy

01:03:20Focus their attention not on little bits of things

01:03:24Like sounds or words

01:03:26But on the overall thing

01:03:28So that to help them always make the thing make sense

01:03:32Balanced literacy is a term that really morphed out

01:03:35Of what was the whole language movement

01:03:39Provide a lot of pictures

01:03:41And have them access the meaning

01:03:44Through thinking about what would make sense of a story

01:03:48It's almost like suggesting that a child who was listening

01:03:53Or an adult who was listening to Mozart all their life

01:03:56You put them in front of a piano and you say

01:03:58Now you play Mozart

01:03:59Teachers want to do the best they can for kids

01:04:05I think it was just that whole language theory had flaws

01:04:11I studied it back then

01:04:13And I worked for some of the people that said

01:04:15Sam, you can't be doing phonics

01:04:17What are you doing?

01:04:18And I pushed back

01:04:19You know, no, we have to be doing phonics too

01:04:22But that era should be over

01:04:24The misconception is that balanced literacy is the opposite of phonics instruction

01:04:29If you're not teaching phonics, you're not doing balanced literacy

01:04:33Oiled and put away

01:04:35And then they ran

01:04:38Try the skin and

01:04:39And they ran

01:04:40All day long

01:04:43Oiled? Do you have to oil your shoes?

01:04:45No

01:04:45Isn't that funny? They have to oil their shoes

01:04:47My daughter's kindergarten year

01:04:49I was in the classroom doing something totally unrelated

01:04:52I saw their teaching instruction and it stopped me in my tracks

01:04:57Because it was everything that I had taught myself to do to look like a good reader

01:05:04They were reading a book all together and there was a picture of a bear and a fox if I

01:05:12recall correctly

01:05:13And I think it was ICA

01:05:16And they got to the word bear

01:05:17And she pointed to the word and said

01:05:20What's the first letter you see here? B

01:05:22What sound is B?

01:05:24Ba

01:05:24Okay, so look at the picture

01:05:26So then she had directed them away from the words

01:05:28Look at the picture

01:05:30Do you think it's a bear or is it a fox?

01:05:33And the kids screamed bear

01:05:34And then they read the sentence

01:05:35And then they congratulated themselves on reading the sentence

01:05:38And moved on

01:05:39And I thought

01:05:40Oh no

01:05:41That's not

01:05:42You know, I wanted to scream at the top of my lungs

01:05:44That's not what good readers do

01:05:46No one says phonics instruction is all you need to do

01:05:49But if you don't teach kids how to read the words

01:05:51You're leaving so many kids behind

01:05:53And so you have to ask yourself

01:05:55If we have this data

01:05:56If we have this knowledge

01:05:57Why aren't we being more audacious and bold and confronting?

01:06:03With the answers that we know that we have

01:06:06Through the science of reading

01:06:07Why aren't we asking ourselves

01:06:09How can we live with balanced literacy and the science of reading?

01:06:12Why does there have to be a war?

01:06:14When we know that the outcome of us having that debate

01:06:19Is literally the trajectory of someone's life

01:06:27So this is the Genesee County Jail

01:06:30I know incarceration

01:06:32I see three generations come through the jail

01:06:35Dads, kids, grandpas, grandmas, daughters, grandchildren

01:06:40And there had to be a better way

01:06:42So 2019

01:06:44I'm actually training

01:06:45And an idea popped in my head

01:06:47Because education has set me free

01:06:49Why don't we take the entire model of incarceration

01:06:52And turn it into education?

