In this episode of Science of Reading: The Podcast, Susan Lambert is joined by Doug Lemov,  former teacher and school principal, to discuss how teachers can identify when disfluency is actually the root cause for students’ struggles with comprehension—and what they can do about it. Using his new book, The Teach Like a Champion Guide to the Science of Reading, to guide the discussion, Susan and Doug address building attention stamina, the argument for reading whole books, and the value of expressive read-alouds. Finally, Doug ends the episode asserting that humans are meant to live in community, and that a deeper level of comprehension is unlocked through deep empathic connection to text and the experience of reading with others.

Show notes: 

• Listen to Season 2 of the Beyond My Years podcast for solutions to common teaching challenges directly from seasoned educators.
• Connect with Doug Lemov:
  • X: @Doug_Lemov 
• Resources:
  • Read: The Teach Like a Champion Guide to the Science of Reading
  • Watch: Gabby Woolf’s Dr. Jekyll Lesson and the Power of Reading Fluency
  • Listen: ”Phonology as a settled science”
  • Listen: ”The plea to preserve deep reading, with Maryanne Wolf, Ed.D.”
  • Listen: ”Writing the way to better reading, with Judith Hochman, Ed.D.”
  • Listen: ”The joy of reading aloud, with Molly Ness”
  • Download: cComprehension 101 Bundle
• Submit your questions on comprehension! 
• Join our community Facebook Group: www.facebook.com/groups/scienceofreading
• Connect with Susan Lambert: www.linkedin.com/in/susan-lambert-b1512761/

Quotes: 

 “If you're not a fluent reader, you can't be a deep reader.”—Doug Lemov

“The research is clear that when you start to read expressively externally, then your internal reading voice while reading silently is much more expressive and therefore infused with more meaning.”—Doug Lemov 

Episode Timestamps
03:00 Introduction: Doug Lemov
05:00 The importance of the middle grades
07:00 Book: The Teach like a Champion Guide to the Science of Reading
13:00 How to build attention stamina
16:00 Background knowledge and vocabulary
19:00 Writing’s impact on memory and reading
22:00 The value in reading whole books
25:00 Embracing smaller writing assignments
27:00 Fluency deep dive
30:00 Working memory
35:00 Troubleshooting fluency
39:00 Expressive reading
41:00 Read-alouds
44:00 Reading as a social act
52:00 The argument for books
*Timestamps are approximate, rounded to nearest minute

In this special dyslexia-focused Essentials episode of Science of Reading: The Podcast, Susan Lambert pulls from past episodes to summarize everything you need to know about dyslexia, from experts Emily Lutrick, Ed.D.; Nadine Gaab, Ph.D.; Tim Odegard, Ph.D.; Sally Shaywitz, M.D.; and Francisco Usero-González, Ph.D. You'll also hear first-hand accounts from young people about their personal experiences with dyslexia, reading, and the education system. Even if you have little prior knowledge of dyslexia, you’ll walk away from this episode with a foundational understanding of the condition, including what it is, what causes it, how to identify it, the importance of early screening, how it is a continuum, methods for intervention, and more.

Show notes:

• Resources
  • Access free high-quality resources at our brand new professional learning page: http://amplify.com/science-of-reading/professional-learning 
  • Download your Dyslexia Support Power Pack
• Join our community Facebook Group: www.facebook.com/groups/scienceofreading

Episode Timestamps
00:27 Introduction to SoR: Essentials
01:02 Susan’s personal connection with dyslexia
02:53 Accounts from young people on their experience of dyslexia
05:09 Defining dyslexia with Dr. Emily Lutrick
06:53 Dyslexia as a reading disability with Dr. Nadine Gaab
07:39 Three key characteristics of people with dyslexia with Dr. Tim Odegard
09:42 Longitudinal study with Dr. Sally Shaywitz
11:54 The causes of dyslexia
13:09 Early identification and effective intervention
15:22 Discrepancy model/Waiting to fail model
16:35 How early is too early to screen for dyslexia
18:37 How to know when a student is at risk for dyslexia
21:54 Identifying risk factors in older students
22:54 Decoding nonsense words
24:27 The power of naming a struggle
25:28 The importance of having a cohesive system in place
26:43 Screening students in their home language with Dr. Francisco Paco Usero Gonzalez
29:45 Dyslexia as a continuum
33:41 Final thoughts from young people on dyslexia
36:12 Preview of upcoming episode
*Timestamps are approximate, rounded to nearest minute

