Last night, I played Cards against Humanity with four AirB&B guests. Don't judge me for having an AirB&B during COVID or for playing that vilely funny game. One young man and his father simply could not read the cards. They didn't know the words when someone read them aloud. Now, I didn't know who Cardi B. was either. But there was a different reason. Dyslexia.
I was asked to write a response to TCTELA's Position Statement on the NEW ELAR TEKS. The memory of this game was in the back of my mind as I wrote the following:
Thoughts from Educators
“The 2017 ELAR TEKS represent what is right for teachers and students.” What is right. Indeed. The organizing structure and design of the standards were purposefully grown from sound research about what practices help people become readers and writers capable of participation and contribution as joyfully literate citizens. Too often… well, too often, our ill-informed pedagogy and selection of a small range of WASP texts from a list that hasn’t changed since the Industrial Revolution have produced mindless robots who might be able to regurgitate content if they are forced.
By incorporating knowledge of the people and the art of teaching as well as the science of that impact, the ELAR standards represent a tremendous opportunity to shift paradigms that will
- invigorate and include instead of prompting apathy, inaction, and disenfranchisement
- spur creativity and solutions as opposed to avoidance and retreat
- empower instead of oppress
As such, teachers will need significant advancements in building and refining their knowledge, skills, and repertoire of textual knowledge, forming a pedagogy of promise that leads to advanced learning outcomes for the very ones we choose to serve: our students.
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