Texas Alternative Document

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5-11-97 OpEd piece by Tommy Denton, Staff Writer for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, "Two Paths for Texas Schoolchildren"

5-10-97 OpEd piece by Donna Garner, "Texas State Board of Education Votes 7-7 on Texas Alternative Document Draft for English/Language Arts/Reading"

5-4-97 Letter from Dr. E.D. Hirsch, Jr., Linden Kent Memorial Professor of English, University of Virginia, to Mrs. Donna Garner.

5-5-97 Letter from Mr. Robert W. Sweet, Jr., President, National Right to Read Foundation, to the Honorable George W. Bush, Governor of Texas.

4-6-97 Letter from Dr. Sandra Stotsky, Research Associate at the Harvard Graduate School of Education and the Boston University of Education, to Mrs. Donna Garner.

4-4-97 Letter from Dr. Chester E. Finn, Jr., John M. Olin Fellow, Hudson Institute, to Mrs. Donna Garner.

4-11-97 OpEd Piece by Donna Garner, "Lost in the Quagmire of Political Rhetoric"

5-6-97 OpEd Piece by Cindy Fry, "The TEKS - Foundation of Texas Public Education"

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May 11, 1997

Two paths for Texas schoolchildren

By Tommy Denton
Star-Telegram

To the extent that most folks care much about the affairs of state in Austin, the biennial slugfest in the Legislature draws the greatest attention, not least for the sheer amusement of watching lawmakers stretch the bounds of human folly.

But very serious business has been quietly under way just down the street from the Capitol --business that could have tremendous implications for the young Texans who are about to inherit the future. After nearly two years of study, drafting, redrafting and bureaucratic intrigue, the State Board of Education is on the verge of revising the curriculum standards for reading and writing instruction in Texas public schools.

If the board ultimately adopts the "official" version influenced and led by the staff of the TexasEducation Agency -- a final vote is scheduled for July after tentative approval last week -- all the members should be fitted for dunce caps and sent to detention hall.

About a year ago, the International Reading Association and the National Council of Teachers of English promulgated what they optimistically titled "Standards for the English Language Arts." The "standards" were a lump of such opaque, jargonistic bloat that they drew derisive jeers nationwide from defenders of clear, precise writing, including `The New York Times.'

The new Texas curriculum proposals were headed in the same direction last year until the intervention of a small group of devoted contrarians on the appointed reading-writing team who, as experienced teachers, actually toil in classrooms with real, live students. They studied the amorphous "standards" in the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS -- pronounced `teeks' ) and found them disturbingly inadequate.

For months they sought to introduce greater specificity in defining the essential skills that every student should master. They argued, against stiff resistance from the panel's leaders, that clear, specific, progressively advanced standards should guide instruction in each grade.

So they went to work to develop what they called the Texas Alternative Draft Document (TADD). They consulted expert teachers, scholars and researchers in the linguistic arts and education authorities, both "liberals" and "conservatives," from all across the country.

The TADD is a monument to clarity and specificity, establishing particular skills to be accomplished by students, from kindergarten through high school -- the rules of phonics, spelling, grammar, punctuation, vocabulary and composition, all constituting the infrastructure of language, which is nothing less than the architecture of thought and therefore the framework of all learning.

In addition, the TADD's recommended range of literary texts at each grade level is much more specific, and therefore helpful to classroom teachers.

Such an approach is fundamentally repulsive to advocates of "whole language" instruction, who prefer to immerse young students in a literary bath, sparing them the creativity-stifling drudgery of acquiring the essential building blocks of language, in hopes that somehow mastery will appear through osmosis.

No other process in the natural order works that way, and neither does human learning, as should be clear from the deterioration of academic achievement by American students in the last 30 years since the theory invaded U.S. classrooms.

Whole-language advocates on the reading-writing team have remained the main line of resistance to the TADD, but the powerful logic undergirding the alternative proposal and endorsements from authorities of national renown were sufficient to compel some grudging concessions in the TEKS, although in only very generalized terms. The TEKS proposal, although not nearly as "mushy" as before, still lacks sufficiently specific grade-level requirements, so that all Texas teachers and students in, say, fifth grade will be held accountable for attaining measurable achievement in crucial knowledge and skills required for that grade statewide.

Members of the State Board of Education have the opportunity to set the national standard for excellence in the public school curriculum. The current TEKS proposal falls short of that standard. Nor will simply tacking a superficial graft from the TADD here and there rise to the level that Texans should demand.

