Oral Reading: Making it Useful or Making it a Waste of Time?

Oral reading is often the 'go to' strategy for many classroom teachers teaching children aged 5-10 years of age. But while it is an essential tool for teaching the very young beginning reader, it can be badly used and even abused at school and at home. Furthermore, while it might well be an appropriate way to assess reading for beginning readers aged 4-7 years, it isn't sufficient to properly assess proficient readers, nor to act as a core part of literacy instruction for children with reading ages beyond 7 years (irrespective of the grade they are in).

1. How can oral reading be useful?

Oral reading can:

• Help teachers and parents to observe and make 'visible' children's reading processes (to some extent what's going on in their heads).
• Help children to develop reading fluency and can support vocabulary development.
• Help teachers and parents to assess reading progress and diagnose difficulties.
• Be a helpful skill for life that we don't want to lose.

I've written about oral reading before covering a variety of topics, including:

How to listen to children reading (HERE & HERE),
The importance of reading to and with children (HERE), and
Readers' Theatre (HERE).

 2. How can oral reading be abused?

While oral reading does have some helpful functions, it should never be assumed by parents and teachers as the key tool for reading assessment and instruction.
  Sadly, for many children, reading around the group (or worse still the class) kills interest and motivation. What's even worse, at times oral reading can be used as the only tool to assess the ability of young readers with little attention to comprehension. Just listening to children reading is NOT an adequate tool for assessment. While some young readers might struggle with oral reading, they might possess excellent reading comprehension skills, extensive vocabulary and greater reading fluency when reading silently.

But we also know from research that 'repeated readings' can improve fluency and ability (e.g. Stoddart & others 1993, Rasinski 1990, Rasinski & Hoffman 2003). So it has a place with young readers, but not as the key instructional and assessment tool. My key question for teachers is how can they move beyond 'round robin' reading and embrace more creative and enjoyable approaches to reading?

3. Making it fun and enjoyable

First of all, we need to ensure that children have frequent opportunities for silent reading and opportunities for response, discussion and comprehension tasks.

Above: Reading to her day-old sister

Second, if using oral reading or repeated reading make it interesting and supportive of learning? Here are some key elements to help achieve this.

1. Choose appropriate material for your children - use graded material at varied levels; favourite passages from books the class has heard or read (e.g. Roald Dahl or Dr Seuss books work); jokes & riddles; poetry or songs that they know; speeches and famous quotes.
2. Ensure that students are reading at their appropriate level.
3. Use varied strategies and avoid simply reading around the group.
4. Try to give the oral reading task an 'authentic' rather than contrived purpose.

4. Some alternative strategies

Most of the ideas that follow can be found in a great article by Mary Ann Cahill and Anne E. Gregory published in 'The Reading Teacher'. Here is their description of oral reading in a US 2nd grade classroom they had worked in:

'One pair is rolling dice and using different voices to read; a small group is reading to small, plastic animals on their desks; three students are wearing masks while reading; and another pair is using little, red-beamed flashlights to shine on each word as they read.'

What are some simple novel ways to help children remain motivated and enjoy oral reading?

Above: Evie reads to her pet cat

i) Read to prepare for performance - By this I mean, putting exciting material in children's hands, letting them practice and then asking them to share it with a group or the class (e.g. read a favourite section from a book, read a song, silly poem etc).
ii) Try Readers' Theatre - I've written about this before (HERE). Obtain some free scripts and let your children have fun reading together in small groups to present the scripts to others.
iii) Read to someone or something - This might seem strange, but some teachers get their children to read not to other people but to other 'things'. A number of classes in the UK and the US have had children read regularly to a school dog (read more HERE) with great success and benefits. Some creative teachers have had their children read to plastic dinosaurs (!), a favourite doll etc.
iv) Some turn it into a game such as 'Reading Dice' - This involves getting children to discuss the different voices a character could have for a reading extract; they then write 6 of them on the board and giving them the numbers 1-6. They then have children work in pairs or groups to take turns, roll the dice and use the voice that matches the number.
v) Newsreader or media presenter - Teachers have a microphone (it can be a fake one) and ask children in pairs to conduct an interview for an appropriate extract.
vi) Reading Masks - the children practice reading passages using the voice and persona of the mask they are wearing (these can be animals, super heroes etc).
vii) Use songs for reading - The use of songs has the added advantage that the rhythm, sound repetition, melody etc can be used to support reading (see my recent post on this topic HERE)

Summing up

Oral reading is a valuable instructional tool but should NEVER be used as the sole instructional or assessment tool. It has been misused for many years with the effect that some children have found it less than rewarding. But it can and should be enjoyable and fun. I'd love to hear of your own experiences with oral reading. Do you have any great ideas? Post a comment. 

A useful reference

Mary Ann Cahill & Anne E. Gregory (2011). Putting the fun back into fluency instruction, The Reading Teacher, Vol. 65, No. 2, pp 127-131.

