“It Was Hard, But It Worked:” Children’s Theories of Learning to Read

In this paper we come together as teachers, a school leader and a professor to examine children’s theories of learning to read captured in written and illustrated texts created by 143 children currently enrolled in kindergarten to sixth grade. This collection of children’s theories of reading was created in the context of a progressive elementary school located at Smith College, a women's liberal arts college in Massachusetts. Our hope in examining children’s theories is to humanize and historicize current debates about how reading is taught. We also hope to offer a counter narrative to the dichotomies currently shaping reading education, particularly based on ideas about the “science of reading”. To do so, we start with a short introduction and a brief description of our school and its current approach to reading curriculum, touching on our experiences of the impact of the “science of reading" in our school. We then discuss children’s theories of learning to read focusing on the following themes: (1) variety in reading, (2) reading as a process, (3) reading as skills and experiences, (4) reading as relationships and community, (5) reading as materials, bodies, and environments, and (6) reading as feelings. We close with a moving forward section to briefly highlight the implications and relevance of children’s theories to reading education. Across sections our aim is to advance current ideas about how children understand reading and its learning, based on their experiences with explicit literacy instruction, at a time when the "science of reading" is the subject of intense debate.