Education Commissioner Mike Moses has indicated that he must walk a thin line to accommodate divergent views and reach consensus on developing the new curriculum. He's mistaken. Consensus had already been reached in the policy decision to improve the reading and writing skills of Texas schoolchildren to the greatest extent possible. Science -- the measurable outcome of what works and what doesn't -- should determine how `best' to achieve the policy goal set by consensus.

Between now and July, the State Board of Education should re-examine the unquestionable superiority of the TADD over the "official" proposal. If the board has the best interests of present and future students at heart, its members ultimately will adopt the TADD in its entirety as the reading and writing curriculum guide for Texas schools.

If Gov. George W. Bush was serious when he said that he wanted to establish himself as the "education governor," he will exercise his considerable influence through public -- and if necessary, private -- persuasion with the board members to encourage that adoption. The ball's in your court, governor.

Tommy Denton is senior editorial writer and columnist for the Star-Telegram.

This article can be accessed on the internet at http://startext.com/archives/05111997.arc/news/opinions/columntext/denton2.htm.

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May 10, 1997

TEXAS STATE BOARD OF EDUCATION VOTES 7-7 ON TEXAS ALTERNATIVE DOCUMENT DRAFT FOR ENGLISH/LANGUAGE ARTS/READING

by: Donna Garner
Lead Writer, Texas Alternative Document Draft (TADD)

In a surprise move, SBOE Member Bob Offutt moved that the Texas Alternative Document Draft (TADD) be substituted for the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS); since the vote was 7-7 and without a majority, the measure failed. Why is this significant? Why are we who wrote the TADD excited over a "failed" vote?

This vote of 7-7 means that our TADD, which was written literally around a "kitchen table" by a group of dedicated classroom teachers with the donated assistance of some expert researchers, has successfully challenged the Texas Education Agency-produced TEKS. The TADD was written at the time and expense of private citizens at the grassroots level while the TEKS was written at taxpayers' expense (Department of Education grant for over $lM) under the auspices of the state education bureaucracy. So far as I know, no group of educators has ever really challenged the Texas Education Agency by crafting such a document.

In this SBOE meeting, the board members voted separately on each part of the core curriculum (ELAR, Mathematics, Science, Social Studies, Health Education, Physical Education, Economics, Spanish Language Arts for ELAR) for First Filing Authorization. A work session on the ELAR will be held at the June meeting with the final vote on the entire package of TEKS scheduled for the July meeting.

Since the substitute motion failed, the SBOE then went on to vote 8-5 (one abstention, one absence) for the First Filing of the ELAR. However, before that vote, two board members who voted for the First Filing said they would not vote for the final TEKS product if large portions of the TADD are not blended into the TEKS.

We appreciate the two members' good intentions, but here is the problem. How can you "marry" explicit (TADD) to broad, generic, meaningless language (TEKS) and have a smooth, seamless document for use in the classroom? We personally do not believe this can be done because the two documents represent completely different philosophies. However, we wish the TEA personnel "good luck" as they try to deal with the dilemma.

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May 4, 1997

Letter from Dr. E.D. Hirsch, Jr., Linden Kent Memorial Professor of English, University of Virginia, to Mrs. Donna Garner

Dear Ms. Garner:

Thanks for sending me your proposed alternative document for English language arts in Texas along with various letters including one from Commissioner Moses, and from various educational experts.

I have great admiration for Chester Finn, Diane Ravitch and other experts who have written in support of your fine work. I also know that Finn and Ravitch are sometimes linked with conservative politics -- a fact that might cause some to discount their comments in the politically polarized atmosphere that the creation of curricular material so often generates. I deplore the sometimes facile linking of educational policy with political ideology. So, as a card-carrying liberal Democrat, I feel a special obligation to offer support for those elements in your alternative document that seem superior to the main document, which, like every human production (especially one made in committee) is imperfect.

The general principle behind my comments is this: In a democracy, consensus ought to guide decisions about educational goals, such as, for example, the goal of enabling all children to read as early as may be feasible. I think there is a clear consensus on that point throughout the nation. But science, not consensus, should be our guide in determining how best to achieve such an agreed-on goal. This distinction between goals and research-based, proven policies forms the backdrop to my comments. I am forwarding to you by e-mail the text of a talk I gave on that principle to the California State Board of Education.

I see three points of technical superiority in your document, which, if reason rather than partisanship were to prevail, would cause those superior elements to be integrated into the main document.

