Elementary Teacher Preparation in Reading
Instruction: Louisiana
Delivering Well Prepared Teachers Policy
Analysis of Louisiana's policies
Although Louisiana requires elementary education candidates to pass the Praxis II Multiple Subjects (5001) test, which includes reading as a topic, this assessment does not generate a separate reading score and therefore does not amount to an adequate stand alone reading test. Further, although better than previous Praxis tests, the Multiple Subjects test does not appear to be fully aligned with scientifically based reading instruction.
In its reading and language competencies for new teachers, Louisiana does require all teacher preparation programs, including elementary programs, to address the science of reading.
Elementary teacher candidates must be prepared for the key instructional shifts related to literacy that differentiate college- and career-readiness standards from their predecessors. Elementary teachers in Louisiana are required to pass the revised Praxis II Elementary Education: Multiple Subjects (5001) test. The reading and language arts subtest includes some of the instructional shifts toward building content knowledge and vocabulary through careful reading of informational and literary texts associated with these standards. However, although the framework now addresses complex texts, it does so only in the context of measuring text complexity and does not address how to also incorporate increasingly complex texts into instruction.
Louisiana's competencies do not adequately address the use of informational texts.
Neither teacher standards nor testing requirements address incorporating literacy into all academic subjects.
Louisiana's competencies fully address the needs of struggling readers by requiring teacher candidates to know how to:
- Use assessment information to identify students' proficiencies and needs
- Group students for small groups based on data, including small flexible intervention groups
- Develop instruction that is targeted and linked to student deficits visible through screening assessments
Recommendations for Louisiana
Require all teacher candidates who teach elementary grades to pass a rigorous assessment in the science of reading instruction.
Ensure that new elementary teachers are prepared to incorporate informational text of increasing complexity into classroom instruction.
Louisiana's adoption of the new Multiple Subjects test is a step in the right direction. However, the Multiple Subjects framework does not adequately capture all the major instructional shifts of college- and career-readiness standards. Louisiana is therefore encouraged to strengthen its teacher preparation requirements and ensure that all candidates who teach the elementary grades have the ability to address the use of informational texts as well as incorporate complex informational texts into classroom instruction.
Ensure that new elementary teachers are prepared to incorporate literacy skills as an integral part of every subject.
To ensure that elementary students are capable of accessing varied information about the world around them, Louisiana should also—either through testing frameworks or teacher standards—include literacy skills and using text to build content knowledge in history/social studies, science, technical subjects and the arts.
State response to our analysis
Louisiana indicated that the state requires the Praxis Teaching Reading (5204) test for early childhood, elementary and special education candidates enrolled in a non-IHE alternate program. Alternate and traditional early childhood, elementary and special education teacher candidates enrolled in an IHE must earn nine credit semester reading hours that focus on the teaching of reading emphasizing techniques of teaching reading and the recognition and correction of reading problems. Louisiana added that candidates are required to fulfill coursework requirements in the area of teaching reading.
Further, Louisiana stated that the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education policy requires all teacher preparation programs to address State Content Standards, which are the Common Core State Standards. The Common Core State Standards require programs to prepare candidates to incorporate informational text into instruction and ensure that all new teachers are prepared to incorporate literacy skills as an integral part of every subject.
The state added that teacher preparation programs are required to realign the teacher preparation curriculum to prepare preservice teachers to teach to the new CCSS, Compass and assessments. The CAEP and Louisiana Department of Education Partnership Agreement states that “Louisiana standards and institutional standards must be applied in the CAEP accreditation process.”
Louisiana also noted that an ongoing review of this alignment is occurring as campuses provide documentation for their national NCATE/TEAC/CAEP accreditation and ongoing state approval.