Testing Our Children Towards Mediocrity

In Australia, we have adopted a number of school-wide tests, of which NAPLAN is just one. NAPLAN does three-yearly sample assessments in science, literacy, civics and citizenship, and also information and communication technology (ICT). This is done for grades 3, 5, 7, & 9. To quote government documents, NAPLAN is designed to test "... the sorts of skills that are essential for every child to progress through school and life, such as reading, writing, spelling and numeracy." The results have just been released, and as usual, we are castigating our schools and teachers for failing to teach well enough to the test (see HERE).

When we first started using NAPLAN, Australia was ranked highly in international assessments like PISA. But, as our education systems have increased the volume of testing with tools like NAPLAN, we have lost sight of their original purpose.

They were meant to provide advice to teachers and systems, about the areas of curriculum where students need additional help; they were never meant to be the key driver of pedagogy and classroom practice. It is clear now that teachers have (not surprisingly) increasingly taught to the test. But who could blame them!

Over the last 10 years our results in the international PISA assessments have been dropping in some areas. I believe that this, at least in part, is due to tests like NAPLAN shaping the curriculum and methods that teachers use. Such 'shaping' is inevitable in an environment of constant system-wide testing. I believe that this pressure shapes behaviour and priorities, as teachers and principals contemplate and predict what might be in the test. Is this the best we can do? Is the key goal of education to teach content in order to pass a test, devised by people who don't know the specific needs and background of the children from varied communities? I believe that the answer is no! 

Tests like NAPLAN are what assessment experts call summative assessment tools. They are designed to assess in objective ways what children know and don't know, as well as what they can and cannot do. They assess overall student achievements, monitor system wide student progress, identify areas of under and over performance, assess skills development, and in some cases, give direction guidance in relation to curriculum content.

But there is a problem with such system wide summative approaches. Key among these weaknesses is that no matter how hard you try to ensure that such tests are used to inform classroom pedagogy and right choices with curriculum content and skills development, teachers end up simply teaching to the test!

This type of assessment involves someone other than the teacher, to set a test that is designed to evaluate student learning at the end of a period of time, or a course of work. In summative assessment, performance is evaluated against a specific standard that is decided by people other than the teachers who knows the students.

The challenge for schools and their teachers is that they end up being criticized if the school 'under performs'. So, they try make sure that they teach to the test next time. Even worse, some parents send their children off to additional classes after school to be better equipped for the test. Practice tests abound in shops. We then end up in an endless cycle of teaching our students with one major purpose; to do well on tests. What's lost in such a vicious cycle is any sense of formative assessment of children by their teachers. The goal of formative assessment sets out to monitor student learning and provide feedback that teachers can then use to improve their teaching, and to help their students to improve their learning. Worse still, we lose sight of the overall key aim of education to shape the character of our students. School education was never meant to be a skill factory, it was meant to serve as a safe place where children could grow in knowledge, skills, human virtues and capabilities that would allow them to live and cope with life.

Above: My one-teacher school (guest teacher)

As a young primary school teacher, I was free of the ongoing incessant use of summative state-wide assessment. And so, I was free to use my own formative assessment strategies that were tailored to assess my students learning. Of course, I used lots of informal observation as well. I did this not just for individuals who had learning problems, but also for groups of learners of similar abilities, and also for my class as a whole. My observations and formative assessment occurred in subjects across the curriculum, including reading and writing, spelling, mathematics, social sciences, science and more. As a result, my students improved and made significant progress. In the case of students with specific weaknesses I devised my own activities and programs to help them improve. I'd then assess their progress and reassess my methods in light of their progress or lack of it. I used varied instruction programs and methods for up to four ability groups in my regular classes. I taught even more when in a one-teacher rural school with up to 31 students in the one room across grades Kindergarten to Grade 6. Freed from the need to teach to a national test, I was able to concentrate on my students as learners in many varied ways. But as well, I would administer key summative tests in areas like reading, spelling and maths on a regular basis, simply to see whether my students were reaching age related standards.

Overall, my 'formative' assessment was designed to help me teach so that students grew in skills and knowledge, as well as being equipped for life. Would they grow up with positive self esteem, could they cope with failure? Did they have human qualities of humility, kindness, a desire to serve and so on. Teachers today spend so much time testing, I wonder how they find time to know their students well enough to help shape them as people. My simple point is that if we over use summative testing regimes, we end up with many unintended consequences that do little to help children grow as learners. 

How can we stop this nonsense?

Step 1 - If we must have central system wide curricula, then let's involve the best of our teachers at every grade level in curriculum development. Let's always inform the process of review with the work of our best teachers. And let's limit it as much as possible.

Step 2 - Help teachers to understand thew role of formative assessment and identify the best of our practitioners to teach other teachers how to use formative approaches to grow and shape their students as learners and people.

Step 3 - Only use summative assessment regimes to inform system wide performance and to guide curriculum content, not to dictate and shape the methods and pedagogy of individual teachers. 

Step 4 - Offer additional professional development courses and ensure that there are expert teachers in every school, who help to equip colleagues with pedagogies that will assist them to grow children as learners and people. 

Step 5 - Treat teachers as professionals and stop the constant abuse of schools by politicians, media and the community at large.

Step 6 - Lets reward teachers for success in helping all of their students to grow as learners, not against external measures, but in relation to the individual growth and achievement of their students. 

The over-achieving parent: It could be you!

