The World of Literacy: A Revolution in Teaching Reading and Writing
By Theresa Kelly Gegen
Teaching reading in the United States is a world that is constantly revolving and evolving. The way you learned to read as a child may not be what is being taught today. Or it may be, because much of the thinking about the teaching of reading has evolved back into place.
Look at the image above. Is that the Earth? A world? A globe? The Big Blue Marble?
Would you have answered differently when you were a pre-reader?
What if you consider the headline underneath it? As an adult and a reader, it’s easy, once your brain hits that letter “W,” to get it correct. It might be easy even if you didn’t see the first letter of the word, because “World of” is pretty common usage. But pre-readers who don’t know their letters, or know that colloquialism, could not be faulted, given the picture cue, to guess “the Earth of Literacy” or “the globe of literacy.” They’d be guessing wrong, but their idea was fine. They get the gist. And in this instance — reading a headline in a magazine — it wouldn’t really matter.
Literacy, the ability to read, write, speak, and listen in a way that lets us communicate effectively and make sense of the world, is essential. Literacy skills help people develop and communicate. But when children have a tough start in their literacy lives, they fall behind. They struggle to learn, which impacts their confidence and self-esteem as well as their prospects. For an adult without literacy skills, navigating everyday life can be difficult, up to and including securing employment.
Teaching literacy is a story of processes, perceptions, profits, and even politics. It’s also a story of kids struggling to read, so for some, literacy is a story of perseverance.
In the mid-to-late 1900s, two teaching-reading strategies with sometimes confounding nomenclatures essentially rose to the top of the teaching-and-learning-reading conversation: whole language and the science of reading (which includes teaching phonics).
Before we go on, let’s ask: Is teaching reading a governance issue?
No, because the board of education doesn’t make front-line curriculum decisions. That is the role of the administration.
But yes. Truly, the answer is yes. Literacy is a governance issue. Understanding the teaching of literacy is a responsibility of school boards, which must make key decisions impacting quality, achievement, and outcomes for all students, including curriculum adoption and resource allocation. School boards set policy and are accountable for educational quality, including literacy skills. Boards of education set goals and monitor student performance, including literacy outcomes.
Whole Language
The whole language approach assumes that reading comes naturally and eventually, like speaking, and that immersing children in text is the best way to develop the natural ability to read. Whole language prioritizes making meaning from complete words and emphasizes the use of authentic texts and finding meaning. Whole language teaches reading and writing through immersion — indirect instruction — in literature and language experiences, emphasizing comprehension and holistic learning over explicit phonics instruction.
The old Dick and Jane books are examples of whole language teaching.
One widely-used process for whole language teaching is known as 3-cueing or MSV (meaning, structure/syntax, visual). When a child has trouble with a word, teachers using this system ask students: What makes sense? (meaning), What sounds right? (structure), and What looks right? (visual).
What the teacher does not do, in traditional whole language, is tell the student to “sound it out.”
The Science of Reading
Phonics is the foundation for the science of reading and one of two significant differences between the two theories. Children taught phonics learn to “sound out” or “decode” words, move up to sentences and paragraphs, and then use that to develop comprehension and understanding. The science of reading emphasizes direct instruction (the second significant difference) in letters and letter combinations that make up sounds.
McGuffey Readers — predating even Dick and Jane — are phonics-based literacy instruction.
Phonics is rooted in the individual sounds (phonemes) of spoken language as well as the relationships between letters (graphemes) of written language. Phonics instruction helps students identify familiar words and promotes their ability to learn new words by sounding out or decoding.
Proponents of the whole language approach claim that sounding out words detracts from their meanings and is boring for kids learning to read. Opponents say that whole language promotes guessing and not reading. Proponents say the phonics and science of reading offer the necessary foundations for pre- and early readers. They say some kids can learn to read without phonics, but those who struggle cannot. Opponents say phonics takes the joy out of reading.
There is more to the science of reading than phonics, and there is more to whole language than guessing.
Adding to the sometimes confusing terminology, another system, “balanced literacy,” was devised by whole language proponents in response to research on phonics and the science of reading. In its inception, balanced literacy, allowed letter sounds as an additional cue, but did not emphasize phonics instruction. You may also hear the term “structured literacy,” which is affiliated with the science of reading, especially because it emphasizes explicit (or direct), systematic, and cumulative teaching of language structure and its components.