-
Louisiana
Select another topic
Delivering Well Prepared Teachers
- Admission into Teacher Preparation
- Elementary Teacher Preparation
- Elementary Teacher Preparation in Reading Instruction
- Elementary Teacher Preparation in Mathematics
- Early Childhood
- Middle School Teacher Preparation
- Secondary Teacher Preparation
- Secondary Teacher Preparation in Science and Social Studies
- Special Education Teacher Preparation
- Special Education Preparation in Reading
- Assessing Professional Knowledge
- Student Teaching
- Teacher Preparation Program Accountability
Expanding the Pool of Teachers
Identifying Effective Teachers
- State Data Systems
- Evaluation of Effectiveness
- Frequency of Evaluations
- Tenure
- Licensure Advancement
- Equitable Distribution
Retaining Effective Teachers
Exiting Ineffective Teachers
Pensions
Research rationale
Reading science has
identified five components of effective instruction.
Teaching children to read is the most important task
teachers undertake. Over the past 60 years, scientists from many fields have
worked to determine how people learn to read and why some struggle. This science
of reading has led to breakthroughs that can dramatically reduce the number of
children destined to become functionally illiterate or barely literate adults.
By routinely applying in the classroom the lessons learned from the scientific
findings, most reading failure can be avoided. Estimates indicate that the
current failure rate of 20 to 30 percent could be reduced to 2 to 10 percent.
Scientific research has shown that there are five essential
components of effective reading instruction: explicit and systematic
instruction in phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary and
comprehension. Many states' policies still do not reflect the strong research
consensus in reading instruction that has emerged over the last few decades.
Many teacher preparation programs resist
teaching scientifically based reading instruction. NCTQ's reports on teacher
preparation, beginning with What
Education Schools Aren't Teaching about Reading and What Elementary Teachers
Aren't Learning in 2006 and continuing through the Teacher Prep Review in 2013 and 2014, have consistently found the
overwhelming majority of teacher preparation programs across the country do not
train teachers in the science of reading. Whether through standards or coursework
requirements, states must direct programs to provide this critical training. But relying on programs alone is insufficient; states must only grant a license to new elementary teachers who can demonstrate they have the knowledge and skills to teach children to read.
Most current reading
tests do not offer assurance that teachers know the science of reading.
A growing number of states, such as Massachusetts,
Connecticut and Virginia, require strong, stand-alone assessments entirely
focused on the science of reading. Other states rely on either pedagogy tests
or content tests that include items on reading instruction. However, since
reading instruction is addressed only in one small part of most of these tests,
it is often not necessary to know the science of reading to pass. States need
to make sure that a teacher candidate cannot pass a test that purportedly
covers reading instruction without knowing the critical material.
College- and career-readiness standards require significant shifts in literacy instruction.
College- and career-readiness standards for K-12 students adopted by nearly all states require from a teachers a different focus on literacy integrated into all subject areas. The standards demand that teachers are prepared to bring complex text and academic language into regular use, emphasize the use of evidence from informational and literary texts and build knowledge and vocabulary through content-rich text. While most states have not ignored teachers' need for training and professional development related to these instructional shifts, few states have attended to the parallel need to align teacher competencies and requirements for teacher preparation so that new teachers will enter the classroom ready to help students meet the expectations of these standards.
Elementary Teacher Preparation in Reading Instruction: Supporting Research
For
evidence on what new teachers are not learning about reading instruction, see NCTQ,
"What Education Schools Aren't Teaching About Reading and What Elementary
Teachers Aren't Learning" 2006) at:http://www.nctq.org/nctq/images/nctq_reading_study_app.pdf.
For
problems with existing reading tests, see S. Stotsky, "Why American Students Do Not Learn to Read Very Well: The Unintended Consequences of Title II and Teacher Testing," Third Education Group Review, Vol. 2, No. 2, 2006; and
D. W. Rigden, Report on Licensure Alignment with the Essential Components of Effective Reading Instruction (Washington, D.C.: Reading First Teacher
Education Network, 2006).
For
information on where states set passing scores on elementary level content
tests for teacher licensing across the U.S., see chart on p. 13 of NCTQ "Recommendations for the Reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, Removing the Roadblocks: How Federal Policy Can Cultivate Effective Teachers," (2011).
For an extensive summary of the research base supporting the instructional shifts associated with college- and career-readiness standards, see "Research Supporting the Common Core ELA Literacy Shifts and Standards" available from Student Achievement Partners.