I had a scary experience recently at a park in the inner-west of Sydney while I was out with one of my daughters, her husband and two of their children. This was a time for all of us to play and have fun together. To climb on everything that could be climbed, dig sand with the mechanical shovel, pretend we were warriors defending our stone fort, trying desperately to keep the marauding hordes at bay (my grandson Sam and I were the warriors, and the hordes were, well... the local pigeons!). It was also a time to see how fast we could go down the slippery dip (that is, the kids plus my son-in-law), and for my grandson and me to ramble along the shore nearby to collect some sticks (vital to create arrows, never destined to be fired), look at emerging mangroves, discuss the wind turbine, talk about the difference between light rail and heavy rail trains, read a sign that spoke of re-vegetation near the water's edge and discuss how mangrove trees grow in water. We also discussed how people were being kept off the site, talked about the working harbour across the bay, peered at distant buildings and Sydney's great bridges and so on. There was even time for an ice cream. All the while we were there we were talking, telling each other stories, occasionally bursting into rhyme, song and laughter. It was a wonderfully enjoyable and rich time of learning.

And then something scary happened. My daughter and I noticed a woman talking VERY loudly on her mobile phone. She was there with her 7-8 year-old son who had just finished a game of Australian Rules football on an adjoining oval. It was one of those conversations that was difficult not to hear, or not to listen to, as painful as it was. I kept wondering (as did my daughter), is this lady serious? We eventually left the sandpit just near where she was sitting, led by the children to the next fun 'station'! But each time we came back near the sandpit, she seemed to be still talking loudly to the same person about the same content, and her son was still playing by himself. I'd estimate that her phone conversation lasted for over 30 minutes, most of the time they were at the park.  The following is the mum's side of the conversation. It reflects the rough record of the encounter hastily written down later on my iPhone. The conversation of course is not continuous, but it would seem that it was rather repetitive and cyclical, so it seems almost linear:

"I'm worried about his school work."
"He's under-performing, because he's deliberately not putting in the effort because he's scared he's going to lose."
"He got 73% in maths, but that was the bottom 20 in year so he got a pass..."
"It's hard for me because I'm not in classroom. I can't control what goes on there."
"He needs a goal..like, you know, what do you want to achieve with each task. So in spelling it would be every word correct, all sentence structure complete..."
"They need to tell him, now look at your portfolio and set a goal. Don't necessarily aim for 5 [i.e. I assume the reporting uses a 5 point assessment scale]. But 2x 4's and the rest 3's...."
"That will be enough to say he's succeeded this semester."
"Then we make them harder goals next semester."
"Just like in his AFL, we need to measure success. He may not win the game, but set goals, this game.. I may lose 8-20, next game 8-16."
"I'm not going to let you bench yourself because you can't 'win'."
"He needs mental toughness."

Now, I have to say that I wasn't using listening equipment, nor was my daughter. This was an animated conversation you could hear across the park. I need also to stress, that this mother no doubt loves her son and wants to do the best things she can for him. But I found this a scary conversation because I suspect that what she is doing is not in his best interests at all. Why? Let me give you just five reasons.

First, here is a parent for whom the judgement of the worth of her son's life seems to be shaped in a major way by the need for him to be successful as assessed on a limited range of academic attainment measures at school.

Second, here is parent who cannot accept that her son might not outperform the majority of his age cohort.

Third, here is a mother who wants to control her child's life so much that she almost cannot cope because she can't be in the classroom directing it.

Fourth, here is a mother who is failing to grasp that her son has worth that cannot be measured in the way she and the school is trying to do it.

Fifth, here is a mother that has missed the chance to have a variety of rich experiences with her son that she would struggle to have in many other ways.

What had both the boy and the mother missed out on? The boy missed an opportunity to learn in a manner that isn't common in most schools. The mum missed the chance to interact with her son informally at a much deeper level and to enrich his knowledge and learning at the same time. Both missed the opportunity to strengthen their relationship, listen to each other and grow in their understanding of one another. This was a significant missed opportunity.

My encouragement to readers of this blog is that if you find yourself drifting in the same direction as this mother, take a 'chill pill', to quote some of the residents of my college. Then reassess your own expectations and ask yourself, "what is driving my expectations, and what might be the consequences if left unchecked?"

The Worrying Preoccupation with Weighing the 'Sheep'!

Global trends in education policy

I’ve recently returned from a trip to Europe where I had the chance to read British newspapers most days. Reading 'The Times' every day was like being at home reading the Sydney Morning Herald. Not because the content was the same, but because many of the articles about education covered the same topics as at home. In Britain, as in Australia and to a large extent the USA, governments, business leaders, media commentators and some parents are decrying the limitations of education systems and are planning or are implementing remarkably similar strategies. In brief, the public agenda involves a call for:

• More extensive national testing of literacy, maths and science.
• Tougher exit exams at the end of high school that provide a single mark that allows all students to be compared across the country.
• A strengthening of system-wide standardised testing of literacy at grades 3, 5 and 8, and in Britain there are plans to test 5 year-olds and include the data in school league tables.
• The publication of lists of the ‘top’ schools ranked on available cross-national data (e.g. the 'My School' website in Australia).
• Better-qualified teachers.
• Increased benchmarking against other OECD countries on the various Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) tests.
• The introduction or strengthening of national curriculum initiatives.

