The Literacy View

Send us Fan Mail Official Sponsor of this episode!🎉👏🏻 Decodify is a supplemental, structured literacy toolkit that allows for reading practice in an engaging, purposeful, and educational format. It helps students unlock the code and own the word. For an exclusive 5 % discount on your decodify purchase  email Judy@theliteracyview.com Decodify Website: https://www.decodifylearning.com/ Work or Pa...

Send us Fan Mail Official Sponsor of this episode!🎉👏🏻 Decodify is a supplemental, structured literacy toolkit that allows for reading practice in an engaging, purposeful, and educational format. It helps students unlock the code and own the word. For an exclusive 5 % discount on your decodify purchase  email Judy@theliteracyview.com Decodify Website: https://www.decodifylearning.com/ Work or Pa...

New Curriculum, Same Scores: Did Your District Just Waste Millions? with Dr. Shawn Datchuk | October 11, 2026 ▶️ Watch on YouTube: https://youtu.be/Ue4vljZJNfw Districts are spending millions on shiny new reading programs. So why are so many scores stuck? Shawn Datchuk, professor of special education at the University of Iowa and former director of the Iowa Reading Research Center, helps schools c...

Ep.175 Send us Fan Mail Official Sponsor of this episode!🎉👏🏻 Decodify is a supplemental, structured literacy toolkit that allows for reading practice in an engaging, purposeful, and educational format. It helps students unlock the code and own the word. For an exclusive 5 % discount on your decodify purchase  email Judy@theliteracyview.com Decodify Website: https://www.decodifylearning.com/ Wor...

Ep.174 The How: Building Knowledge That Makes Readers Stronger (with Daniel Willingham) Hey, no BS besties. Decoding gets kids in the door, but it doesn't carry them through a text. Comprehension depends on what readers already know about the world, and that knowledge doesn't build itself. In this episode, I'm joined by Daniel Willingham, cognitive psychologist at the University of...

Rediscovering Knowledge as the Key to Reading with Daniel Willingham: The Why Ep.173 Value For years, comprehension instruction leaned almost entirely on skills and strategies. Strategies have a place, but they can't do the heavy lifting alone. In this episode, I sit down with cognitive scientist Daniel Willingham to dig into the why behind "Rediscovering Knowledge as the Key to Reading,...

Ep.172 Value Spelling often gets squeezed out of the literacy block, treated as a Friday list test or handed off to spell-check. In this episode, I'm joined by Sean Morrisey, fifth grade teacher, former school psychologist, and creator of The Word Mapping Project, to break down Timothy Shanahan's article on the essential fundamentals of spelling instruction. The article pulls together ad...

Ep.171 Hey No BS Besties! Let’s talk about spelling. In this episode, Sean Morrisey and I break down Timothy Shanahan’s Essential Fundamentals of Spelling Instruction and, more importantly, talk about the WHY behind effective spelling instruction. VALUE Spelling is not just about memorizing a list of words. It is connected to phonics, orthography, morphology, reading, and writing. We take a closer...

Value: Differentiating phonics instruction can feel overwhelming, especially when students have a wide range of needs. In this episode, Wiley Blevins shares practical guidance for using small-group instruction to provide targeted support while maintaining access to grade-level learning. Listeners will gain research-informed insights and classroom-ready ideas for making phonics instruction more res...

Ep.169 Value This episode will challenge the way you think about engagement, rigor, and student learning. Zaretta Hammond shares practical, research-backed insights on how to create classrooms where students are doing the real cognitive work instead of passively participating. You’ll walk away with actionable ideas to strengthen thinking, discussion, productive struggle, and equity in instruction....

Ep.168 Value In this episode of The Literacy View, we have an amazing conversation with Assistant Superintendent Lynn Gaffney about why so many school initiatives fail and what actually leads to meaningful, lasting change. We dig into the realities of implementation, initiative overload, leadership decisions, and what schools need to stop doing if they want improvement efforts to truly stick. Prom...

Ep.167-What Actually Works In Schools The Literacy View live from researchED. VALUE: In this episode with Jim Heal, we call out the truth most schools avoid. We are not failing because teachers are not working hard. We are failing because we keep chasing everything instead of committing to what actually works. Jim breaks down mental models, worked examples, and the science of learning in a way tha...

 Join Us This Saturday Live In NYC!💜 🚨 WE’RE GOING LIVE RESEARCHED NYC 2026 🚨 No fluff. No boring PD. Just real conversations that actually matter. Join us live 👇 🎤 Lynn Gaffney 9:00 AM Making It Stick: Why School Initiatives Fail and What Actually Works 👉 https://www.youtube.com/live/4ismP8GCM3w?si=KXJZrHHlOaAeZPiQ 🧠 Zaretta Hammond 11:30 AM If Students Aren’t Doing the Thinking, They Aren...