(1) You provide well-chosen and specific examples of appropriate texts at each grade level. You do not mandate these texts, but you do offer useful and intelligent suggestions for teachers or districts desiring such guidance. It is of course an American tradition, honored in Texas, that the localities or even individual teachers should make the final choices of texts, and you don't go against that tradition. Nonetheless, many teachers appreciate having specific suggestions, and many schools value the coherence conferred by schoolwide agreement on specific texts at a grade level. Such agreement avoids the problem of repetition, e.g., Charlotte's Web three years in a row.

(2) You provide a grade-by-grade sequence for specific learnings. For example, even when there is not always firm scientific agreement about which precise sound-letter correspondences should be learned in which order, it is nonetheless enormously useful to have a well-tested and definite sequence laid out so that the wheel does not have to be reinvented in each school or classroom. This definite sequence is especially important for the many children who have to move from one school to another in mid-year -- particularly in a skill as important as reading.

(3) You provide a more detailed and sequenced guide to instruction in grammar. Although it is not necessary to teach the grammar of one's native language, it is desirable to teach the names of the parts of speech and the agreement-principles of standard written English. For, unless these grammatical names and principles are taught explicitly, the teacher and the student lack a common vocabulary for talking about language. This vocabulary is especially important for the teaching of writing and of standard usage.

On these three important points your document is superior to the main one, and I would hope that your excellent work in these areas will find their way into the final document. It would also be a great plus if the final version could be made as concise, usable, and clear as yours.

Without a lot more study, I would not want to endorse everything you have proposed. For example, "syntactic awareness" is a new one on me. There's not a child who speaks and understands modern English who doesn't have syntactic awareness. It's the essence of the language.

You deserve enormous credit for overseeing the creation of this excellent guide. It would be unfortunate if those parts of your work that are superior to the other document didn't lead to an improvement and adjustment of the final product.

You deserve a medal!

Yours sincerely,
E.D. Hirsch, Jr.

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May 5, 1997

Letter from Mr. Robert W. Sweet, Jr., President of the National Right to Read Foundation, to the Honorable George W. Bush, Governor of Texas.

Dear Governor Bush:

Texas is in a unique position to lead the nation in setting rigorous, measurable, academic standards in reading, English and language arts instruction. I have followed the development of the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS) with great interest. The whole nation will be affected by your decision. Textbook companies will design their materials to meet your standards, and the books they sell to your schools will find their way into schools all across America.

I have reviewed the latest version of the TEKS (May 1997), and if they are issued as currently written, it will make it extremely difficult to hold anyone accountable for results. General statements such as the first sentence in Chapter 110, for English Language Arts and Reading illustrate my point: "Meaningful, engaging and effective oral language is the basis for understanding the printed word as well as the currency for success in all academic contexts." The draft TEKS are often repetitive, and quite subjective. This "educational mush," as you said in one of your speeches, is unacceptable if teachers are to be held accountable.

The Texas Alternative Document Draft (TADD) for English, Language Arts, and Reading, which has been submitted to me for review, is without a doubt, the most comprehensive, and complete grade by grade outline of essential skills that I have seen. The grade level elements are specific, easy to read, and can be used in the development of an assessment system to insure that all Texas students receive a high quality education. Educational terms are defined, subject matter such as grammar, composition, penmanship and alphabetic knowledge are carefully presented. Some of the nation's leading research scholars have offered detailed comments that were included in the TADD. Marilyn Jager Adams, Bill Honig, Doug Carnine, E.D. Hirsch, Barbara Foorman, Louisa Moats, Connie Juel, Isabel Beck, and many professors and teachers from Texas schools and universities have reviewed and added to the TADD.

Over the past several years I have reviewed state language arts frameworks from New Jersey, Nebraska, South Carolina, North Carolina, Ohio, California, Michigan, Louisiana, Missouri, Massachusetts, and Wisconsin. None of them compare in detail and quality to the Alternative Document Draft. Virginia Governor George Allen asked me to serve on the Champion Schools Commission for the purpose of developing the Virginia Standards of Learning. As proud as I am of the Virginia Standards, I believe the TADD is an improvement over that document. Texas can bring your state and the nation one step further toward measurable, rigorous, academic standards.