In this episode of Science of Reading: The Podcast, Susan Lambert is joined by Katie Pace Miles, Ph.D., founder of The Reading Institute and director of the Advanced Certificates in Reading Science, Brooklyn College. An expert in orthographic mapping, Pace Miles explains why it’s a cognitive process, why that means it can’t be “taught,” and how we can instead leverage an understanding of it to inform instructional practices across reading, writing, and spelling to improve comprehension. Pace Miles outlines what it takes to develop good word-reading habits in emergent readers, and offers step-by-step advice on how to implement quick intervention when needed.

Show notes:

• Submit your questions on comprehension! 
• Access free, high-quality resources at our brand-new companion professional learning page.  
• Connect with Katie Pace Miles:
  • Website: https://www.katiepacemilesphd.com/
  • Instagram: @thereadinginstitutenyc 
• Resources:
  • Book: Making Words Stick: A Four-Step Instructional Routine to Power Up Orthographic Mapping 
  • Article: ”Phases of Development in Learning to Read and Spell Words” by Linnea C. Ehri
  • Podcast episode: The joy of reading aloud, with Molly Ness
• Join our community Facebook group: www.facebook.com/groups/scienceofreading
• Connect with Susan Lambert: https://www.linkedin.com/in/susan-lambert-edd-b1512761/  

Quotes: 

 "You don't teach orthographic mapping, 'cause, again, that's a cognitive process, but you can facilitate support for long-term storage of words." —Katie Pace Miles, Ph.D.

"Never acquiesce to illiteracy. We all, as a community that supports all readers, have to figure out what instruction needs to be provided and what dosage over what duration of time … and it will happen." —Katie Pace Miles, Ph.D.

"If you're focused only on phonics and not on spelling, you are going to miss a whole bunch of decoding instruction, word analysis work." —Katie Pace Miles, Ph.D.

"You don't need a Ph.D. to have that knowledge. That should come in all teacher training. The complexity of the English language—every teacher I've ever met can handle it once we teach it."—Katie Pace Miles, Ph.D.

Episode timestamps*
03:00 Introduction: Who is Katie Pace Miles?
04:00 Beginnings as a teacher
07:00 Book: Making Words Stick: A four step instructional routine to power up orthographic mapping
10:00 The motivation behind the book
13:00 Orthographic mapping as a cognitive process
17:00 Can you teach orthographic mapping?
19:00 Research behind the theory of orthographic mapping
24:00 Developing good word reading habits with emergent readers
28:00 Reading-spelling connection
32:00 Rubberband analogy: Developing speaking and reading skills in tandem
34:00 Orthographic mapping can support or impede comprehension
39:00 Intervention
43:00 Activities and strategies from the book
44:00 Final thoughts
*Timestamps are approximate, rounded to nearest minute

In this episode of Science of Reading: The Podcast, Susan Lambert is joined by Wesley Hoover, a psycholinguist at the University of Texas at Austin, to discuss the Simple View of Reading and how it can serve as the basis for our understanding of comprehension. Wesley digs into all the complexities of this model—which is only simple at a high level—including the meaning of language comprehension vs. reading comprehension, the impact of word recognition, and using the simple view to identify struggling students. He’ll even address the limitations of the simple view of reading, untangle common misconceptions, and give you tools for assessing the value of any model for reading that you might encounter.

Show notes: 

• Submit your questions on comprehension! 
• Access free, high-quality resources at our brand-new, companion professional learning page: http://amplify.com/science-of-reading/professional-learning  
• Resources:
  • Listen: Science of Reading Essentials: Comprehension
  • Read: The Primacy of Science in Communicating Advances in the Science of Reading
• Join our community Facebook Group: www.facebook.com/groups/scienceofreading
• Connect with Susan Lambert: https://www.linkedin.com/in/susan-lambert-edd-b1512761/
• Check out Season 2 of the Beyond My Years podcast at.amplify.com/bmy 

Quotes:

"Language comprehension is unbounded… the knowledge of the world and being able to express the knowledge of the world in language—that's always a key difficulty you work on for your entire life.” —Wesley Hoover, Ph.D. 

