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What is the Science of Reading?

"The Animated Reading Rope." (AIM Institute for Learning & Research)
"Dr. Hollis Scarborough’s Animated Reading Rope provides a powerful illustration of the multiple strands of proficient reading. The rope model unravels the critical skills of word recognition and language comprehension. It directly informs our understanding of why some students succeed and some struggle and provides necessary direction for effective instruction."
The Science of Reading: A Defining Guide (The Reading League)
The Reading League has developed a SOR Defining Movement coalition to create a guide for the science of reading. This guide is a continually evolving project, so check back from time to time to see what new sections have been added!
"Research Recap: why the "Early Reading Accelerators"?" (Student Achievement Partners n.d.)
"Reading science emphasizes two critical pieces in systematic early reading instruction: securing foundational skills and building knowledge and vocabulary. These Early Reading Accelerators, including the Simple View of Reading and Scarborough’s Reading Rope, are essential content that all students need access to in order to become proficient."
"Reading Foundational Skills Key Concepts and Terms." (Student Achievement Partners n.d.)
"Foundational Skills Key Terms defines the key components of research-based reading foundational skills instruction. Structured, sequential reading instruction moves young readers along a continuum of skills and is best done with a structured program."
The Science of Reading (Ohio Dept. of Education & Workforce)
This module from the Ohio Dept. of Education & Workforce describes the components of the science of reading. You can also read their overview of the Simple View of Reading here.

Research Reports and Syntheses

Improving Reading Comprehension in the Primary Grades (Shanahan, 2019)
In this paper, expert Timothy Shanahan explains what is entailed in improving reading comprehension, particularly for primary school students.
"Research supporting foundational skills in reading: an annotated bibliography curated by Student Achievement Partners." (Student Achievement Partners n.d.)
"One of the most important jobs of an early-grade teacher is to support students as they unlock the code to the written language. A robust body of research points to the fact that systematic, explicit foundational skills instruction is a critical part of early childhood instruction, and it is crucial for students as they are learning to read and write in English. Research Supporting Foundational Skills in Reading names and summarizes the latest research on effective foundational skills instruction."
Teaching Children to Read: An Evidence-Based Assessment of the Scientific Research Literature on Reading and Its Implications for Reading Instruction (National Reading Panel, 2000)
This is the National Reading Panel report that is at the center of much of the discussion around the Science of Reading.
"Teaching Reading Is Rocket Science, 2020: What expert teachers of reading should know and be able to do." (Moats 2020)
"Teaching Reading Is Rocket Science, 2020 is an update to the original Teaching Reading Is Rocket Science published by the American Federation of Teachers over 20 years ago and emerges from a collaboration between the AFT and the Center for Development and Learning. Together they acknowledge that, although some progress has been made in teaching reading effectively, too few at-risk, disadvantaged, and minority students become proficient readers. Insufficient emphasis has been placed on understanding the science of reading, which, when appropriately implemented, can enable these students to make significant reading and writing gains."