In a letter to your Commissioner of Education Mike Moses, Chester Finn, Jr., John M. Olin Fellow, and former Assistant Secretary for the Office of Educational Research and Development for the U.S. Department of Education commented:

"I hope, further, that you will find additional common ground with Donna Garner's group and their excellent draft. They have done a conscientious, selfless, tireless, public-spirited, highly professional job for the Lone Star State... the quest for consensus ought never be allowed to get in the way of insistence on quality.... TADD is superb, TEKS is very good. A suitable amalgam might be termed excellent."

I am in full agreement with Dr. Finn's assessment. In the words of the Walker Texas Ranger theme song: "The eyes of the ranger are upon you...," and so are the eyes of the nation. You can hit a "double," or a "homerun." The decision you make will determine whether Texas takes the national lead in requiring rigorous, academic standards. Accepting the TADD as the standard for Texas would be the best decision that could be made for the children of the state and the nation. Please give them every possible consideration.

Respectfully,

Robert W. Sweet, Jr.
President

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April 6, 1997

Letter From Dr. Sandra Stotsky, Research Associate at the Harvard University School of Education and the Boston University School of Education, to Mrs. Donna Garner

Dear Mrs. Garner:

I commend you and your colleagues for creating one of the best standards documents I have seen for the English language arts and reading. I have been examining standards documents from almost all 50 states, and yours is a model document. Its high academic expectations are visible in all its details, it is written in teacher-friendly language accessible to the public, it clearly reflects the wisdom of dedicated teachers, and it has features that are ahead of the times. Let me highlight here what I see as some of the special strengths of the Texas Alternative Document Draft.

* This document makes absolutely clear what its academic expectations are for reading/literature. Specific titles of literary selections are suggested at each grade level to indicate the reading level and quality of reading expected at that grade level. In grades 11 and 12, literary periods and authors are spelled out. Few other standards documents in this country are courageous enough to make their academic expectations clear to the public. A document that shows concretely what it expects by grade 12 can help rebuild confidence in our public schools. Expectations for high levels of literacy in the English language arts must be embedded to some extent in shared content if they are to be realized. Literary appreciation and analysis in our society must be informed by knowledge of some of the key works, authors, and traditions that have contributed to the evolution of our literary and civic culture. Moreover, for statewide assessments to be fair, all students must have had an opportunity to acquire a common framework for understanding the literary and civic culture of the country they live in. This document is outstanding in this respect.

* This document makes clear that students are to study American literature, and an American literature that is inclusive of our ethnic literature. This is the right way for students to understand our national literature and our diversity as a society, an approach with which the late Barbara Jordan would surely have agreed.

* This document rightfully sees teaching and learning as related and interactive processes. By distinguishing and clarifying what both teachers and students are to do, it makes clear that both are vital in the educational processes. High levels of academic achievement do not take place without demanding teaching. And this document spells out all the ingredients of demanding teaching.

* It expects explicit and systematic instruction in decoding skills in the primary grades as well as use of vocabulary-rich literary selections. The research evidence has been consistent for decades on this question.

* It expects students to do regular independent reading through the grades, and it indicates how much they should do per year as a minimum, offering some guidance about its quality.

* It covers all important English Language arts skills, strategies, and processes in a viable, coherent manner. It does not include objectives that belong more appropriately to other disciplines.

* It wisely does not expect students to relate everything they read to their lived experiences and to understand everything they read from the perspective of their personal experiences. Instead, this document expects students to develop analytic skills that transcend subjective biases in order to understand what authors (or others) are themselves trying to communicate.

* Last, but not least, it seems to expect all students to read, write, and speak consistently in English in English language arts classes so that they have a full opportunity to acquire mastery of the most important language in the world today. The research evidence is abundantly clear on this issue; students who try to do all their thinking and academic work in the language they are trying to learn achieve at a higher level than students whose learning time in the target language is reduced.

The Texas State Board of Education is fortunate to have a document of this caliber to consider for its English language arts and reading standards. I was a member of the 12-person committee that wrote the English language arts standards document for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, a document that was approved by our State Board of Education in January, 1997. I am very proud of that document, but I think this one is even better in many respects. I have great respect for the work that you and your colleagues have done in an effort to upgrade academic expectations for all students in the public schools of Texas.