01:06:57This is an average day at school

01:07:00Half of them cannot read

01:07:0250% can't read

01:07:04The average before Ignite

01:07:06Math was 5th grade

01:07:08And reading was 6, 6 and a half grade

01:07:10And then 6 out of 10 are mentally ill

01:07:14By having an audience here that we can protect

01:07:17And give them the ability to read better

01:07:19Or to read in the first place

01:07:21And that self-confidence kicks in

01:07:23It spills over in all aspects of life

01:07:25They become better fathers, mothers

01:07:26They become better sons, daughters

01:07:28They become citizens

01:07:29And I've told people

01:07:30I have no interest in making better inmates

01:07:32I'm interested in making better people

01:07:35I've been coming to this jail a long time

01:07:37And I've never seen anything like it

01:07:39I've been coming to this jail since 2004

01:07:44And I've had one hell of a past

01:07:46But it's given me an opportunity to change that

01:07:50And instead of getting stuck in that same cycle

01:07:53Now I'm trying to break it

01:07:55And it's given me that opportunity to break that cycle

01:07:58There's a direct correlation between

01:08:00The school to prison pipeline

01:08:03And having the highest incarceration rate

01:08:05Of any country in the world

01:08:06So we're the land of the free

01:08:09But are we really, if people don't have the currency

01:08:12Of the 21st century in their hands

01:08:14So that they can find their place at the table

01:08:17And not end up on the menu

01:08:19Thinking about 85% of adjudicated youth

01:08:22In the juvenile court system

01:08:24They're functionally illiterate

01:08:26I don't think people know that

01:08:28Go ahead, sir

01:08:28Me, one thing that changed about my

01:08:32The program changed about me

01:08:34When I was growing up

01:08:36I didn't really go to school and stuff

01:08:38And then I started going to school

01:08:40But I was falling back

01:08:42And this program, I want to finish it

01:08:45So I can have something to look at in my life

01:08:48That makes me proud

01:08:50And I want to go to college

01:08:52I want to put my life into engineering

01:08:56And this program's helping me

01:08:59Well, it's given me an opportunity to get my GED

01:09:02I got the GED through the Genesee County Ignite program

01:09:05And it's given me a chance to use this time

01:09:09And make it worth something

01:09:11Because if you're stagnant

01:09:13And you're not doing anything

01:09:14Then it's just a waste of time

01:09:19And what I want to point out

01:09:21Is if you look around

01:09:23Jails are very segregated by classes and colors

01:09:26You've got white and black sitting next to each other

01:09:29You've got them figuring out, helping each other

01:09:30It breaks down barriers

01:09:32You talk about unity, this is unity

01:09:34As I said, you're changing the history of incarceration

01:09:38Thank God for people like that

01:09:41What we get is sub-par, below-the-bar programs

01:09:50Stopgap programs

01:09:54Instead of outcomes

01:09:57And it pisses me off that people play with children's lives

01:10:01At some point, we've got to stop the bleed

01:10:04See, when you know

01:10:06You fight

01:10:07And we're igniting the movement

01:10:10And with igniting the movement

01:10:12I also have to make sure that they understand

01:10:15That they understand

01:10:17What's going on

01:10:18This is actually exciting

01:10:20Like, not anxiety exciting

01:10:22But like, wow, I never knew that

01:10:24This is something new for my brain

01:10:27Yeah, pretty cool

01:10:28It's like a puzzle

01:10:29Yeah

01:10:30Okay

01:10:30And within walking distance

01:10:33Were the courthouse

01:10:34The governor's mansion

01:10:36And the intriguing, intriguing La Fonda Hotel

01:10:43Nice

01:10:43I can't believe you're saying yes

01:10:45And I have no anxiety

01:10:47Yeah

01:10:47I know

01:10:48It's crazy

01:10:49This is what readings should feel

01:10:50Even though I'm not

01:10:51Just even thinking about what it could do for other people

01:10:54I have goosebumps

01:10:55My hairs are standing up on end

01:10:57This is life-changing

01:11:00I think for most people

01:11:01That haven't achieved everything they dreamed

01:11:04Or wanted to achieve in life

01:11:05If they looked at the very fact

01:11:07That they don't feel confident reading or spelling

01:11:10Even if they don't understand, that's it

01:11:12If they were taking a program such as this

01:11:16Their lives would change

01:11:21I did what she told me to do

01:11:23And here I am, a 60-year-old person

01:11:27Can't read

01:11:28And after just a couple days

01:11:3011 hours

01:11:31I astounded myself

01:11:34I couldn't even believe it could be real

01:11:38David, this is amazing

01:11:43Jubilation

01:11:43Wow

01:11:47Oh my gosh

01:11:48Oh my gosh

01:11:56Can I give you a hug?

01:11:58I am so afraid to do

01:12:01Oh my God

01:12:02As an adult going into a literacy program

01:12:04You have some advantages

01:12:05Even though maybe you're not reading well

01:12:08You have life experiences

01:12:09You have vocabulary

01:12:10You're self-motivated

01:12:12You're doing this yourself

01:12:14And you have particular needs

01:12:16So you have some goals

01:12:17So there are a lot of things that adults have

01:12:19Going into a literacy program

01:12:20That children don't have

01:12:21And they don't

01:12:22The children don't have a lot of contacts

01:12:23You know

01:12:24But there are also sponges

01:12:25All they do is learn, right?