Practitioner Articles

Literacy and the Single Student (Mcbride, 2022)
This article discusses striking a balance between research findings (e.g., the "science of reading") and individual learning preferences.
The Role of Research: The Speed, Source, and Scale of Science in the Science of Reading Debate (Goodwin, 2020)
The co-editor of the Reading Research Quarterly journal discusses the speed, source, and scale of the science of reading debate. She argues that media discussion often underrepresents scholars, and that because peer reviewed articles take longer to publish, scholars' opinions are often published after the public has finished discussing the debate.
Beyond the Label: Looking at the Science of Reading Instruction (Gabriel, 2020)
Gabriel argues that the science of reading (SOR) is as much a political statement as it is a label advertising a certain set of values: that evidence derived from the scientific method can and should direct the actions of people in schools. However, she also argues that meaningful solutions can and should vary according to different contexts if they are truly connected to science, and that endeavors backed by evidence may be much broader than is sometimes associated with SOR.
Embracing Reading for Understanding: Expanding our Vision of the Science of Reading (Pearson et al., 2020)
These authors discuss the science of reading for understanding. While much of the science of reading conversation has focused on decoding, these authors discuss the research around reading comprehension.
Teaching Reading: A Blend of Art and Science (Rasinski, et al, 2020)
These authors argue that "scientifically based reading instruction can and should be delivered in artful and authentic ways that engage students."
Connecting Educators with Reading Research: Best Practices for Finding Trustworthy Content (Dole, 2020)
Dole discusses several strategies for keeping up with literacy research: consider the source, search for reviews of research and meta-analyses, search ERIC and Google Scholar for research, search for peer-reviewed studies, and read peer-reviewed research articles critically.
Questioning Research: Distinguishing Incredible Reading Research Claims from More Credible (and Useful) Findings (Hruby, 2020)
Hruby gives the following tips for critically reviewing claims, including: be cautious of single studies, be cautious of packaged narratives, be cautious of complicated meta-analyses and syntheses, be cautious of binaries, be cautious of theories that don't correspond to the world you actually live in, etc.
“Lessons Learned? Reading Wars, Reading First, and a Way Forward” (Goldberg & Goldberg, 2022)
"By studying lessons from the past and hearing perspectives from the field, leaders can improve initiatives that aim to connect research and practice, ultimately moving past the reading wars."
“The Science and Poetry in Learning (and Teaching) to Read” (Wolf, 2018)
"In this excerpt from Reader Come Home: The Reading Brain in a Digital World, Maryanne Wolf describes how many different parts of the brain must work together when reading and why each requires attention in teaching. She delves into research into different reader profiles, each of which needs different emphases in reading instruction, and she explains the value of teaching approaches that include both explicit instruction in decoding and deep reading processes, and engagement by learner and teacher with the world of words and stories."
“The Sciences of Reading Instruction” (Gabriel, 2021)
'When it comes to reading instruction, an 'all or nothing' approach is actually unscientific."
Making Sense of Reading’s Forever Wars (Durán & Hikida, 2022)
"Leah Durán and Michiko Hikida argue that [the 'reading wars'] fail to get at the root issues behind students’ poor reading performance. Even when schools with the lowest reading scores implement science-backed pedagogical approaches, these shifts do not make up for structural inequalities in facilities, resources, and teacher quality. Reading scores reflect problems rooted in class and race inequalities that cannot be resolved through pedagogy alone."
Teaching Reading: Development and Differentiation (Kuhn & Daugherty Stahl, 2022)
"Rather than emphasizing individual components of reading instruction, Melanie R. Kuhn and Katherine A. Dougherty Stahl argue that it is more effective to view the reading process as a reciprocal or interactive one in which readers’ development in one component of reading can support their growth in other components. Further, while some components need to be consistently emphasized (i.e., vocabulary, comprehension) across readers’ developmental path, others should be focused on at specific developmental moments (e.g., alphabet knowledge, phonemic awareness)."
Brain Words : How the Science of Reading Informs Teaching
In Brain Words: How the Science of Reading Informs Teaching, authors J. Richard Gentry and Gene Ouellette bring their original, research-based framework of brain words dictionaries in the brain where students store and automatically access sounds, spellings, and meaning. This book aims to fill the gap between the science of reading and classroom instruction by providing up-to-date knowledge about reading and neurological circuitry, including evidence that spelling is at the core of the reading brain.
New Art and Science of Teaching Reading (Simms & Marzano, 2018)
The New Art and Science of Teaching Reading presents a compelling model for the stages of reading development, structured around five key topics: (1) foundational skills, (2) word recognition, (3) reading fluency, (4) vocabulary, and (5) reading comprehension. More than 100 reading-focused instructional strategies are laid out in detail to help teachers ensure every student becomes a proficient reader.
Why Children Should Be Taught to Read with More Challenging Texts (Shanahan, 2019)
"Although a major instructional tenet of the past 70 years has been that students will make progress in reading only if they are taught with relatively easy texts-texts at their so-called "instructional levels," this nearly universal assumption turns out to be completely unsupported by evidence. Likewise, the measures used to estimate a child's reading levels have been dubious. This article considers the validity of the "instructional level" construct, pondering whether learning is actually facilitated if we match texts to students in the ways that have been recommended."

