[MOSAIC] :Louisa Moats

[Lindsey Jean Bishop]

It is not unreasonable to assume the presence of some of the four  
things "ljackson" just mentioned...no matter what a person's political  
or religious stance ;).  BUT, back to teaching children about reading,  
I think it may be unreasonable to assume that someone, or anyone, who  
dedicates their life to educating children -or researching on  
educating children-  is motivated solely by those four things referred  
to above.

I read Moat's article after becoming interested in this strand of  
Mosaic. And in my opinion, Moat's article is not trying to "bash"  
anybody.  It seems that she brings up legitimate points that can be  
taken in ways that make us feel defensive.    (But the "summary" part  
of the article reads differently than the body about the issues, which  
be really important to keep in mind.)

A great point Kelly brought up, and a good example of what I'm trying  
to express, is illustrated when Kelly writes:  "The author says that  
teachers like us don't do "explicit teaching"  when we do lessons  
through read alouds (aka think alouds).  She says that teacher  
modeling is most effective, but isn't that what we do with our think  
alouds?"    It is perfectly reasonable to take up Moat's words in this  
way, but what if we thought about the following things:
(Kelly, thank you for being an example here - you bring up a great  
point to use as an example!)

First comes the definition of modeling.  How we talk about it on this  
listserv seems to be the most progressive (which is a word that  
shouldn't need to be associated with any political party ;) way of  
defining how to model in our classrooms...precisely because it IS  
partly an explicit pedadgogy, by the way we define and use it.  As the  
"comp strategies for little ones" strand touched on, without teaching  
explicitly the how's and why's behind strategies/our modeling  
think-alouds/etc, modeling is not nearly as meaningful (intuitively OR  
when the subject is analytically researched).

This is just one example of possible misunderstanding that could  
necessitate further consideration.  The article, just as any, is not  
perfect or the end-all for teaching reading, but it does bring up some  
meaningful points.

Keither has reminded us to leave politics and religion out of all of  
this; perhaps our listserv can act as a model for our current  
administration ;) (I couldn't help but to 'go there' - hehe).  And  
seriously, we all love children and want to do the right thing for  
them (way better to assume that way than any other!!)...same goes for  
researchers; label jars, not people.  We don't have to agree, but we  
do need to at least try to understand differing viewpoints (another  
apt modeling potential for our admin...I mean...students.)