The dilemma of how often to weigh sheep

Overall, the priority is on being able to measure student performance based on agreed measurable outcomes. Now, I’m not against measurable outcomes, but in education they have some limitations when compared to, say, raising sheep, or monitoring factory production. The assessment of sheep production can be monitored in varied ways. You can weigh the sheep, assess the quality of fleece, check general health signs etc. But one thing I know, as the wise Scottish sheep farmer once said, “it doesn’t matter how many times you weigh the sheep, you have to feed them if you want them to grow.”

I’m very concerned at what is happening in relation to the public debate about education where much of our energy is being spent on calls for more testing. As well, large amounts of money and time are being spent on practices which arguably contribute no more to children's growth than weighing does for the growth of sheep. The people who know most about education, the teachers, are being beaten up by farmers, policemen, lawyers, social workers, small business owners etc, because the teachers don’t want to keep ‘weighing’ their kids and limiting school programs to that which can be easily turned into items on a national test.

I’m no stranger to business and public policy, nor the needs of parents and I’ve been an adviser to PISA and other major national assessment projects in Australia for almost 20 years. I believe that testing has a place in assessment, I see the value of a national curriculum and even system wide testing. And I know that parents want and deserve clear feedback on their children’s progress at school and their performance relative to other children. You can read my post on the ‘My School’ website in Australia for a fuller discussion of some of these issues (here). However, for me, the problem with national assessment programs and the My School website is what they are unable to measure, or those things that cannot be easily measured in quantitative terms.

PISA and the performance of some nations

Prof Geoff Masters

It is worth noting that of the English speaking countries surveyed in reading literacy, Canada, New Zealand and Australia have outperformed the USA and the United Kingdom since PISA was commenced. While I won't speculate on the performance of the USA and the UK, I would offer one piece of advice, increased testing will do little to help either country, only quality teaching will help. The USA has a long history of standardised testing of reading that is well beyond anything you would have found in Australia or New Zealand, although this has increased dramatically recently. It is also worth noting that Australia’s love affair with the national testing began about ten years ago. Since then, while Australia continues to have high levels in reading literacy (we were ranked 9th of 65 countries in 2009 in the PISA results), we have seen a decline in our performance in the same period. In a recent report on Australia’s performance, Professor Geoff Masters, the Chief Executive of the Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER) points out that:

“Australian students are still performing well above the OECD average but their results in reading literacy and mathematical literacy have declined significantly over the past few years,” 

More worryingly he points out that:

“Australia was the only high performing country to show a significant decline in reading literacy performance between PISA 2000 and PISA 2009.”

For Australian readers let me stress that our performance is still high, only six countries had significantly higher scores for their 15 year-old students. But for me a number of alarm bells are ringing.

I don’t think that the secret to a great education system, let alone a great nation, is the structuring of national school education systems to teach to tests, particularly when the tests only measure one small slice of what learning and education is about.

Professor Allan Luke commented recently on Australia’s first attempt at a National Curriculum in a paper for the Australian College of Education:

“To date, the Australian Curriculum has the hallmarks of the new generic, transnational curriculum settlement that emerged in the late 1990s as a response to new economic and social contexts. This features a focus on basic skills acquisition and a taxonomic reinstatement of canonical content knowledge in literature, science and history. It attempts to address the emergence of digital cultures and transnational economies through a complex overlay of 'new capacities' to be 'embedded', integrated and indexed against traditional basics and subject knowledge.”

I don’t agree with all that Luke says but his major point is well made. Many of our efforts to respond to a changing and more complex world, have involved cobbling a few new ideas onto traditional notions of curriculum. Schools are not factories, they are places where teachers create and lead communities of learners who inspire one another. Schools and teachers are trying to educate children for life in a world where there are greater opportunities for learning and the gaining of knowledge than at any time in human history.

The things that national testing find hard to measure

When we do assess children’s learning within our classrooms and across educational systems we need to be careful what we measure. I need to stress that I’m not criticising the quality of the PISA assessments. In fact, the tests used are the best they can possibly be. They measure what they are expected to measure well. But there are many things that the tests cannot measure (or find it difficult to measure) which are very important for individuals and nations. Here are just a few:

• Problem solving ability.
• Critical thinking.
• Creativity.
• Level of engagement, interest and motivation.
• Moral growth.
• Aesthetic and design sense and ability.
• Citizenship.
• The ability to work as part of a team.
• Leadership ability.
• Depth of knowledge in areas of great interest.
• Human sensitivity.
• Well-developed self-awareness. 

While good teachers understand that the above are very important and seek to develop them, consider what might happen to teacher behaviour if all that is seemingly valued by governments, business and lobby groups is performance on school or system wide testing. A National Curriculum like that just developed in Australia (see here) must allow, indeed encourage, the development of many of the above abilities and attributes as well as basic skills like decoding. I read a number of blogs and am part of a number of online communities. The following comment by one outstanding teacher speaks volumes for the issues at hand:

Right now I have to assess 126 items per report card times 26 children. That means 3276 check marks per tri-mester, times each tri-mester = 9728 marks. Now they want us to record it 3 different places…That doesn't count the pretesting in September or the CA60's (Cumulative Student Record Folders) and literacy folders in June.