Sincerely yours,

Sandra Stotsky, Ed.D.
Research Associate

Outgoing Editor,
Research in the Teaching of English

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April 4, 1997

Letter from Dr. Chester E. Finn, Jr., John M. Olin Fellow, Hudson Institute, to Mrs. Donna Garner

Dear Mrs. Garner:

Hurrah for you and your fellow creators of the "Texas Alternative Document Draft" on English, language arts and reading. Would that every state and community in the land would embrace this outstanding, coherent structure for imparting specific English-language skills and knowledge to all our children in a sensible, sequential, cumulative way. As I read it, it provides teachers with the skeleton they need to build good lessons around and provides test-makers with a solid framework on which to construct effective assessment instruments, performance standards and accountability systems. Thanks so much for giving me the opportunity to review your draft.

I am really impressed. Your approach to English appears to me faithful to the most reliable research and best practices that I know, especially with respect to the acquisition of reading skills in the primary grades. You also appear to have consulted nearly all the national experts in this field for whose knowledge and judgment I have real respect (to your list I would add Jeanne Chall and Sandra Stotsky, but otherwise you've covered America's all-stars of serious reading/language arts research).

I should acknowledge that nobody in Texas has seen fit to share with me a copy of the Texas Education Agency's "TEKS" document to which yours is an alternative, so I cannot make comparisons, other than to the brief excerpts -- from the July '96 draft -- included in Section 2 of your document. If those are fairly representative of the T.E.A. approach, however, I would have to say that they suffer from the terminal vagueness and soft-headedness that afflict so many state "standards" in this field. By contrast, your document offers clarity, precision, specificity, coherence and -- I wish there were a word for this -- the quality of being cumulative and rational, like insisting that a building's foundation be in place before constructing the attic.

I could pick some nits. I'd like your discussions of what a child is supposed to draw from literature to include more of the "character" dimensions that one gleans from feats of heroism and cowardice, from the biographies of great or villainous individuals, etc. (Your suggested reading lists, on the whole, are terrific!) I wish your discussions of composition were juicier. (I'm no post-modernist, but I think writing is a chance to loose one's imagination and fire one's creativity as well as to gain, practice and demonstrate essential skills.) Your draft has a few typos (unless "mullet-step directions", on page VI-8, is a Texas expression that hasn't made its way to the East Coast). I trust you're flexible enough to make some provision for those youngsters who can make faster progress than the grade level acquisitions you indicate. Please don't keep them from gaining eleventh-grade skills and reading eleventh-grade books just because they're in tenth grade. (And I bless you for realizing that half-way through first grade is a crucial place to lend extra help to those kids who are lagging behind. That seems to me one of the important insights of Bill Honig's exemplary book.) And of course you understand that these standards are, in Washington argot, more in the vein of "content" standards than "student performance" standards. In other words, they leave for later determination just "how good is good enough". (E.g. The student is expected in grade eleven -- page IX-8 --to "write a critical essay," but someday someone will also need to specify how long, how elaborate, how accurate and how sophisticated an essay it must be for its author to be said to have "met" this standard.)

But those are nits. Your accomplishment, on the whole, is magnificent -- and seriously worth sharing with the whole country. If the T.E.A. document doesn't possess its virtues, I trust that Texas policymakers will have the wisdom to embrace yours instead. Thanks again for giving me the chance to review it.

Sincerely,
Chester E. Finn, Jr.
John M. Olin Fellow

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April 11, 1997

LOST IN THE QUAGMIRE OF POLITICAL RHETORIC

by Donna Garner

If Governor Bush really wants to be the education governor, he must do more than just criticize the TEA-produced Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS) by calling it "mush." The taking of federal money from the Department of Education and from Goals 2000 has forced Texas to write the TEKS (the proposed curriculum guidelines) in broad, generic, meaningless language that even educators do not understand. As the leader of our state, Governor Bush has the authority and the responsibility to take some action which would really revolutionize education as we know it.

What action could Governor Bush take? Disillusioned by the controversial TEKS process, a number of leading researchers and Texas classroom teachers combined their expertise to write what has come to be called the Alternative Document Draft (ADD) for English/Language Arts/Reading.

All of us ADD writers believe that children must be taught to read through direct, systematic instruction as documented by the National Institutes of Health. We wrote the ADD on our own time and at our own expense--very different from the TEKS which has cost the taxpayers over $5.6M to produce.

Our ADD has been presented to the public and to the State Board of Education on three different occasions, and we have yet to hear a word of support from Governor Bush.

Why should the Governor, Commissioner Moses, and the State Board of Education support the ADD? The Houston Chronicle on December 29, 1996, stated:

It is possible to write standards for public school students that require students to know certain facts and be able to master certain skills by specific grade levels. In fact, various members of the TEKS Clarification Writing Team and other reading experts have developed a sensible alternative to the TEKS that lays out exactly what teachers are to teach and what students are to learn and when.