Ep.165 Send us Fan Mail Sponsor-The Literacy View-Contact FaithandJudy@theliteracyview.com Partner With The Literacy View-Contact-FaithandJudy@theliteracyview.com Support the show Donate to support the show so it stays real, research-aligned, and independent.💜 https://www.paypal.com/donate/?hosted_button_id=88DP4YMVETHFQ 🚨 Partner with The Literacy View No BS All Impact🫵   Coaching, PD, Retreat...

NEVER BEFORE‼️ The Controversial Four!  Ep.164 1) SoR gone wrong  ⚠️$$$$$$ 🤔 Article: https://hechingerreport.org/new-york-ten-million-reading-instruction/?fbclid=IwdGRleARTu3JleHRuA2FlbQIxMQBzcnRjBmFwcF9pZAo2NjI4NTY4Mzc5AAEeqbWxaS5IvvzlW4XxIdG4RN3kgnT7cDuSDppB69uyRhEscHxSzV6xlJ8Um3E_aem_2PbKgzuF_DYLzkAMMolz4g 2) LETRS  Article: https://epaa.asu.edu/index.php/epaa/article/view/8621?fbclid=IwdGRle...

Ep.163 VALUE 🔥 This episode is about the power of strong foundations and why they matter in every subject. We break down how the science of learning applies across literacy, math, science, and social studies so you can make smarter instructional decisions every single day. You will walk away knowing exactly what to prioritize, how to spot gaps early, and how to build knowledge and skills that act...

Ep.162 VALUE 🔥 What if we have been thinking about small group instruction all wrong? In this episode, Nell Duke brings the real talk on what actually matters in literacy instruction right now. We dig into the role of knowledge building, why science and social studies cannot keep getting pushed aside, and what it really means to use small group reading instruction wisely. This is not surface-leve...

Ep.161 🔥 Value If you are questioning whether screens are helping or hurting your students or your own kids, this episode gives you clarity. We break down what screens may be doing to attention, language, and learning, and what actually matters in real classrooms and homes. You will walk away with concrete things to think about, discuss, and watch for. 🔥 Promise This episode will challenge you t...

Ep.160 Does Teacher Talk Really Matter? What the Evidence Shows with Dr. Yan Jiang In this episode of The Literacy View, we sit down with Dr. Yan Jiang, Postdoctoral Scholar at the Stanford Center on Early Childhood and coauthor of a major meta analysis published in Review of Educational Research. Her study analyzes more than one hundred studies examining the relationship between teachers’ languag...

Value In this episode with Reid Lyon, we go straight to the source of the modern reading research movement. You hear firsthand what the research actually revealed about how children learn to read, where implementation has gone wrong, and why misunderstanding the science continues to create confusion in classrooms. This is not secondhand interpretation. It is direct insight into the evidence, the h...

Ep.158 Value: In this Valentine’s Pop-Up LIVE, we share the quotes that made us think, pause, and remember why this work matters. You’ll hear powerful moments from episodes across the year, honest reflections from our community, and the conversations that define The Literacy View. Promise: You will leave re-energized and grounded in your purpose, reminded that this literacy work is bigger than tre...

Ep.157 Value A clear explanation of Linguistic Phonics and how this approach teaches reading through the direct connection between spoken sounds and written spellings. You’ll see how focusing on a small set of sounds and spellings at a time, and using them repeatedly in reading and spelling, helps learning stick. Promise You’ll leave knowing exactly how this approach works in practice and how to u...

EP.156🌶️  Value : This episode breaks down the article everyone’s talking about and asks the hard question it raises: If synthetic phonics has been mandated for years, why haven’t outcomes for struggling readers changed? We talk directly with Dominic Wyse about the research, the data, and what gets lost when literacy policy becomes rigid instead of responsive. Promise : You’ll leave with a clearer...

Ep. 155 We had a surprise guest: Mark Seidenberg! 🙌🏻 💜 Value & Promise In this episode, educators are invited into a research conversation that is still unfolding. You’ll hear Mark Seidenberg discuss his latest article while educators engage in real time with questions, reactions, and pushback. This episode offers • A window into how researchers think aloud as ideas are examined, questioned...

Ep. 154 Value Cuts through the curriculum noise by explaining why so many debates miss what actually drives reading comprehension. Clarifies how curriculum, instruction, strategies, and prior knowledge interact so educators can think more clearly about what really supports understanding. Promise Listeners will leave with sharper language to explain what’s broken in common curriculum conversations,...