You can hear the frustration in this teacher’s voice because as a professional she knows that her time is being soaked up ‘weighing’ the children rather than feeding them on the excitement and challenge of learning. There is a need to look closely at the quality of our schools and teachers and to ensure that they continue to do the very best they can with the children parents nurture and prepare for schooling in the first five years of life. Teachers need to be held accountable, but they also need to be left alone at times to make professional decisions. On top of this, they need our support in an age where teaching is harder and all families have higher expectations than ever before.

Other relevant posts

'Australian National English Curriculum' HERE

'My School' Website: A Blunt and Inadequate Instrument' HERE

'Multiple Intelligences' HERE

Stifling Creativity: The School as Factory

I've written a number of times about creativity and divergent thinking and how easy it is to stifle both (for example here). I've also written before about Sir Ken Robinson's ideas on the topic, and his view that school tends to educate '...people out of their creativity'.  Children he suggests have a natural tendency towards novelty, experimentation and exploration of their world in new ways right from birth. While genes have something to do with creativity and it varies from one person to another, all humans have the potential to be creative and creativity can be fostered or discouraged. In a recent lecture he cites research from a longitudinal study of 1500 children over a 10-year period ('Breakpoint & Beyond: Mastering the Future Today').  The results of this work suggested that while at age 5 almost all children (98%) demonstrated high levels of creativity and divergent thinking, that at subsequent assessments at 5-year intervals, this dropped dramatically as children progressed through school.



In a recent lecture Sir Ken Robinson suggests that throughout the developed world governments are talking about reforming schools, but in every case they are simply seeking to go 'back to the future'. He suggests that around the world we are seeing governments continuing to support the maintenance of schools systems that:

1. Were devised in the 18th century age of the Enlightenment and the Industrial Revolution. The Enlightenment led to a questioning of traditional institutions, customs, and morals, and a strong belief in rationality and science. The needs of the Industrial Revolution led to the creation of mass public education to train workers. 

2. Deductive reasoning is valued and the school system turns children out factory-like after being tested and 'packaged' for life.

3. School education is completed in institutions that resemble factories, children are grouped in classes, grades and year groups and are shuffled through a system that approaches learning in discrete subjects and devalues the arts and creativity compared to the sciences.

4. The outcome he argues is that children are streamed into academic and non-academic groups and many find the experience boring and frustrating. In an age where children receive more stimulation than ever before through media, life experiences and communication technology, school he suggests, is simply mind-numbingly boring.

His presentation below takes just 11 minutes to view; it is a stimulating and challenging lecture. 



How can we stimulate creativity?

a) The preschool child - Parents, carers and preschool teachers need to:

• Provide time for children to explore their world.
• Offer opportunities for structured and unstructured play.
• Encourage experimentation with language and story.
• Create an environment that encourages the child to invent novel solutions in play.
• Ensure that children are not placed under too many restraints and structures.
• Try to enhance opportunities for children to attempt to solve problems or explore new things.
• Offer new experiences and situations that challenge them to find out, seek solutions and solve problems.
• Make good use of technology without allowing it to dominate children's lives.

b) School-age children - The teacher or parent needs to:

• Encourage learning, expression and exploration in situations that emphasise the generation of ideas, solutions and forms of expression that are divergent as well as convergent.
• Ensure that the desire to evaluate learning and encourage excellence does not limit creativity.
• Ensure that rewards do not simply privilege single answers or solutions, or pathways to reaching the single right answer (because of course there are correct answers to some things).
• Integrate opportunities to learn as much as possible cutting across the traditional subject disciplines.
• Provide time for children to explore, express and reflect on their learning.
• Encourage self-discovery, inquiry learning and varied modes to expressing ideas.
• Encourage exploration of the arts and humanities as well as the sciences.

Conclusion Schools constrain and conform our children to such an extent that originality, innovation and discovery are not valued as much as they should. As these disappear, so too do enjoyment, motivation and creativity. As John Holt expresses it:

What children need is not new and better curricula but access to more and more of the real world; plenty of time and space to think over their experiences, and to use fantasy and play to make meaning out of them; and advice, road maps, guidebooks, to make it easier for them to get where they want to go (not where we think they ought to go), and to find out what they want to find out. (John Holt, 1981)

Related links and resources

'Creativity in Young Children' - James Moran (here)

My previous post 'The critical place of play, creativity and fantasy' (here)

I have written a series of 4 posts on play here or check out all posts tagged 'play' here and a number of posts on creativity in learning and language (see for example my post on being inventive with language here or all posts tagged 'creativity' here).

Multiple Intelligences

The recent debate about the 'My School' website in Australia has reminded me that it is far too easy to narrowly define education, educational achievement and intelligence. Education is about people and how we facilitate their learning and growth. If we narrowly define what counts as knowledge and how we define intelligence and learning then we will end up with a very narrow curriculum at school, narrow approaches to assessment and a very narrow range of experiences at home.

