Science of Reading: Background Knowledge - What Every EdLeader Should Know

EdLeader Podcast host Dr. Rob Jackson might just be a closet bibliophile, someone who has a great love of books. Occasionally he enjoys returning to touchstone texts or timeless tomes, those books that shaped him early in his career and life and bringing them forward, spending time again with the words, thoughts, and reflections that moved him then and move him still.

This latest episode is just that, a return to a treasured book. The book, Tuesdays with Morrie, became a runaway bestseller 26 years ago. It was made into a movie and a Broadway play and is said to have changed millions of lives. A successful young man made a series of trips to visit his college professor almost twenty years after graduating. The professor, Morrie Schwartz, was in the final weeks of his life as he was gradually overtaken by ALS, more commonly known as Lou Gehrig's Disease. The book recounts the fourteen Tuesday visits the young man, Mitch Albom, made, their conversations, Morrie's lectures, and his life experiences. In his final days, the professor taught his student, and all of us how to die, and consequently, how to live.

He said, “The most important thing in life is to learn how to give out love, and to let it come in.”

In this episode, Dr. Jackson is beyond honored and excited to welcome another young man and his mentor to the podcast. They read and shared this book with each other and then shared it with Dr. Jackson. In his hands, it felt familiar, it felt timeless.

Regardless of what day of the week it is as you listen to this, pretend it is Tuesday. Let’s join Morrie and Mitch, and these two guests, let’s imagine opening the worn pages of this beloved book and in Morrie’s words, “Let it come in.”

The professor said, “As long as we can love each other, and remember the feeling of love we had, we can die without ever really going away. All the love you created is still there. All the memories are still there. You live on—in the hearts of everyone you have touched and nurtured while you were here.” As EdLeaders, you will live on in the hearts of everyone you have touched and nurtured while you were here.

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Military-connected students and families transition on average 6-9 times in a military child's academic career. Schools should thoughtfully consider how to provide every flexibility possible to ensure that military-connected students have a smooth transition when they arrive and that their unique needs are met while they are with us.

Dr. Angie Mullenix is the Director of Innovative Practices and Programs and the State Military Liaison for the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction. A veteran herself, Dr. Mullenix leads the state's efforts to recognize schools and school districts for their service to military-connected students and families.

In a time where a war is being fought in the Gaza Strip and in the Ukraine, and understanding the cost that is borne by military personnel and their families, taking some time to consider how schools can support military-connected students and families is time well-spent. 

U.S. Department of Education Secretary Miguel Cardona said, "Our military-connected students are resilient and know how to grow and thrive in new school environments. To do so, they need the tools and resources that we, as education leaders, must provide to support them in these new environments."

Join Dr. Mullenix and Dr. Jackson as they discuss how EdLeaders and schools may support these students.

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The Science of Reading is undergirded by theories of how students learn to read and comprehend text. The theory most often cited is Scarborough's Reading Rope as conceived by Dr. Hollis S. Scarborough. Dr. Scarborough believed that the elements of Word Recognition and the elements of Language Comprehension all weave together into the rope of Reading Comprehension. Just like a true rope, the more strands present and the stronger each strand is, the stronger the rope is. It is surmised that if a student is weaker in one strand, the strength of the other strands can still help the student comprehend what she is reading.

In this new podcast series on the Science of Reading - What Every EdLeader Should Know, Dr. Rob Jackson, host of the EdLeader podcast, has one goal, to peel apart the individual strands of reading comprehension and build our shared understanding of what EdLeaders need to know about learning to read.

So metaphorically, we grab Scarborough’s reading rope and separate the strands of Word Recognition and Language Comprehension. Within the Language Comprehension strands, we find the strand that is the topic for today’s episode, Vocabulary.

Building vocabulary knowledge is important to help students be better communicators, help them access more text, and increase their own expressiveness.

Show notes are available at: www.drrobjackson.com
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When students graduate from our schools and school systems, where do they go? We hope that they are enrolled, enlisted, or employed. We hope that we have helped them accomplish their dreams and reach their goals. Today’s guest on the EdLeader podcast is focused on meeting students where they are and taking them as far as they want to go.

Dr. Jeff Cox became the 11th President of the North Carolina Community College System on June 1, 2023. Dr. Cox previously served as president of Wilkes Community College for nine years. Prior to that, he served for nine years as the superintendent of the  Alleghany County Schools system. Today, he brings his experience working with students from Pre-kindergarten to the university level to lead the North Carolina Community College System, the third largest system in the U.S. serving nearly 600,000 community college students each year with 58 colleges providing education to all 100 counties.