A leading Harvard professor who helped to write the Massachusetts standards has recently stated that our ADD is the finest standards document in the country.

One of the parents from Oregon who has filed a lawsuit to protest Oregon's implementation of outcomes-based education, performance assessments, and the Certificate of Initial Mastery wrote recently, "I urge everyone to read the Alternative Document Draft, print it, and get it into the schools post haste. Make sure as many elementary school parents as possible get to see this so they will have an idea about what their children should be learning."

Our Alternative Document Draft is knowledge-based which means that its skills are measurable and could be graded objectively. The TEKS are so broadly worded that school districts would be forced into subjectively graded performance assessments which would be evaluated on the value system of the grader. When it comes to accountability, subjectively scored tests are neither fair nor reliable.

The TEA plans to rewrite the Texas Assessment of Academic Skills (TAAS) once the TEKS are adopted. The essay on the TAAS writing section is subjective enough right now. What would happen if the TEKS end up being adopted as they are presently worded? We Texans think we have problems now with a few school districts who cheat on the TAAS. Can you imagine what would happen if the TAAS were to turn into a full-fledged, subjectively graded performance assessment?

As an example of the mushy wording of the TEKS, here is one of the three statements in Grades 4-8 which even mentions grammar: "The student correctly uses conventions such as capitalization and punctuation that clarify and enhance meaning." How can a teacher justify grading a child on such a vaguely worded standard?

In contrast, the ADD for grade 8 says, "The student should use colons correctly (e.g., in expressions of time, in business letters, after a statement followed by a list)." This wording would give teachers something solid upon which to evaluate a child's progress.

Our Alternative Document Draft is certainly not "mush." It emphasizes reading, grammar, punctuation, spelling, vocabulary, literature, and composition--just the skills that the Governor, the Commissioner, the public, and the business community all say they want students to learn.

The ADD is very explicit; it tells teachers, students, and parents exactly what needs to be taught and learned at each grade level. The skills increase in depth and complexity from one grade level to the next. The ADD is so precisely written that students, classroom teachers, staff development personnel, TAAS writers, textbook publishers, and college/university professors who are in charge of teacher training would all know what is expected of them. The adoption of the ADD would implement true accountability across the state.

In a few weeks, the latest TEA-produced TEKS for English/Language Arts/Reading will be out for the public to see. Reportedly, it still contains components of the discredited whole language reading approach which says that you can immerse children in a morass of good literature, and they will miraculously surface as proficient readers sometime between the first and third grades.

It does not take a great intellect to realize that children develop from the part to the whole--not from the whole to the part. Just watch a baby learn to crawl, then stand, and then walk. Why would learning to read be any different?

We now have sound scientific/medical research which proves that a child must first learn the subsounds (phonemic awareness), then the syllables, then the entire word, and then the sentence. "Predicting" what the word might be just will not suffice. Being able to sound out a word effortlessly and accurately is what makes a person a good reader. After all, there are times in life when it makes a great deal of difference whether the word is "horse" or "house."

There are also many times in life when a printed page contains no cartoons or colorful illustrations and a person is faced with words he has never seen or heard before. If he is struggling to figure out the words, he cannot focus on the meaning of the sentence.

This leads me to beg the question, "What is Commissioner Moses' excuse for allowing the TEA to produce TEKS which will only cause more frustration and academic failure on the part of our Texas children?" Up to this point, he has only paid lip service to our Alternative Document Draft; we have yet to see anything substantive from the TEA that would indicate a change from mushy to explicit.

If Commissioner Moses really believes what he says about getting the TEKS "right," he should insist that our ADD be implemented as an outstanding example of grassroots involvement from knowledgeable researchers and experienced classroom teachers?

Texas now has an opportunity, because of the new National Institutes of Health research, to produce a TEKS document which will completely recast the way English/Language Arts/Reading is presently being taught.

Texas could chart the way for the entire nation because of the tremendous impact our state has on textbook content. We must not let the education of millions of students get lost in the quagmire of political rhetoric.

_____________________________________________________________________________

Donna Garner has been a classroom teacher for over 24 years. She is a member of the TEKS Writing Team for English/Language Arts/Reading.