We often hear people say, "wow he's smart" or "gee, she's intelligent". What do people mean when they say things like this? Intelligence is a very slippery concept (and it is just a concept) that is defined in many different ways. Generally, when people talk about being intelligent they mean general mental ability to learn and apply knowledge in one's immediate environment, as well as the ability to reason, think abstractly and solve problems. However, we tend to judge this in terms of a limited range of abilities that we can observe and measure; for example, language proficiency, mathematical ability and memory. While it is self-evident that society places greater importance on certain manifestations of intelligence, some have suggested that we have defined intelligence far too narrowly. It might just be that if we do continue to adopt limited definitions of intelligence that we will fail to recognise each child's full potential.

Howard Gardner's work

Howard Gardner is famous for having challenged narrow definitions of intelligence. He has developed a theory that argues that intelligence, as it has been defined in the past, does not sufficiently cover the wide variety of abilities that people possess and demonstrate. He outlined his theory in his book Frames of Mind: The Theory of Multiple Intelligences (1983). In it he suggested that it isn't valid to say that a child who excels in for example, mathematical ability, is necessarily more 'intelligent' than another. The 3rd grade child who is always fastest at the 7 times tables may find it more difficult to complete more abstract mathematical problems, or indeed may be out performed by other children in the class in other areas of ability or intelligence.

In his initial work Gardner proposed seven types of intelligence, but he stressed at the outset that we might be able to identify other forms of intelligence. The following are the foundational set of intelligences that he proposed.

Linguistic intelligence reflects proficiency with spoken and written language in literal and metaphorical forms, the ability to learn languages, and the ability to use language to achieve varied goals (e.g. persuasion, humour, pleasure, communication). It can include the ability to use language to express yourself rhetorically or poetically and using language to remember information. He suggests that writers, poets, lawyers and proficient speakers are amongst those with high linguistic intelligence.

Logical-mathematical intelligence is the capacity to analyse problems logically, carry out mathematical operations, and investigate issues scientifically. Gardner suggests that it involves the ability to detect patterns, think logically and reason deductively. This type of intelligence is associated with scientific and mathematical thinking and ability.

Musical intelligence is characterised by skill in the performance, composition, and appreciation of musical patterns. It includes the ability to recognize and compose musical rhythm, tones and pitches. He observes (as other have) that musical intelligence often runs in parallel to linguistic intelligence.

Bodily-kinaesthetic intelligence is the potential to use one's body or parts of it to solve problems. It is the ability to use mental abilities to coordinate bodily movements. Howard Gardner sees mental and physical activity as related (as have many psychologists before him). It involves a strong sense of timing, the ability to train responses to become like reflexes. The proficient mime artist, actor, gymnast and the dancer illustrate this type of intelligence. We'll see thisa demonstrated again and again at the Winter Olympics in Vancouver.

Spatial intelligence is intelligence where spatial ability and judgement is necessary. It involves the ability to recognize and use the patterns of space. This is the ability to visualize with the 'mind's eye'. Gardner suggests that it involves the ability to discern similarities across diverse domains, and the potential to recognize and use the patterns of wide space and more confined areas. It is a form of intelligence that is demonstrated by the artist, designers, architects, mapmakers and the puzzle wiz.  

Interpersonal intelligence is the capacity to understand the intentions, motivations and desires of other people. People intelligent in this way read social signs well, interpreting verbal and non-verbal communication well, collaborate and work well with people of varied abilities. It is critical to allowing people to work effectively with others. This type of intelligence can often be found in effective teachers, salespeople, company CEOs, politicians, therapists, preachers and counsellors. These are people who know how to work with, lead and get along with others and use teamwork to full advantage.

Intrapersonal intelligence is the ability to understand oneself, to appreciate one's feelings, fears and motivations. It involves the ability to act based on self knowledge, knowing your own emotional states, motivations, moods, desires and anxieties. Gardner suggests that these people have effective working models of themselves and are able to use this information to regulate their lives. They can be introverted and seem to learn best independently.

From the above list you should note that the first two have been typically valued in schools; and are of course the basis of the 'My School' assessment process in Australia. The next three are usually associated with the arts and the final two are what Howard Gardner called 'personal intelligences' (Gardner 1999: 41-43).

Gardner has continued to explore other potential forms of intelligence including:

• 'Naturalist intelligence' (the ability to recognize, categorize and draw upon certain features of the environment).
• 'Existential intelligence' (a concern with 'ultimate issues', including spiritual awareness).
• 'Moral intelligence' (a sense of personal agency and personal stake, a realization that one has an irreducible role with respect to other people).

Illustrating the implications of this work

When you start to consider intelligence in all its forms you begin to observe different things in children, encourage different things and value different things. Here is a simple illustration. I spend a lot of time with my grandchildren; all demonstrate their own forms of intelligence. My eldest grandchild Jacob demonstrates a number of Gardner's forms of intelligence including 'Spatial Intelligence', but the one that I find most interesting, and which is more difficult to observe, is Gardner's idea of 'Naturalist intelligence'. This has been given further exploration and definition since Gardner defined his initial set. It is the ability to observe the natural world and discriminate among living things and even features like the physical world (e.g. clouds, rocks and landscapes, clouds etc). This form of intelligence is associated with outstanding observation, and the ability to see the natural world from different (and sometimes new) perspectives. This is the type of intelligence that will be observable in the botanist and the naturalist, scientific researchers, architects, artists and the skilled farmer.

