The Science of Reading Simplified
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Grab your favorite beverage and settle in, because we need to talk about something that’s been weighing heavily on my heart lately – the “Sold a Story” podcast. Like many of you, I’ve spent years in the classroom trying my best to help every child learn to read. And like many of you, I thought I was doing everything right.
Then I listened to “Sold a Story.”
I’ll be honest – parts of it were hard to hear. Really hard. As I listened during my morning commute (chai in hand, of course), I found myself nodding, crying, and occasionally talking back to my car speakers. The Sold a Story podcast series by Emily Hanford isn’t about blame or shame. It’s about understanding how we got here and, more importantly, how we can do better for our students.
Let me walk you through my journey of listening to this groundbreaking series and why I believe every educator needs to hear it:
Remember sitting in your teaching program, learning about balanced literacy, thinking it all made perfect sense, and trusting the process? That’s exactly where I was. But “Sold a Story” helps us understand something crucial – why so many of us were taught to teach reading in ways that didn’t align with the science.
The Sold a Story podcast traces how influential figures like Marie Clay developed theories about how children learn to read that seemed to make sense at the time. I found myself thinking about all those guided reading lessons where I encouraged my students to “look at the picture” or “think of a word that makes sense.” Like Sarah Gannon shares in Episode 3, “I trusted that they’re experts. I trusted that this is the way you teach reading.”
It wasn’t so long ago that I could walk into just about any of my colleagues classrooms and see teachers still doing those picture walks before reading, still covering words with sticky notes to encourage “strategic guessing.” We were all told thatI we were following best practices, but I still couldn’t get rid of the nagging feeling that something was off. Now I understand why those strategies weren’t helping my struggling readers make progress.
One of the most powerful aspects of the podcast is hearing from students themselves. There’s Cooper, who says, “I couldn’t read in kindergarten, first grade, second grade. I was running in darkness.” His words stopped me in my tracks during my morning workout. How many Coopers have sat in my classroom over the years?
Then there’s Dan Corcoran’s story in Episode 2 – a Vietnam veteran who couldn’t write a dying Marine’s final letter home because he’d never learned to read properly. I had to pull over and just sit with that one for a while. These stories remind us what’s really at stake when we don’t teach reading effectively.
Perhaps most gutting was hearing from Kenni Alden in Episode 1, describing her son who “doesn’t look at all the letters in words. He doesn’t look at all the words in sentences. And reading is miserable for him.” How many of our students feel this way?
You know that nagging feeling some of us have had when our struggling readers weren’t making progress despite following all the “right” strategies? The podcast helps explain why. As Christine Cronin shares in Episode 6: “It’s hard to recognize that you believed in something so much that now the research is like blowing out of the water. It makes you feel gullible.”
I felt that way too, especially listening to Episode 5 about the research behind leveled reading systems. Learning that the Fountas & Pinnell Benchmark Assessment System was about as accurate as flipping a coin? That was a tough pill to swallow. How many hours had I spent administering those assessments, thinking I was getting reliable data about my students’ reading abilities?
But here’s where the podcast truly shines – it doesn’t leave us in that place of dismay. We hear from teachers like Virginia Quinn-Mooney in Episode 7, who started hosting discussion groups because she couldn’t keep this information to herself. We learn about districts making successful transitions to evidence-based reading instruction.
Most importantly, we hear about kids like Matthew, whose mom Missy Purcell shares in Episode 9 that after just one year of proper reading instruction, “He is doing so great. First of all, I was told he would never be a fluent reader. He’s a fluent reader.”
The podcast shows us that change is possible. As Mark Seidenberg explains in Episode 10, there’s now “a thoughtfulness about reading in the country today. There is an actual mature conversation.” We’re part of that conversation, and we can be part of the solution.
I want to pause here and acknowledge something important: If you’re feeling defensive or overwhelmed as you listen to the podcast, that’s completely normal. As Christine Cronin reminds us in Episode 10, “No one likes to be criticized, especially when it’s as personal as teaching.”
But here’s what I want you to remember: We all went into teaching to help children succeed. When we know better, we do better. And that’s exactly what this podcast helps us do – know better so we can do better.
After listening to all ten episodes (yes, that includes four bonus episodes you absolutely need to hear), I’ve started making changes in my classroom. I’m being more intentional about phonics instruction. I’m rethinking how I assess my students’ reading skills. Most importantly, I’m not afraid to question practices that don’t align with the Science of Reading.
Here are 3 specific changes I’ve made:
If you haven’t listened to “Sold a Story” yet, I encourage you to start. You can find it wherever you get your podcasts. As you listen, remember you’re not alone in this journey. We’re all learning and growing together.
And if you have listened? I’d love to hear your thoughts. How did the podcast impact your understanding of reading instruction? What changes are you considering in your classroom?
Because at the end of the day, that’s what this is all about – ensuring every child in our classroom has the opportunity to become a successful reader. Our students deserve nothing less. They deserve teachers who are willing to learn, grow, and change when the evidence shows us a better way.
Give teachers the science-backed tools they need to help every student become a confident reader.
I’m so glad you’re here!
You’ve noticed something isn’t quite right. A student who struggles during read-alouds, avoids writing, or works twice as hard for half the results. Your instincts are telling you something – but what’s next? Download my free 5 Silent Signs of Reading Struggle to identify what you’re seeing and know exactly what to do about it.
Ready to hear the reporting that got teachers everywhere talking? Here’s the direct link to all ‘Sold a Story‘ episodes that many educators describe as a turning point in their understanding of reading instruction.
A compound word is a word made of two or more smaller words that can each stand on their own, joined to create a new meaning. Sunflower. Butterfly. Backpack. Compound words matter because they’re the first place students see that words are built from meaningful parts: the insight every later morphology skill depends on.
Phonological awareness is the ability to hear and work with the sounds in spoken language, syllables, rhymes, and individual phonemes, with no print involved. Phonics connects those sounds to letters. The difference matters because phonological awareness has to develop first: a student can’t map sounds to letters she can’t yet hear in the first place.
Onset-rime awareness is the ability to hear a single syllable split into two parts: the onset, which is the consonant or consonants before the vowel, and the rime, which is the vowel and everything after it. In “map,” /m/ is the onset and /ap/ is the rime. It matters because it’s the first time a child works inside a syllable instead of with whole chunks, and that shift is what makes the smaller, harder phoneme work possible later.
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