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May 6, 1997

The TEKS -- Foundation of Texas Public Education

by Cynthia C. Fry

On May 8-9, 1997, the State Board of Education (SBOE) will consider the new K-12 standards called the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS). The proposed TEKS to be discussed include English Language Arts/Reading (ELAR), Mathematics, Science, Social Studies [these four comprise the "core curriculum"], Health Education, Physicial Education, Economics, and Spanish Language Arts and English as a Second Language. Final adoption of these TEKS is scheduled for the July 1997 SBOE meeting.

The TEKS have been embroiled in controversy since their development began with writing teams appointed mostly by former Commissioner Lionel Meno. Most of this controversy has surrounded the TEKS for English Language Arts and Reading (ELAR). According to the Waco Tribune-Herald's opinion page editor, in an editorial titled "G is for gibberish", the ELAR TEKS are "an exercise in gobbledygook." (1) The Houston Chronicle labeled them "mush" and said that the problems with the TEKS are "akin to the trendy but worthless pedagogical philosophy that tries to solve students' academic problems by addressing their assumed lack of self-esteem." (2) Even Governor Bush criticized the draft TEKS, saying that they included vague and confusing "feel-good" phrases, but sources now say that he will support the TEKS. (3)

An Alternative is Offered

Dissatisfied with the writing team's version of the ELAR TEKS, team member Donna Garner, a veteran English and Spanish teacher at Midway High School in Hewitt, Texas, spearheaded an effort to develop an alternative document, now called the Texas Alternative Document Draft (TADD) for English Language Arts and Reading. Produced through the combined efforts of various members of the TEKS Clarification Writing Team and the State Board Review Committee for ELAR, the TADD has been reviewed and further refined by national experts as well as grassroots educators. In the process, the TADD has gained wide recognition and support. Endorsements are impressive: Chester Finn, Hudson Institute; Sandra Stotsky, a research associate at the Harvard Graduate School of Education and the Boston University School of Education; Robert W. Sweet, Jr., President of National Right to Read; and E.D. Hirsch, Jr., Linden Kent Memorial Professor of English, University of Virginia, Department of English.

Dr. Stotsky called the alternative document a model and one of the best standards documents she has seen. "The Texas State Board of Education is fortunate to have a document of this caliber," said Dr. Stotsky, who has examined standards documents from almost all 50 states. Dr. Stotsky said the alternative document is better in many respects than the standards she helped develop as a member of the writing team in Massachusetts. "I have great respect for the work that you and your colleagues have done in an effort to upgrade academic expectations for all students in the public schools of Texas," she wrote to Garner. (4)

Impressed by the alternative document, Chester Finn wrote, "Your English appears to me faithful to the most reliable research and best practices that I know,especially with respect to the acquisition of reading skills in the primary grades. You also appear to have consulted nearly all the national experts in this field for whose knowledge and judgment I have real respect." Finn said that the brief excerpts he had seen from the official TEKS "suffer from the terminal vagueness and soft-headedness that afflict so many state `standards' in the field." The alternative document, Finn said, "offers clarity, precision, specificity, coherence and - I wish there were a word for this - the quality of being cumulative and rational, like insisting that a building's foundation be in place before constructing the attic." (5 )

Robert Sweet has reviewed both the TEKS and the TADD. "I have reviewed the latest version of the TEKS (May 1997), and if they are issued as currently written, it will make it extremely difficult to hold anyone accountable for results." (6) In contrast, Mr. Sweet adds, "The Texas Alternative Document Draft (TADD) for English, Language Arts, and Reading, which has been submitted to me for review, is without a doubt, the most comprehensive, and complete grade by grade outline of essential skills that I have seen. The grade level elements are specific, easy to read, and can be used in the development of an assessment system to insure that all Texas students receive a high quality education. Educational terms are defined, subject matter such as grammar, composition, penmanship and alphabetic knowledge are carefully presented. Some of the nation's leading research scholars have offered detailed comments that were included in the TADD." (6)

Dr. Hirsch writes to Mrs. Garner, "You deserve enormous credit for overseeing the creation of this excellent guide. It would be unfortunate if those parts of your work that are superior to the other document [TEKS] didn't lead to an improvement and adjustment of the final product." (7)

Major Distinctions Between the TEKS and the TADD:

The alternative document (TADD) has characteristics that distinguish it from the ELAR TEKS in major ways: It is grade-level specific and progressively increases in depth and complexity from one grade to the next; it is knowledge-based and explicitly worded; and its standards can be measured objectively.

Commissioner Mike Moses indicated at the April 1997 State Board of Education meeting that many of the alternative document's concepts have been and will continue to be incorporated into the final version of the TEKS, but Garner says that substantive changes have yet to be seen.