Jacob demonstrates this type of intelligence in many ways. In his fascination with the unusual behaviour of all creatures, in his constant efforts to mentally identify and classify all types of living creatures (insects, birds, sea creatures), in his efforts to speculate and hypothesise about his world, and his ability to see things from new angles. The sketches below illustrate something of what I mean. The first was drawn when he was 4 years old and was done just after a trip to the Aquarium with me. When he went home and drew the picture he explained it to his mother this way - it is "Grandad looking through the glass at the Aquarium". But notice the vantage point he has used for the drawing. He has given the perspective of the jellyfish, fish etc looking out at me, as I am looking in. The drawing is interesting in view of the varied species he shows, but more importantly it shows how much he is considering the natural world, even hypothesising what it might look like from another vantage point.


In the next drawing below (which he drew to use as a name plaque for his room), Jacob is again experimenting with different viewing points, but this time aged 6 his drawing of the Dimorphodon (a prehistoric flying reptile) is much more complex, with two overlaid vantage points. The artist is above the Dimorphodon but if you look closely at the bottom of the drawing you will see a tree (seemingly small because it is viewed from a distance) near a river, and another dinosaur (perhaps its potential prey). So while seeing the Dimorphodon from above, we also see what IT in turn sees below. While he doesn't quite orient the Dimorphodon's body to be viewed from above, his speculation and intent is clear. He is imagining what it might have looked like for the Dimorphodon to seek its prey, and tries to represent this by drawing it from above. He also shows an awareness that in nature, the size of anything is affected by the distance of the viewer and he is interested enough in this to include it in his drawing.


The final drawing (left), also drawn at age 6, shows a Blue Tongue lizard that he'd observed that day and he drew it so that he could show me later. He draws a number of other creatures with it that he'd also seen in the backyard that day and labels them. Most young children will draw animals from the side elevation and in a very 2 dimensional way. Jacob's vantage point (again) is from above most of the creatures, a vantage point that he cannot easily assume and one that for some of the creatures he has had to imagine. Note also how he has attempted to give three dimensions to the Blue Tongue lizard with its patterns curving around the body, and the legs oriented correctly as it slowly moves and begins to drag its tail out from underneath itself (note especially the different orientation of the back and front legs, and the inside and outside legs back legs). This is sophisticated and accurate observation.

Summing Up

It is far too easy to view intelligence narrowly and in the process to limit our expectations of what children can achieve. Good teachers encourage their children to explore all forms of intelligence and show that they value them as they look for new areas of learning and different demonstrations of intelligence.

Related Posts

A useful article on the Infed Site - 'Howard Gardner, Multiple Intelligences and Education' (here)

'My School' Website: A blunt and inadequate instrument (here)

'My School' Website: A blunt and inadequate instrument

Declaring my conflicts of interest

I had hoped to avoid commenting on the 'My School' website released in Australia on Friday, because I figure that no matter what I say about it, lots of people reading the blog will disagree. But when one of the readers of the blog (Jo) asked for my opinion I thought that I should say something. As well, the publishing of league tables of the 'best' and 'worst' schools made me quite angry. My apologies to international readers of the blog for this more parochial topic, but I'm sure that some of you will have had similar models for national assessment in your countries

Let me first declare some background that some might see as conflicts of interest:

• I was an academic adviser to the first comprehensive national literacy assessment in this country in the late 1990s (the National English Literacy Survey) that was ultimately foundational to the current testing that informs the site.
• I spent 10 years as a primary school teacher and have a strong interest in assessment.
• My two daughters went to the closest public schools to our homes and my only school-aged grandchildren are currently attending the closest public school to their home.

I am a strong supporter of public education but I respect the right of parents who choose to send their children to private schools. The comments that follow are not motivated by self-interest, nor am I captive to any interest group, I'm simply concerned about the site.

A few givens about schools and families

1. Teachers vary in ability and at times after 30+ years in the classroom the odd teacher wishes they were elsewhere (as in all occupations), BUT I've rarely met a teacher who wasn't doing their best to help children learn.

2. My own family literacy research over a period of 15 years (see my website for more details HERE) demonstrated many things, but the most self-evident of the findings was that in spite of the varied resources, education and life experience of parents, that it is difficult to find a parent who doesn't want the best for their children.

3. Australia has one of the finest school education systems in the world. The international data speaks for itself. The results from the OECD Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) have shown over the last decade that Australia is consistently one of the highest achieving school systems in the world. Overall literacy achievements have remained in the top 6 in the world, mathematical ability has been in the top 12 and scientific knowledge in the top 3. While we have ongoing underachievement by Indigenous students, overall performance on international comparisons is outstanding.

4. Parents want to know how well their children are doing at school, not just in terms of their effort and ability, but how they compare with other children. This has led some parents and parent advocates to be critical at times of school assessment practices and the feedback given to parents.

