and the Reading/Language Arts Teacher: A Time for Learning

I happened to be in the audience at the 1977 Texas State Council of the International Reading Association meeting in Austin when Rudine Sims delivered a general session speech on psycholinguistics and reading. She reviewed the emergence of psycholinguistics and pointed out several aspects ("myths") of conventional reading education now challenged by proponents of a psycholinguistic concept of the reading process (particularly Kenneth and Yetta Goodman). She was direct, pleasant and committed. She drew a standing ovation from the more than three hundred classroom teachers and supervisors of English and reading present. Several thoughts occurred to me as I evaluated this experience and the conference in general. One, language arts teachers want to know about psycholinguistic thought; two, they are ready to act on that knowledge; three, the reaction occurs just as readily among secondary teachers as elementary; and, four, English Educators had better gear up for psycholinguistics now before we are forced to play catch up later. Sure enough, the two sessions at CEE a few weeks later drew over sixty people, most of whom had little knowledge of psycholinguistics but were feeling some pressure to learn about it in a hurry. They, like me, must be feeling vibrations from the field. Many language arts teachers in the schools express dissatisfaction with conventional reading and language approaches. They are not at all pleased with the results of instruction as compared to the energy expended to effect it. It is this displeasure, perhaps, which accounts for the tendency of most language arts teachers not to rebut the public censure of reading and writing instruction. They probably agree with the censure, but from a different perspective and for different reasons.