“If you're a teacher thinking about language comprehension, whatever time you devote to helping people understand language, if you can be effective in doing that, you'll never waste a kid's time.” —Wesley Hoover, Ph.D. 

"To be a reader, you have to be good at two things: word recognition and language comprehension. Both of them are necessary components of reading, but neither one of them is sufficient on its own.”—Wesley Hoover, Ph.D. 

Episode timestamps*
03:00 Introduction: Wesley Hoover and the simple view of reading
06:00 What is the simple view of reading?
08:00 What is language comprehension?
10:00 What is word recognition?
11:00 Defining reading comprehension
12:00 Dr. Gough’s big A-Ha! Moment
15:00 Reading competency
16:00 Misconceptions of the simple view of reading
21:00 Changing the size of the boxes
23:00 Extension of the simple view
26:00 Using the simple view to identify kids that are struggling
29:00 What the simple view does or does not address
33:00 Navigating models of reading comprehension
35:00 Is the simple view outdated?
38:00 Why is comprehension worth exploring?
41:00 Final advice
*Timestamps are approximate, rounded to nearest minute

Podcast host Susan Lambert gives you a first look at Season 10 of Science of Reading: The Podcast. This season will focus on reading comprehension, taking a deep dive into what is ultimately the goal of every classroom: breaking down why comprehension matters and how to achieve it. Get a glimpse into the season’s different angles on comprehension, as well as the expert guests you can look forward to hearing from.

Show notes:

• Access free, high-quality resources at our brand new, companion professional learning page: http://amplify.com/science-of-reading/professional-learning  
• Join our community Facebook Group: www.facebook.com/groups/scienceofreading
• Connect with Susan Lambert: www.linkedin.com/in/susan-lambert-b1512761/
• Trailer: Beyond My Years is back for Season 2!

In this crossover episode Susan Lambert joins host Ana Torres and Classroom Insider Eric Cross from sister podcast, Beyond My Years. Together, the trio dive into the idea that all educators contribute to—and thus must invest in—student literacy development, regardless of the content they teach. Throughout the conversation, they discuss how all teachers are literacy teachers, offer four simple tips for developing academic language in any classroom, and explore why Susan still doesn't feel like a "seasoned educator" despite over 30 years in education. Finally, Ana and Eric discuss what they learned and Eric shares his top three takeaways from Susan.

Show notes:

• Subscribe to Beyond My Years https://at.amplify.com/bmy
• Access free, high-quality resources at our brand new, companion professional learning page: http://amplify.com/science-of-reading/professional-learning  
• Connect with:
  • Susan Lambert: https://www.linkedin.com/in/susan-lambert-edd-b1512761/
  • Ana Torres: https://www.linkedin.com/in/anayansi-ana-torres-m-ed-26a10654/
  • Eric Cross: https://www.ericcross.org/ 
• Resources:
  • Science of Reading: A New Teacher’s Guide
  • Scarborough’s Reading Rope
  • The Knowledge Gap by Natalie Wexler
• Join our community Facebook Group: www.facebook.com/groups/scienceofreading
• Follow us on Instagram @amplify.education 

Quotes: 

“Reading and writing and understanding language is not just an English language arts teacher's responsibility. It's the responsibility of every educator to communicate their discipline and the words and the concepts from their discipline to their students.” —Susan Lambert

“[The Science of Reading movement] is not being led by one person or another person. …  I'm part of a greater community, and to know that I play a certain role or part in that community actually gives me a lot of inspiration on days when it's really, really hard.” —Susan Lambert

“Any teacher in a classroom, no matter what content area they teach, is teaching something about language.” —Susan Lambert

“The more that we can sharpen our tools and our skillset to be those teachers of literacy, the faster we're going to see improvements in learning in our classrooms. They're not two separate things.” —Eric Cross

In this episode of Science of Reading: The Podcast, literacy coach (and podcast host in her own right) Amie Burkholder joins us to discuss her new book, Literacy Unlocked: How to Implement the Science of Reading With Young Learners. Amie talks through the origins of the book, how she structured it to be really actionable for educators, and what she hopes educators will take away from it. Amie and Susan also discuss some of the biggest recent changes to the Science of Reading movement, the areas Amie most often sees educators struggle when making the switch to research-based literacy instruction, and some tips educators can implement today—including a walkthrough of a classroom activity targeting phonemic awareness. 