The Story of ‘Sold a Story’
For everything you wanted to know about the movement to, and then from, whole language teaching and learning, please listen to the podcast “Sold a Story,” from APM Reports, presented by American Public Media starting in 2022 and continuing into 2025.
Spoiler alert: “Sold a Story” is very much in favor of phonics and the science of reading approach.
“There’s an idea about how children learn to read that’s held sway in schools for more than a generation — even though it was proven wrong by cognitive scientists decades ago. Teaching methods based on this idea can make it harder for children to learn how to read. In this podcast, host Emily Hanford investigates the influential authors who promote this idea and the company that sells their work. It’s an exposé of how educators came to believe in something that isn’t true and are now reckoning with the consequences — children harmed, money wasted, an education system upended.”
The original six episodes of “Sold a Story” adeptly cover the processes and perceptions, and also the profits and politics that underlie teaching kids to read. It quickly became personal: Many educators, children, and parents shared their stories about the nature of teaching kids to read and learning to read.
“I’ve been thinking about what I’ve been seeing at school board meetings, on social media, in my email — as an awakening. People have actually said that … they’re waking up,” says Hanford in Episode 6: The Reckoning. “Not to the fact that lots of kids can’t read very well. They knew that. What they didn’t know is that many kids aren’t being taught how to read.”
As of 2023, according to statistics published by the NAEP (also known as the “Nation’s Report Card”), more than a third of students do not meet the achievement level of “basic.” Illinois’ numbers equaled those. NAEP achievement levels reflect what students “should know and be able to do.” Results are reported as percentages of students performing at or above basic, proficient, or advanced levels.
One reason literacy conversations lack clarity is because educators and decision-makers act with good intentions. Whole language advocates wanted children to enjoy learning to read and not get bogged down in sounding out words. School districts that were early adopters of whole language curriculum were following the conventional wisdom of the time and investing resources in what they thought was right. Teacher preparation programs taught whole-language approaches. Teachers learned these approaches and then taught children through whole language methods. And most kids learned to read that way.
But many did not.
After setting the scene of processes and politics, “Sold a Story” tells the stories of kids who struggle with the whole language approach. The podcast garnered a lot of attention, both in the education community and the general public. It prompted large-scale change in a way that many podcasters only dream about, in the world of teaching reading and learning. Later episodes of “Sold a Story” discuss this change, the backlash, and the backlash to the backlash.
Nearly every episode of “Sold a Story” mentions local boards of education.
The Illinois Comprehensive Literacy Plan
Public Act 103-0402 requires the state to develop a literacy plan and “highlights literacy as fundamental for both individual and societal well-being, linking low literacy to inequality and economic challenges.”
The resulting Illinois Comprehensive Literacy Plan (ICLP), first published in 2024, serves as a guidance document for districts and was created through an extensive stakeholder engagement process. There is no legislative mandate for districts to adopt or align their practices to the plan.
The ICLP outlines a strategy to enhance literacy instruction statewide, ensuring access to developmentally appropriate and evidence-based instructional practices. It addresses the critical need for literacy improvement, linking it to significant social outcomes and the necessity for focused, equitable instruction. It identifies seven components of literacy as the foundational elements to literacy instruction: oracy, phonological awareness, word recognition, fluency, vocabulary, comprehension, and writing.
The Illinois Comprehensive Literacy Plan focuses on three main goals:
- Goal 1: Every student receives high-quality, evidence-based literacy instruction.
- Goal 2: Every educator is prepared and continuously supported to deliver high-quality, evidence-based literacy instruction.
- Goal 3: Every leader is equipped to create, maintain, and sustain equitable conditions for high-quality, evidence-based literacy instruction.
Several resources are available from ISBE, including the Illinois Literacy Plan for District Leaders, to help implement the ICLP.
Literacy empowers. It expands individual capabilities, which in turn reduces poverty, increases participation in the workforce, and has positive effects on well-being and productivity.
Teaching reading and writing, encompassing outstanding teaching practices, evidence-based and sound, and reaching all children, is crucial for equipping students with the essential skills they need to thrive. Literacy is the foundation, not just for academic success, but also for personal and professional achievement. Educators champion literacy, literacy empowers individuals, and individuals who can read strengthen communities.
Together educators, readers, and communities lead to an equitable and prosperous society.
Theresa Kelly Gegen is Editor of the Illinois School Board Journal and Director of Editorial Services/ Communications for IASB. Resources mentioned in this article, including links to the Illinois Literacy Plan for District Leaders, are available at iasb.com/Journal.