01:12:27So with an adult

01:12:28All the things that they've learned

01:12:29Become part of what reinforces them

01:12:32Being successful in a literacy program

01:12:34You may be a struggling reader

01:12:36Somebody you know for sure is a struggling reader

01:12:38There is no shame in that

01:12:40This does not say something about the person

01:12:43It says something about the instruction

01:12:45That you just haven't gotten

01:12:46Or haven't gotten yet

01:12:47It's not that you can't learn it

01:12:49It is that you haven't learned it yet

01:12:51But we will keep trying until you do

01:12:54I had been a classroom teacher

01:12:56But I had been out of the building

01:12:57Three and a half years

01:12:58Come back as principal

01:12:59And find it in the state that was not the way it was when I had left

01:13:07Chronic absenteeism

01:13:08Chronic discipline problems

01:13:10This school trumped every single reason why I hear that children and schools can't reform

01:13:20Was there for six years

01:13:22And we were able to completely using the science of reading

01:13:25Research based instructional practices

01:13:27Transform that school

01:13:29From one of the lowest 15% of schools in Missouri

01:13:33To first in growth

01:13:35And then later one of the top schools in Missouri

01:13:37What I've seen happen is if you can find a school district or a school

01:13:42That has taken this different approach

01:13:45A combination of systematic phonics instruction

01:13:48And comprehension instruction that includes building kids' knowledge systematically

01:13:54If you can show that to people

01:13:56And they see the teachers actually really like it

01:13:59The kids are incredibly engaged

01:14:01And the parents love it too

01:14:03They often come away saying

01:14:05We've got to try this too

01:14:07As a superintendent now

01:14:09Superintendents across our country

01:14:11Have a powerful job

01:14:13And they have a powerful role for change

01:14:16Because we are the people who can plan the professional development

01:14:20That the teachers need

01:14:21We are the people that can make this be an expectation

01:14:26A school-wide and a district-wide expectation

01:14:30Really a stronger focus on our K-2

01:14:33And then really getting into pre-K

01:14:35Bringing in those foundational skills within the core

01:14:39We're writing our curriculum resource materials

01:14:41So foundational skills were part of the process

01:14:43So they were embedded

01:14:44The second piece to that was making sure that our teachers

01:14:47And our principals

01:14:48And administrators and district level understood

01:14:51What the thought process was behind even teaching this way

01:14:56Or spending time doing these things

01:14:58Go slow to go fast

01:14:59You know, if you skip these steps

01:15:01You're going to wind up getting delayed down the line

01:15:06When I learned to read

01:15:08You know, it was a huge life change for me

01:15:10I mean, I lived 40 years of my life thinking that I couldn't learn to read

01:15:16And I bought into a big lie

01:15:18I knew for sure

01:15:21Absolutely sure

01:15:22That I could learn to read

01:15:23That other people could learn to read

01:15:25And I wanted to kick the door down for other people

01:15:29I think why the literate world

01:15:32As I define the other world

01:15:35Thinks that it's so hard to understand

01:15:38Is because I shatter the myth of illiteracy in America

01:15:43People in America think that we are dumb

01:15:48And it is our fault that we did not learn how to read

01:15:53Or something that was wrong with us

01:15:55But the truth is we just were not taught properly

01:16:01I want the world to hear

01:16:03The good news is that we can learn to read

01:16:08And it's never too late to learn to read

01:16:10I did read my first book cover to cover when I was 40

01:16:13Some people go skydiving

01:16:15Or get a tattoo or something

01:16:18I said I wanted to read a book

01:16:20I would tell people

01:16:22As I started talking about my disability

01:16:24I would say things like I've never read a book

01:16:27And I didn't like saying that

01:16:28And I didn't want to say that anymore

01:16:30So I decided on my 40th birthday

01:16:32I'm going to read a book

01:16:34What book?

01:16:35It's called The Circle Maker

01:16:37It's a book on prayer

01:16:39Did you enjoy it?

01:16:40Loved it

01:16:41Such great direction followers

01:16:43Alright this is what we are going to do

01:16:45Are you ready?