News and Commentary

The Importance of Literacy Training for Secondary Teachers (Frederick 2023)
Many middle and high school students struggle with reading. With training, tools, and a shift in mindset in schools, ELA teachers can help learners access great literature alongside their peers.
"Hard Words: Why aren't kids being taught to read?" (Hanford 2018)
"Scientific research has shown how children learn to read and how they should be taught. But many educators don't know the science and, in some cases, actively resist it. As a result, millions of kids are being set up to fail."
"At a Loss for Words: How a flawed idea is teaching millions of kids to be poor readers." (Hanford 2019)
"For decades, schools have taught children the strategies of struggling readers, using a theory about reading that cognitive scientists have repeatedly debunked. And many teachers and parents don't know there's anything wrong with it."
Just Adding More Phonics Yields Only Short-Term Gains On Reading Tests (Wexler, 2023)
"State policies focused on improving phonics instruction can boost reading scores, but their effects fade by middle school, according to a recent study. To ensure students become truly literate, states also need to adopt policies aimed at building children’s knowledge beginning in the early grades."
Just how polarized are we about reading instruction? (Willingham, 2018)
Reading expert Daniel Willingham argues that phonics proponents and balanced literacy advocates are both right about the basics, and that the "conflict is a waste of time."
What do you think of “phonics first” or “phonics only” in the primary grades? (Shanahan, 2022)
"The scientists who know the most about this are big proponents of teaching phonics, but they don’t buy into the idea that it’s phonics first or phonics only. Those ideas come from folks who are trying to push a pendulum, for a sale, or (perhaps like your district) who want to respond to community pressure without taking the trouble to examine the science of reading."
The Science of Reading and the Media: How Do Current Reporting Patterns Cause Damage? (Aukerman, 2022)
This is the third of a series of articles on the "media crisis" on the "science of reading." In this article, Aukerman argues that this problematic reporting marginalizes actual research, frames teachers as out of touch, and contributes to the disintegration of genuine dialogue and increasing polarization. "Reading educators and other stakeholders all want children to read well, after all, and we need each other’s voices, perspectives, and research in conversation rather than in battle in order to best make that happen."
Why So Many Kids Struggle to Learn (Wexler, 2021)
Nathalie Wexler argues that "teachers continue to be trained in ways that ignore the findings of cognitive science."

Scholarly Articles from Reading Research Quarterly

Reading Research Quarterly, published by the International Literacy Association, is one of the foremost publications on literacy. They published the following two special issues on the Science of Reading. Together, these two issues include over 50 peer-reviewed articles from scholars on the Science of Reading.

When Amanda Goodwin, co-editor of Reading Research Quarterly discussed the research findings from these two journals articles, she explained that "the science of reading is a broad body of research... that includes not just alphabetics, phonics, and word reading, which receive the most attention in the media. Actual science of reading research also incorporates findings related to motivation, dyslexia, digital texts, and multilingualism. In addition, effective reading instruction does not follow a simple prescription but leaves room for teacher discretion" (summarized in Heller, 2022).

Selected articles that discuss the overall concept of the "Science of Reading" are presented below (additional articles appear in the "Research on Components of Reading" page).

The Science of Reading: Supports, Critiques, and Questions (2020)

This article includes two key findings:

Multiple studies focus on deepening our understanding of what typically is seen as the core of the SOR: phonics instruction. For example, Petscher et al. describe the strong evidence for explicit and systematic foundational skill instruction, providing a big‐picture view.
The majority of the articles in this special issue push to expand conceptualizations of the SOR. This perspective contrasts to the singular focus on phonics and word reading.