In a letter, Commissioner Moses reminded Garner that the TEKS development and review process "attended to thousands of comments and was shaped accordingly."(8) Implying that inclusiveness subordinates quality and that the TEKS are a consensus document, Moses said, "Whether you or I like it or not, a certain amount of inclusiveness is required in putting together a document of this type." In contrast to this, Dr. Hirsch indicates, "In a democracy, consensus ought to guide decisions about educational goals, such as, for example, the goal of enabling all children to read as early as may be feasible. I think there is a clear consensus on that point throughout the nation. But science, not consensus, should be our guide in determining how best to achieve such an agreed-on goal." (7)

TADD Based on Empirical Research

The TADD has been reviewed by many of America's leading reading researchers and Texas classroom teachers. Recommendations on early reading acquisition and instruction in this draft are supported by and concur with over $100,000,000 worth of empirical reading research on reading acquisition and instruction funded by the Child Health and Human Development Branch of the National Institutes of Health.

Why Is This Important?

The final TEKS will be the foundational document for the development of public education in the state of Texas. It is this document upon which curriculum guides will be based, textbooks will be written and edited, and the Texas Assessment of Acedemic Skills (TAAS) test will be revised. It is also a document whose purpose is to give classroom teachers a set of guidelines with which to teach. If our teachers don't understand what is minimally expected of them based upon this document, how are they going to teach the knowledge and skills essential to a child at every level of development? If the interpretation is this loose, what hope do we have that all the publishers will consistently interpret them and develop their texts accordingly? What hope do we have that the interpretation of the test developers will correlate with that of the publishers and of our teachers? If all of these interpretations are not in sync, how good are the results of our tests?

Final Analysis

Since, as taxpayers, citizens, and parents, we are all vitally concerned that education be the best in the state of Texas that it can be, there are two very basic questions that have yet to be answered by the Texas Education Agency, Commissioner Moses, or Governor Bush:

(1) Before we finalize the TEKS for ELAR, why don't we make them more explicit? Realizing that the 74th Legislative Sessions's Senate Bill 1 forbad legislating methodology, what is wrong with giving the teachers in the state of Texas some basic guidelines of what they should be teaching and what the students should be learning? Guidelines, or "what" to teach, are not methodology.

(2) Why, after all this time, are the ELAR TEKS not grade-level specific? Is there a reason for this? If so, what is it? The TEKS for ELAR are separated by individual grade, but over and over again the same text is repeated from one grade to the next. If we are to strive to have state-wide standards that can be objectively assessed at each grade, why do we not have grade-level specific TEKS that progressively increase in complexity? If the teachers are going to be held accountable for the TAAS test results, why not tell them by grade level what we expect of them and the students? If we truly want the TAAS test to be an objective assessment of our students, regardless of where they live, or from where they moved, why not have explicit, grade-level specific standards for all Texas educators? If we want textbook editors and publishers held accountable for content, why not have explicit, grade-level specific standards against which their textbooks must be developed?

End Notes

1 "G is for gibberish," John Young, Waco Tribune-Herald, August 13, 1997.

2 "Mush: Education promotes self-esteem, not pats on head," Houston Chronicle, December 29,1996

3 "Education rules' revision blasted," San Antonio Express News, November 13, 1996.

4 Letter from Sandra Stotsky, Ed.D., Harvard University, to Donna Garner, April 6, 1997.

5 Letter from Chester Finn, Hudson Institute, to Donna Garner, April 4, 1997.

6 Letter from Robert Sweet, President, National Right to Read Foundation, to Jeff Judson, Texas Public Policy Foundation, May 2, 1997.

7 Letter from E.D. Hirsch, Jr., Ed.D., University of Virginia, to Donna Garner, May 4, 1997.

8 Letter from Mike Moses, Texas Commissioner of Education, to Donna Garner, April 11, 1997.

Other sources for this report:

- New 19 TAC Chapter 110, Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills for English Language Arts and Reading

- Texas Alternative Document Draft, May 1997 (available on the Internet at: http://www.htcomp.net/tad).

____________________________________________________________________________

Cindy Fry is a trustee for the Clifton Independent School District in Clifton, Texas. She is
a wife, mother of two elementary-aged children, and owner of Systems Engineering Services, a computer systems software design, development, and consulting firm.

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Last Updated January 21, 1998 by JimmyKilpatrick@EducationNews.org