01:16:46A few weeks went by

01:16:48And I was getting it

01:16:49I was understanding it

01:16:51I was comprehending it

01:16:52And I was advancing at a very fast pace

01:16:55I had gone from like a 3rd or 4th grade reading level

01:16:58To like an 8th grade reading level

01:17:00And I was surpassing my peers

01:17:02And I was able to dive into chapter books

01:17:05Like I had always wanted

01:17:07And it was amazing

01:17:08And I was so proud of myself

01:17:10I mean the feeling is so euphoric

01:17:13I understood every question on the boards

01:17:15Versus before

01:17:17And I knew the answer

01:17:19Before I even finished reading the question

01:17:22After Nora and I did the therapy together

01:17:24Now I can read an article extremely quick

01:17:27In the past it would take me 2-3 hours

01:17:29And no one knew that

01:17:31Yeah she had the label of dyslexic

01:17:34Severely dyslexic

01:17:35And learning disabled

01:17:37And there's no need for it

01:17:39Dyslexia just means a problem with reading

01:17:42That's all it means

01:17:43Doesn't mean it can't be fixed

01:17:45You just give the right information

01:17:47In the logical sequential way

01:17:49And she went on to college

01:17:51She's a history major

01:17:52She read enormous volumes of literature

01:17:56She never had any problems

01:17:58We did have some problems

01:17:59Still fixing the anxiety

01:18:04I've been asked by some people

01:18:07How bad the pain or the regret

01:18:10Or the sadness could be

01:18:12From something like this

01:18:14And you don't realize it at the time

01:18:16When you're in it

01:18:18But after I came back

01:18:20From learning to read

01:18:21I had a metal case in my cupboard

01:18:25That I had moved a number of times

01:18:27And it had moved

01:18:28And it had a little lock on it

01:18:29And I hadn't opened it

01:18:30But I knew what was in it

01:18:32And what was in it

01:18:35Were love letters

01:18:37From my first girlfriend

01:18:39The reason I kept them

01:18:40Is one day I was going to read them

01:18:43But I hadn't read them

01:18:44And she was a caring person

01:18:47She wrote me birthday cards

01:18:49And notes on my pillow

01:18:51And on my car seat

01:18:52And I would open them up

01:18:53And it would just

01:18:54I would start to read it

01:18:56And I would glaze over

01:18:56But I could see

01:18:58You know, love this person

01:18:59At the bottom

01:18:59And I'd see a heart

01:19:00So I knew that was a good one

01:19:01And if there was a sad face

01:19:02Maybe I'd done something wrong

01:19:04But I'd kept them all

01:19:05And I pulled them out

01:19:06And I read them

01:19:07And I broke down

01:19:12It wasn't just about reading them

01:19:15It was about everything that was missed

01:19:17Because there were cards

01:19:18And I remember being asked

01:19:20By many people

01:19:21I'd open the card

01:19:22Look at it

01:19:24And someone would say

01:19:25Did you read it though?

01:19:25And I'd go, yeah

01:19:26I'm a fast reader

01:19:27I hadn't read it

01:19:28I would just scan it quickly

01:19:29To see the picture

01:19:30It was all about pictures

01:19:31Some crazy yards

01:19:32When I told the three bears

01:19:34And when I got back

01:19:35From learning to read

01:19:37I opened them up

01:19:38And I looked at them

01:19:38And there's these

01:19:39Most wonderful greetings

01:19:40And stories of people

01:19:41Written in there

01:19:43Somehow the universe

01:19:44Set that up for me

01:19:45Keep that box locked

01:19:48For one day in the future

01:19:50When you will go in

01:19:51And you will read

01:19:52What those people said to you

01:19:54And you will appreciate it

01:19:56It hurt me so much

01:19:58Because I had told those people

01:20:00I'd read them

01:20:01And they believed I read them

01:20:03But I hadn't told the truth

01:20:05I had the spirit

01:20:06Of what was written there

01:20:08But there was something so great

01:20:10That was missing from it

01:20:11The act of reading them

01:20:12That was what I needed

01:20:14And it was all worth it

01:20:15That was really good

01:20:16How are you?

01:20:16Yeah, like

01:20:18I say this all the time

01:20:19To educators

01:20:20No one's coming

01:20:21To rescue us

01:20:22We're the ones

01:20:23That are going to

01:20:23Have to rescue ourselves

01:20:25Smudge

01:20:29Badge

01:20:32So that's a short eye

01:20:36Butch

01:20:37You got it

01:20:37And that together

01:20:38As a collective community

01:20:40We can begin to shift

01:20:42And reimagine what it means

01:20:44To be a teacher

01:20:45In the United States

01:20:47We have to begin to ask ourselves

01:20:49Some really hard, deep questions

01:20:52And begin to be bold about the answers

01:20:55I believe that the education system

01:20:58Cannot fix everything

01:21:00But it sure as hell can give us a running start

01:21:03And there's a link how we come down

01:21:22There's no other thing

01:21:23It's never

01:21:23I don't get it

01:21:32The lie

01:21:35Amém.

01:22:04Amém.

01:22:33Amém.

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