The Science of Reading: Supports, Critiques, and Questions (Goodwin & Jiménez, 2020)
This is an overview of this journal issue, which defines the Science of Reading, summarizes key findings, and gives an annotated bibliography of each article.
The Sciences of Reading and Writing Must Become More Fully Integrated (Graham, 2020)
Steve Graham emphasizes the reciprocal relation between reading and writing and argues that the SOR needs to be integrated with the science of writing.
What Research Has Revealed About Readers' Struggles With Comprehension in the Digital Age: Moving Beyond the Phonics Versus Whole Language Debate (Alexander, 2020)
Alexander extends the conceptualization of reading purposefully to include digital reading and challenges that readers face when reading in such contexts. She also suggests recommendations for addressing these challenges.
Lost in Translation? Challenges in Connecting Reading Science and Educational Practice (Seidenberg, Cooper Borkenhagen, & Kearns, 2020)
"The lack of improvement in literacy levels, especially among students who face other challenges such as poverty, has led to new pressure to incorporate the science of reading in curricula, instructional practices, and teacher education. In the interest of promoting these efforts, the authors discuss three issues that could undermine them: the need for additional translational research linking reading science to classroom activities, the oversimplified way that the science is sometimes represented in the educational context, and the fact that theories of reading have become more complex and less intuitive as the field has progressed."
Reading Wars, Reading Science, and English Learners (Goldenberg, 2020)
The author summarizes what is known about teaching ELs beginning and more advanced reading skills, all in English, as they progress through school. Drawing on classroom studies, interventions, and neurolinguistic research, the author focuses on how learning to read in a second language is similar to learning to read in a first language and what differences might exist. Interestingly, the article highlights that many of the scaffolds designed for ELs also support non-ELs, suggesting that attending to language proficiency is an important SOR consideration both for ELs and for all students more generally.
A Confluence of Complexity: Intersections Among Reading Theory, Neuroscience, and Observations of Young Readers (Compton-Lilly et al, 2020)
The authors emphasize that reading is complex and multifaceted. This embracing of the complexity of reading “challenges instructional approaches (e.g., structured literacy) that deny or ignore the multidimensional and networked nature of young learners’ reading processes and/or unique literacy learning trajectories.” This work also takes an equity lens, emphasizing that “the human factor (Pearson, 2004)—differences among individuals and groups, their practices, their interactions, and the unpredictability that accompanies being human—disrupts the possibility of narrow and universally applicable solutions for helping all students become readers.”
What Constitutes a Science of Reading Instruction? (Shanahan, 2020)
In this article, although the author supports pedagogical decision making on the basis of a confluence of evidence from a variety of sources, he cautions against instructional overgeneralizations based on various kinds of basic research without an adequate consideration of instructional experiments. The author provides several examples of the premature translation of basic research findings into wide‐scale pedagogical application.
Disrupting Racism and Whiteness in Researching a Science of Reading (Milner, 2020)
Milner challenges the field to consider race when interpreting and investigating the SOR. He "questions who builds knowledge, what counts as knowledge, and why knowledge is constructed in the science of reading." Milner critically considers what the SOR (as it has typically been construed) means to scholars and readers of color, and more importantly, he provides a vision for what it could and should be.
How the Science of Reading Informs 21st‐Century Education (Petscher et al, 2020)
These authors consider “what constitutes evidence in the science of reading, and to offer a critical evaluation of the evidence provided by the science of reading.” These authors differentiate between points that have compelling evidence versus promising evidence versus a lack of evidence. Unsurprisingly, Petscher et al. note “that a large evidence base provides strong support for the explicit and systematic instruction of the component and foundational skills of decoding and decoding itself,” as well as teaching of comprehension strategies, explicit instruction in key vocabulary, and text discussions. Less evidence is noted for specific programs (e.g., Units of Study) or for common instructional approaches, such as close reading, use of decodable text, sustained silent reading, multisensory approaches, and the three-cueing system, to support word recognition development.
Aligning the Science of Reading With Adaptive Teaching (Vaughn, Parsons, & Massey, 2020)
The discussion focuses on the ways in which the science of reading emphasizes the teaching of reading as decontextualized and compartmentalized aspects of literacy acquisition that are distant from culturally sustaining and relevant pedagogies and restrict teachers in their efforts to teach reading. The authors demonstrate that adaptive teaching is a vital characteristic of effective reading teachers.
Expanding the Knowledge Base in Literacy Instruction and Assessment: Biliteracy and Translanguaging Perspectives From Families, Communities, and Classrooms (Noguerón‐Liu, 2020)
Silvia Noguerón-Liu synthesizes the research stemming from work with emergent bilingual students, arguing
that the complexity of the instructional, demographic, and sociocultural realities of emergent bilinguals in the United States requires solutions informed by various vantage points and perspectives, including those of students, parents, and communities. The author cautions against the implications of critiques of the three‐cueing systems and miscue analysis, by explaining how language‐related perspectives, including translanguaging, can help expand miscue analytic approaches. This expansion can help teachers and families understand how emergent bilinguals draw from their multiple language and literacy resources in decoding and retelling.
Resisting Positionings of Struggle in "Science of Teaching Reading" Discourse: Counterstories of Teachers and Teacher Educators in Texas (Mosley Wetzel et al, 2020)
Importantly, this work pushes back on “position[ing] teachers and teacher educators as struggling and…[instead] present[s] three counterstories that exhibit how teachers and teacher educators are exceeding the expectations of the framework by foregrounding more complex, social justice–focused perspectives on readers and reading.” This article adds an anti-racist, anti-oppressive, and contextualized professional knowledge lens to SOR discussions.