Show notes:

• Access free, high-quality resources at our brand new, companion professional learning page: http://amplify.com/science-of-reading/professional-learning  
• Connect with Amie:
  • Instagram: @literacy.edventures 
  • Listen to Amie’s podcast: Route2Reading
• Resources:
  • Book: Literacy Unlocked: How to Implement the Science of Reading With Young Learners
  • Download the Science of Reading: A New Teacher's Guide today!
    amplify.com/sorguide 
• Join our community Facebook Group: www.facebook.com/groups/scienceofreading
• Connect with Susan Lambert: https://www.linkedin.com/in/susan-lambert-edd-b1512761/ 

Quotes: 

“Look to those that you trust to guide you.” —Amie Burkholder 

“If you try to change everything you're doing, you're not going to do anything well. Pick one area of your literacy block you’re really gonna nail. Once you nail that—add another one.” —Amie Burkholder

“I want [the book] to follow the research, but I want it to be simple enough for teachers to execute, [and] also engaging enough for kids to want to do it.” —Amie Burkholder 

Episode timestamps*
02:00 Introduction: Who is Amie Burkholder?
07:00 Literacy Unlocked: How to Implement the Science of Reading with Young Learners
11:00 Book Structure
12:00 Phonemic awareness classroom activity walkthrough
16:00 Learning while writing the book
17:00 Strategy for getting the most out of conferences
18:00 Favorite conferences
19:00 Biggest changes to the science of reading movement
20:00 Recommendation for people diving into the research for the first time
22:00 Implementation: Biggest struggle for teaching making the shift
24:00 Ideal takeaway from the book
25:00 Closing thoughts
*Timestamps are approximate, rounded to nearest minute

In this episode of Science of Reading: The Podcast, top literacy scholar Tim Shanahan, Ph.D., returns to discuss his new book, Leveled Reading, Leveled Lives: How Students’ Reading Achievement Has Been Held Back and What We Can Do About It. During his conversation with Susan Lambert, he outlines what existing research says about leveled reading—and why it’s not effective. He also shares how the misuse of theory can lead to ineffectual conclusions, makes a case for the efficacy of more explicit instruction, and provides a few simple tweaks teachers can make to classroom instruction that can make a big difference for their students. 

Show notes:

• Access free, high-quality resources at our brand new companion professional learning page. 
• Resources:
  • Book: Leveled Reading, Leveled Lives: How Students’ Reading Achievement Has Been Held Back and What We Can Do About It
• Join our community Facebook group.
• Connect with Susan Lambert.

Quotes: 

“This notion of trying to match kids to books and get everybody to their right level is, at the very least, wasteful. It's not benefiting kids.” —Tim Shanahan, Ph.D.

“We're spending an awful lot of time doing a lot of work that is not only not paying off, but it's probably holding a lot of kids back.” —Tim Shanahan, Ph.D.

“Maybe we should be having kids read some of these texts more than once. Maybe we should be doing some of our fluency work, not after we did the comprehension work, but ahead of time.” —Tim Shanahan, Ph.D.

Episode timestamps*
02:00 Introduction: Who is Tim Shanahan?
03:00 Most proud of as a researcher
05:00 Most proud of in education policy work
06:00 First book: Leveled Reading, Leveled Lives
07:00 Motivation to write: Addressing instructional levels
14:00 Relevance of misuse of theory
17:00 Leveled instruction isn’t effective
21:00 Self-reflections in the writing process
22:00 Parallels to verbal learning
24:00 What can teachers do?
26:00 Fluency and reading things twice
32:00 Grade level teaching opens opportunities
33:00 The future of literacy development
39:00 What is happening in American schools?
*Timestamps are approximate, rounded to nearest minute

In this special Essentials episode of Science of Reading: The Podcast, Susan Lambert pulls from past episodes to distill reading comprehension insights from experts Hugh Catts, Ph.D.; Sharon Vaughn, Ph.D.; and Reid Smith, Ph.D. Listeners will walk away from this episode with a foundational introduction to the complexities of reading comprehension, and gain an understanding of topics such as reframing comprehension as an outcome rather than a skill, choosing the right texts and asking the right questions, cultivating long term memory and knowledge recall, and understanding the real purpose of reading. 