With the unique perspective of having served as a Principal and Superintendent and as a Community College President, Dr. Cox shares his expertise and experience to assist EdLeaders in growing students and schools through building relationships, earning trust, and casting a bold vision.

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Leaders tend to dive into the work and forget about themselves. Later, they find themselves feeling drained, frustrated, and tired. You have heard the clarion calls to prioritize your own self-care.  We have also heard that self-care is not selfish. Though important aspects, self-care is more than just exercise and eating well. It is also prioritizing your own growth, continuous learning, building a support network, achieving a work-life balance, and choosing personal joy.

EdLeader host Dr. Rob Jackson welcomes back a close friend, a past guest on this podcast,  and one of the most respected educators in the state of North Carolina, Chatham County Schools Superintendent Dr. Tony Jackson! Dr. Jackson shares strategies to sustain in leadership through prioritizing growth and self-care. Being the best you is not being a great leader while being a terrible spouse, parent, sibling, and friend. 

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In a world that tips towards negativity and defeatism, EdLeaders have the opportunity to brighten life and sew positivity through Bringing Joy into the schoolhouse and into the lives of students and staff every day.  Donna L. Bledsoe, principal of Cedar Ridge Elementary School in Surry County, NC was selected as the 2023 North Carolina State Principal of the Year. She encourages every EdLeader to "Bring the Joy" every day.

Since becoming the leader of the small, rural school in 2016, Ms. Bledsoe has cultivated a community with a clear focus on student success, strong faculty collaboration, and overall school improvement. In her words, the culture of Cedar Ridge Elementary can be summed up in one word: “joy.” 

"Bring the joy" is their school mantra, and it’s reflected in all aspects of the school.

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Stephen M. R. Covey is the author of Wall Street Journal #1 Bestseller, Trust and Inspire: How Truly Great Leaders Unleash Greatness in Others.  Joining Dr. Jackson for a truly inspirational conversation, Covey believes that even though our world has changed drastically, our leadership style has not.

Most organizations, teams, schools, and families today still operate from a model of “Command and Control,” focusing on hierarchies and compliance from people. But because of the changing nature of the world, the workforce, the work itself, and the choices we have for where and how to work and live, these old rules of leadership no longer apply. Mr. Covey says that, “truly great leaders can create the right conditions to awaken the potential within a person” and that “they curate conditions in which a person can flourish. As a result, they see that person rise beyond every imaginable expectation.”

The 2023-2024 school year has arrived. For EdLeaders, even in the midst of all of the challenges (budgetary and others), creating and curating conditions where students, teachers, staff, and administrators all “rise beyond every imaginable expectation” is imperative. Creating those conditions occurs through authentic relationships building and deepening trust to inspire all those around us to greater heights. 

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Previous episodes in the Science of Reading series have focused on the strands of fluency, background knowledge, sight word recognition, verbal reasoning, literacy knowledge, decoding, and language structures. With this episode, we continue deconstructing the reading rope.

Today, Dr. Jackson pulls out the strand of phonological awareness. His guest host for this episode is ChatGPT. ChatGPT is an AI language model developed by OpenAI. Although OpenAI does not claim personal authorship or intellectual property rights, a citation has been included in the Show Notes to attribute the content to the AI system that produced it. 

Phonological Awareness refers to the ability to recognize and manipulate the individual sounds, or phonemes, that make up spoken words. This fundamental skill is a powerful predictor of reading success in children. Numerous studies have highlighted its significance in language development and literacy acquisition.

Dr. Jackson has been interested in learning more about ChatGPT and wanted to produce the next episode in the Science of Reading series. This episode is a melding of those two intellectual challenges.

In education, I am surrounded by incredibly caring people who want to make a difference. For years, as an ice breaker in a meeting, an introduction in a presentation, or in an interview question, I have asked the question, ‘Why do you want to be a teacher, a counselor, a principal, a superintendent, or an educator?’

For years, the universal answer has been and is, “I want to make a difference!”

As I think about it, with few exceptions, I can say that my colleagues have each made or are making a profound difference. I can cite countless examples of former students who recount with love and wonder the difference an educator made in their life. I think of my own teachers and even the mentors I have had within the profession who made a difference in my life.