The Science of Reading: Supports, Critiques, and Questions (2021)

This issue presents four key findings:

Multiple studies argue for the need to extend the theories, models, and framing on which the SOR is built. New emphases on embracing complexity, equity, and multiple perspectives are advocated
Multiple studies confirm important SOR instructional principles, such as letter and word‐reading instruction, whereas others suggest additional important factors to consider that relate to instruction, including an emphasis on reading multiple texts, reading volume, syntax skills, play, alignment of curriculum, and use of sociohistorically situated texts
Multiple studies confirm the importance of teacher knowledge and teacher preparation, but methodological challenges lead to more research needed in this area. Also, the interaction between knowledge and teacher judgment (i.e., the art of teaching) is emphasized as key to improving reading outcomes
Multiple studies explore reading across languages, showing both the variable supports of the first language (L1) and the second language (L2) depending on the characteristics of the orthography and context. Issues of Eurocentrism and alphabetism are acknowledged

The Science of Reading: Supports, Critiques, and Questions (Goodwin & Jiménez, 2021)
This is an overview of this journal issue, which summarizes the four key findings and gives an annotated bibliography of each article.
The Science of Reading Progresses: Communicating Advances Beyond the Simple View of Reading (Duke & Cartwright, 2021)
"Research in the 35 years since the [simple view of reading] was proposed has revealed additional understandings about reading. In this article, we synthesize research documenting three of these advances: (1) Reading difficulties have a number of causes, not all of which fall under decoding and/or listening comprehension as posited in the simple view; (2) rather than influencing reading solely independently, as conceived in the simple view, decoding and listening comprehension overlap in important ways; and (3) there are many contributors to reading not named in the simple view, such as active, self‐regulatory processes, that play a substantial role in reading. We present a theory, which we call the active view of reading, that is an expansion of the simple view and can be used to convey these important advances to current and future educators."
What Matters Most? Toward a Robust and Socially Just Science of Reading (Aukerman & Chambers Schuldt, 2021)
The term "science of reading" has tended to have "an intensive focus on assessed reading proficiency as the primary goal of reading instruction. Although well intentioned, this focus directs attention toward a problematically narrow slice of reading. In this article, we propose a different framework for the science of reading... The framework proposes, first, that reading education should develop textual dexterity across grade levels in the four literate roles first proposed by Freebody and Luke: code breaker (decodes text), text participant (comprehends text), text user (applies readings of text to accomplish things), and text analyst (critiques text). Second, the framework suggests that reading education should nurture important literate dispositions alongside those textual capacities, dispositions that include reading engagement, motivation, and self‐efficacy. . Finally, we propose that reading education should attend closely to linguistic, cultural, and individual variation, honoring and leveraging different strengths and perspectives that students bring to and take away from their learning."
Conflict or Conversation? Media Portrayals of the Science of Reading (MacPhee, Handsfield, & Paugh, 2021)
In this article, we contend that in media stories on the science of reading, journalists have relied on strategic metaphorical framing to present reading education as a public crisis with a narrow and settled solution... The media have asserted a direct connection between basic research and instructional practice that, without sufficient translational research that attends to a variety of instructional contexts and student populations, may perpetuate inequities. We end with an example of collaboration and a challenge to reframe reading education in ways that center collaboration and conversation rather than conflict.
Beyond the Simple View of Reading: The Role of Executive Functions in Emergent Bilinguals' and English Monolinguals' Reading Comprehension (Taboada et al, 2021)