Show notes: 

• Access the listening guide—and other free, high-quality resources—at our brand new professional learning page: http://amplify.com/science-of-reading/professional-learning 
• Join our community Facebook Group: www.facebook.com/groups/scienceofreading

Quotes:

“This Essentials episode does not answer everything about comprehension. All we're doing here is building a foundation, understanding that comprehension isn't a skill, it's complex.” —Susan Lambert

“ For the most part, if we're paying attention, if we can read words efficiently and know what they mean and have background knowledge, it yields comprehension.” —Sharon Vaughn

“ Some people say that the purpose of reading is comprehension. It's not the purpose of reading. The purpose of reading is whatever you're comprehending for.” —Hugh Catts 

“[There’s] a strong literature base that tells us that one of the differences between poor readers and strong readers is their ability to notice when there are inconsistencies in the text, and have strategies that they can employ to resolve those inconsistencies.” —Reid Smith

Episode Timestamps*
01:00 What are “Science of Reading: Essentials” episodes
02:00 Introduction to comprehension
05:00 Defining comprehension
07:00 Reading comprehension as an outcome
09:00 The purpose of reading with Hugh Catts
11:00 Comprehension vs foundational reading skills
17:00 The importance of text and asking the right questions with Sharon Vaughn
20:00 Discussion on leveled reading
26:00 Background knowledge with Reid Smith
28:00 Long term memory and knowledge recall
31:00 Final thoughts, tips, & encouragement
34:00 Key takeaways from Susan
36:00 Season 10 preview
39:00 Coming up next: Tim Shanahan
*Timestamps are approximate, rounded to nearest minute

In this rewind episode of Science of Reading: The Podcast, we revisit a Season 1 conversation between host Susan Lambert and Anne Lucas, former curriculum director and current Associate Vice President of Product, Literacy Suite Initiatives & Supplementals at Amplify  on the complexities of reading comprehension.Together they dive into the complex nature of comprehension and why it’s so difficult to teach. 

Show notes:

• Access free, high-quality resources at our brand new, companion professional learning page: http://amplify.com/science-of-reading/professional-learning  
• Resources:
  • Read: Understanding and Teaching Reading Comprehension by Jane Oakhill
  • Read: The missing link in comprehension white paper
  • Listen: Science of Reading Essentials: Writing
• Join our community Facebook Group: www.facebook.com/groups/scienceofreading
• Connect with Susan Lambert: https://www.linkedin.com/in/susan-lambert-edd-b1512761/
• Find our more information – and register – for our Science of Reading Summer Learning Series: https://amplify.com/sorsummerlearning 

Quotes:

“We often think about comprehension as a product, or something that happens after kids read, but … the ability for a student to build a model or a network of ideas or a picture in their mind happens while they're reading.” —Anne Lucas

“You know, you don't have to completely change your curriculum; you don't have to completely change the way you're teaching.” —Anne Lucas

“Comprehension is making sense and meaning while you read, so you have the ability to discuss, analyze, and form an opinion about something after you read it.” —Anne Lucas

Episode timestamps*
03:00 Introduction: Who is Anne Lucas?
07:00 Defining comprehension
09:00 The missing link in comprehension
10:00 Comprehension micro skills vs decoding
14:00 End goal vs. process
16:00 Current research
18:00 Significance of “small” words
20:00 Targeting micro skills in the classroom
22:00 Comprehension skills vs strategies
27:00 Teacher response to learning about micro skills
29:00 Background knowledge
31:00 Final takeaways on comprehension
*Timestamps are approximate, rounded to nearest minute