Mahatma Gandhi, the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Mother Teresa, Sir Winston Churchill, the Reverend Billy Graham, and in our own state of North Carolina, Dr. Dudley Flood and Dr. Gene Causby who were charged with helping schools and communities with the task of bringing civility and goodwill to the school boards, teachers, administrators, parents and most of all the students in the early days of desegregation. They traveled the state bringing fragmented groups to the discussion table for solutions for the schools. It was their wit and courage that defused problems of great magnitude. They like the well-known names I mentioned a moment ago, made a difference.

I wonder though, if any of those I mentioned, have found themselves in moments like I have, in periods of self-doubt, periods where you really wonder if you are making more than a difference in the moment, that you are actually making a lasting difference.

Casting doubt aside and refusing to fall prey to negative self-talk, I search for examples of lasting differences among the tapestry of lives that have been woven together in my career that now spans decades and thousands of lives across dozens of communities. In that reflection, I pause in my rumination to consider the heroes among my mentors and the students I taught early in my career who are now accomplishing their dreams. Among them are doctors, attorneys, teachers, bankers, investors, real estate agents, landscape artists, etc. Beyond career success, I witness them succeeding as friends, spouses, and parents.

My own life bears witness to the lasting difference made by the public school teachers who taught and loved me as a child. My career, now in its latter stages, demonstrates the lasting difference made by the teachers and administrators who took me under their wings and nurtured me as a young teacher and later as a beginning administrator. Perhaps the success of my former students shows the “paying it forward” desire I have always had as an educator. Perhaps it is found in the Instructional Assistants I worked with who are now teachers, or teachers who are now principals, or principals who are now superintendents. Certainly, I can find positive examples of making a difference. What then, can I find in these exemplars of differences made that might just be the keys to making a lasting difference?

From my reflections, I believe that there are two key requirements to making a difference that lasts: intention and attention.

At the start of a new adventure, a new career, a new school year, a new position, a new opportunity, or a new journey, it is important to be able to state in a clear manner the intention of the work.

I know that without the intention at the outset and the attention throughout, I would still be simply talking about what I would like to accomplish instead of actually making a lasting difference.

Intention and attention, powerful tools for any leader, most especially for EdLeaders on the cusp of a brand-new school year.

In the end, only time will tell if we have each made a lasting difference, but I just cannot imagine that we have

Welcome to the 2023 - 2024 school year! It is hard for me to believe that this school year marks the EdLeader podcast’s fifth school year seeking to add value to the work and professional and personal lives of EdLeaders.

Recently I was humbled when the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction selected the EdLeader podcast as a Promising Practice in the state and added it to their collection on the Promising Practices webpage.

The EdLeader podcast community continues to grow worldwide because of your kind words and positive ratings on your favorite podcast player. Thank you for sharing it with your network of colleagues and friends.

There is no question that our ability to successfully help students achieve their potential depends in large part on our ability to recognize and meet the social, emotional, and mental health needs of our students and staff. Equipping ourselves and equipping our teammates for this work is crucial as we prepare for a new school year, a year I believe will be our finest ever.

To launch this school year on EdLeader, I thought it would be appropriate to spend time with an equipper of educators and students. Today’s guest brings a unique background and rich tapestry of experience to this work.

With over 20 years of education and mental health leadership experience, she has the unique lens of both a certified teacher and a licensed clinical therapist specializing in trauma.

After 18 years as a successful high school teacher, she stepped out of the classroom to serve as a social worker and licensed clinician. Her classroom experience coupled with her clinical work with children and families in crisis gives her incredible insight into solving youth mental health problems present in our schools.

She has earned both a Master's Degree in Education and a Master's Degree in Social Work.

She is also the co-author of the book, “Improving School Mental Health: The Thriving School Community Solution,” a global keynote speaker delivering powerful messages of hope to educators, and is the host of the Thriving School Community podcast.

I hope that you enjoy our time together with Ms. Peck. Her simple, yet powerful solutions for making a difference resonate with me, especially when she encourages us to not say to someone that they “should” do something and instead remind them that they “could” do something. I am convinced that turning “should” into “could” would absolutely make a difference in our interactions. 

As a new school year arrives, please allow me to thank you for all that you do for every student, every teacher, and every staff member. You are making a difference. If no one else has told you, I want you to know that I believe in you.

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