However, the simple view of reading has been challenged, and evidence has proved it to be too simple to explain the complexities of reading comprehension in the elementary school years. Hypotheses have been advanced that there are cognitive‐linguistic factors that underlie the common variance between D and LC, which are malleable, although there is no clarity at this point regarding what these are. We propose that one such group of malleable cognitive factors is executive function (EF) skills. Further, we posit that EF skills play equally strong roles in explaining reading comprehension variance in emergent bilinguals and English monolinguals.
Reading Volume and Reading Achievement: A Review of Recent Research (Allington & McGill, 2021)
"The evidence available indicates that, initially, the level of reading achievement drives the relation observed between achievement and volume, but as students become more proficient readers, the relation changes such that volume of reading drives reading achievement." The authors also review programs that encourage reading volume via providing access to books, showing evidence of the effectiveness of such programs, including a summer reading program for students from low-income backgrounds that allowed the students to choose books. Such students performed better on reading achievement as compared with control students who were not provided with books, suggesting the power of choice and reading volume.
The Contribution of Play Experiences in Early Literacy: Expanding the Science of Reading (Rand & Morrow, 2021)
Rand and Morrow note that the many interpretations of the SOR as having a narrow focus on decoding have led to reports emphasizing the need for teaching reading skills in preschool and kindergarten, which has resulted in “many teachers believ[ing] that there is not enough time to use play in kindergarten because of the pressure to meet academic standards (Lynch, 2015).” This article extends the SOR to emphasize “that enriched play environments encourage a variety of emergent literacy behaviors,” highlighting the potential of “planned play experiences and games that are scaffolded by adult guidance.”
Teaching Reading Is More Than a Science: It's Also an Art (Paige et al, 2021)
"The science of reading and teacher craft are each insufficient without the other. In this article, we discuss the art of teaching and advocate that it must be given serious consideration if the science of reading is to be adopted en masse by teachers...We define the art of teaching as being embodied in the teacher’s decision making that involves selection, differentiation, and delivery of engaging and efficacious reading instruction. Such decision-making processes occur daily and often on the fly within the social interactions of the classroom." Ultimately, the authors argue that when the SOR and teacher craft are “properly blended, [they can] become powerful allies that lead to improved reading outcomes for all students.”

Additional Scholarly Journals and Articles

Journals

Scholarly Articles

Ending the Reading Wars: Reading Acquisition From Novice to Expert (Castles et. al. 2018)
This article presents "a comprehensive tutorial review of the science of learning to read, spanning from children’s earliest alphabetic skills through to the fluent word recognition and skilled text comprehension characteristic of expert readers."
The Science of Reading and Its Educational Implications (Seidenberg 2013)
This article discusses how, despite enormous progress toward understanding skilled reading, the acquisition of reading skill, the brain bases of reading, the causes of developmental reading impairments and how such impairments can be treated, there are still significant literacy achievement gaps.The author examines possible reasons for these persisting achievement gaps.
Legislating Phonics: Settled Science or Political Polemics? (Reinking, 2023)
"We argue that phonics instruction is more effective when embedded in a more comprehensive program of literacy instruction that accommodates students’ individual needs and multiple approaches to teaching phonics—a view supported by substantial research. ...There is no one uppercase Science of Reading. Instead, there are multiple lowercase sciences of reading, each contributing interesting and relevant findings to our understanding. But to suggest that they constitute a settled science of reading is to ignore the history of science, or, for that matter, reading research,” which is a constantly evolving field with new insights emerging every year.

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