5. Teachers know that basic skills tests can only ever sample a limited range of the things that are taught at school and that they fail to measure many other things that they see as fundamental to judging the success of schooling.

6. The majority of children no longer go to the closest school to their homes. Instead, they attend varied schools: near parent's place of work; where after school care is provided; that are private; that are selective and so on. Hence, parents today make choices about where they should send their precious children and feel the need for information that makes comparison possible.

What's right about the 'My School' website?

1. The website is an attempt to satisfy the demands of parents for data on how well their children's school performs relative to other schools.

2. It is simple and attempts to make comparisons between schools that serve comparable communities. The latter relies on a measure of socio-economic advantage based on census districts associated with schools, that considers 16 variables that may influence educational outcomes, including measures of income, the proportion of non-English speaking background, employment and educational attainment.

3. It is a response to a public call for greater accountability and transparency in school reporting on standards.

4. It offers measures across a broad range of academic areas.

5. It offers some basic comparative information on enrolments, student attendance and promises to eventually provide data on funding levels.

What's wrong with the site?

1. The implicit assumption that you can measure school performance, and hence teacher competence, using this blunt instrument, is incorrect and grossly unfair to teachers. The test data offer an assessment of school cohorts in a range of academic skills and competencies that can be tested using a mass assessment programme.

2. While the site is able to show which student groups perform best on the above skills and competencies, it is unable to identify fairly why this is occurring. For example, I looked at one school that seemed to have outstanding results for year 3 but whose results for year 5 were average. Does this drop off reflect the quality of the teachers in tear 4 and 5? Or some quirky difference in the demographic over time? Perhaps a new private school nearby had attracted some of the best students after year three? No doubt, teachers and parents in the community could suggest some reasons for this drop in achievement. I also considered one of the elite schools that the newspapers declared one of the stars. Interestingly, in spite of very high achievement, the growth from year 7 to year 9 was limited in reading. What does this show? No value-added by the year 8 teachers? The reality is that the data need to be interpreted with material extraneous to the site.

3. The site isn't able to measure what some parents find most important. What does the site tell a parent (or a politician) about the arts? What about creativity and the ability to solve problems? Leadership development? Sport and fitness? Programs for children with learning difficulties? The care and compassion of staff? Emotional well being? Are the children happy in these schools? How open is the school to parental involvement? How approachable are staff members? What is the school budget for professional development, and how does this compare to other schools? In the case of secondary schools, what is youth culture like in the school? What values are shaping my child and what is the school doing to promote the values that I see as important?

Unhelpful responses

There have many unhelpful comments based on the website comparisons, in fact too many to count. However, surely the newspapers that published the 'top of the class' and the 'bottom' in the State, deserve to be criticised strongly. I have spent extended time as a researcher in some of the so-called worst schools and always found children who were seeking to do their best and dedicated teachers. At times, these schools lack resources and struggle in communities where there are a myriad of social problems. In spite of the number of families who struggle to cope with the challenges of life, they were (on the whole) doing the best that they could to ensure that their children had the best education possible. Publishing the names of such schools on a public list as failures is an indictment upon those who are responsible; those who condone it; and those of us who stand by and say nothing to defend them. I applaud the teaching profession for asking serious questions about the way that the My School Website is being used.

However, the teaching profession cannot simply refuse to cooperate in providing public information about the performance of the children in every class. The fact that newspapers have published league tables and many people have bought them, suggests that parents do want to know more about the quality of education in their children's school. The question is, how can schools meet this expectation without using a blunt instrument of the type that we've seen demonstrated? Efforts to improve the quality of the feedback that schools offer to parents is critical. But a key starting point is that such reporting needs to be at the individual child, class and school level. While the aggregating of national and state data is relevant, the type of public league tables that we've seen are unsupportable.

Related Posts

Sydney Morning Herald article (here)

What's right and wrong with Standardised tests?

Standardised testing is a hot topic amongst teachers. Why? Because teachers know that tests only offer one measure of ability and progress. They also know that they can be helpful by informing teachers and parents about student performance and aiding good instruction. But they can also be misleading and can be used to unfairly label children, teachers and schools. Standardised tests can also lead to some unfortunate practices, the most problematic being the practice of teaching to the test. Parent groups, business leaders and politicians often see tests as a magic bullet, ensuring that their children are taught well and that they make good progress. They also see this as an accountability issue and see the resistance of teachers to testing as an indication that they don't want to be accountable. It is right for parents, business and the wider community to want schools to be accountable, but standardised tests are just one tool for achieving this outcome.

Harvard University professor Daniel Koretz has just published a new book on testing. Koretz's book, Measuring Up was published recently by Harvard University Press. There have been some interesting reviews of the book as well as a couple of good interviews with the author which are helpful.

I intend to read the Koretz book and will do another post on this topic but Anthony Cody offers some insights into some of the significant points that Koretz makes. Cody spent 18 years as a science teacher in inner-city Oakland, California. He now works with a team of experienced science teacher-coaches who support the many novice teachers in his school district.

You can read Cody's post here.

You can also read an interview with Koretz on the Harvard University website here.