[Reading-hall-of-fame] Balanced Literacy

[Carol D Lee]

Keep in m ind this is not a scientific debate. It’s a political debate.  We need to figure out how to engage the politics.

Carol

Carol D. Lee, Ph.D.
Edwina S. Tarry Professor Emerita
School of Education and Social Policy
Northwestern University

Member, National Academy of Education
Member, American Academy of Arts and Sciences
Fellow, American Educational Research Association
Fellow, National Conference on Language and Literacy
President, National Academy of Education
Member, Reading Hall of Fame
Fellow, International Society of the Learning. Sciences



From: Reading-hall-of-fame <reading-hall-of-fame-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk> on behalf of P David Pearson <ppearson at berkeley.edu>
Date: Thursday, June 22, 2023 at 9:51 PM
To: Kris Gutierrez <gutierrkd at berkeley.edu>
Cc: reading hall of fame <reading-hall-of-fame at lists.nottingham.ac.uk>
Subject: Re: [Reading-hall-of-fame] Balanced Literacy
I started using the radical middle in the preface to Teaching Reading Comprehension in 1978. I borrowed it from Jules Pfeiffer, who used it in a 1950’s cartoon describing Eisenhower’s politics. But I don’t think I uttered the term balanced literacy until I started using it in talks in about 1995 or so. I should see what PowerPoints I have in my cloud storage.
P David Pearson
110 41st Street, Apt 401
Oakland, CA 94611-5237
510.543.6508

If we teach today’s students as we taught yesterday’s, we rob them of tomorrow." John Dewey, 1903

“Youth is the gift of nature, but age is a work of art.” – Stanislaw Jerzy Lec


On Jun 22, 2023, at 7:25 PM, Kris Gutierrez <gutierrkd at berkeley.edu<mailto:gutierrkd at berkeley.edu>> wrote:
David, I recall you writing about the “radical middle,”  which I used;  I don’t recall your writing on  balanced literacy.
Kris Gutiérrez
Carol Liu Distinguished Professor
Associate Dean
Berkeley School of Education
University of California, Berkeley
2121 Berkeley Way
Berkeley, Ca 94720-1670
gutierrkd at berkeley.edu<mailto:gutierrkd at berkeley.edu>
Member, National Academy of Education
Member, American Academy of Arts and Sciences






On Jun 22, 2023, at 5:57 PM, P David Pearson <ppearson at berkeley.edu<mailto:ppearson at berkeley.edu>> wrote:

Fact-checking my own recollections of history.

I was surprised to learn from the Daily in the NYT a couple of weeks ago that Lucy Calkins was the founder of balanced literacy.  I imagine she was also surprised to learn that. And I know that our RHF colleague, Gay Su Pinnell, has sometimes received the same attribution. So I am trying to recall when I first became aware of the common use of balanced literacy.

I am a little vague on this, but I do remember that in the early 90s version of the reading wars, which sometimes featured tensions between colleagues affiliated with the Whole Language Umbrella and those aligned with the findings of Marilyn Adams' Beginning to Read volume, there were some researchers and teacher educators and many state and district leader who began searching for a middle ground. And I vaguely recall that some even banded together to ask IRA to authorize the establishment of something like a Balanced Literacy SIG (special interest group).

And then I recall a 1996 book by
E. McIntyre & M. Pressley, Balanced Instruction:  Strategies and skills in whole language. Boston MA:  Christopher-Gordon.

Can others add to the story of who was involved--and how-- in coining Balanced Literacy?  And I bet there are uses of the term as far back as Horace Mann.

David


--
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"If we teach today’s students as we taught yesterday’s, we rob them of tomorrow." John Dewey, 1903
“Youth is the gift of nature, but age is a work of art.” – Stanislaw Jerzy Lec
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
P. David Pearson
Evelyn Lois Corey Emeritus Professor of Instructional Science
Graduate School of Education
University of California, Berkeley

email:  ppearson at berkeley.edu<mailto:ppearson at berkeley.edu>
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