The National Reading Panel provided no evidence that phonics helps the majority of struggling readers above grade 1¶

Claim · All claims
Evidence · 1 study · review r1 · q2
Currency · newest study 2021 · not yet checked against its sources · not reviewed by a person

Subclaims¶

q2 i? The NRP found no significant short- or long-term phonics benefits for 'low achieving' readers (d = 0.15), supporting no evidence of benefit for the majority of struggling readers in grades 2–6. → Jeffrey S. Bowers 2021

Evidence¶

Jeffrey S. Bowers 2021¶

Jeffrey S. Bowers. (2021). Yes Children Need to Learn Their GPCs but There Really Is Little or No Evidence that Systematic or Explicit Phonics Is Effective: a response to Fletcher, Savage, and Sharon (2020). Educational Psychology Review (2021) 33:1965–1979. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10648-021-09602-z

q2 · i? · review · r1

Re-analysis of the National Reading Panel (2000) meta-analytic results discussed in this commentary. The nonsignificant effect for 'low achieving' readers was d = 0.15; the author argues most struggling readers in grades 2–6 fall in this category due to comorbidity of learning difficulties.

"based on the failure to observe significant short- or long-term benefits of phonics for “low achieving” readers (d = 0.15), I concluded that the NRP provided no evidence that phonics helped the majority of struggling readers above grade 1."

Discussion¶

Related Claims¶

• Systematic phonics outperforms unsystematic or no-phonics instruction on children's reading overall, but its advantage over whole-word teaching on novel words is untested in children and contested — related
• Phonics instruction has a small but statistically confirmed effect for children with reading disabilities, while Orton-Gillingham structured-literacy programs show positive but non-significant effects — related
• Instruction that includes systematic phonics leads to better spelling and reading outcomes than instruction that does not — related
• The Torgerson et al. (2006) meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials found almost no strong evidence for systematic phonics — related
• Corrective word-reading feedback effects depend on timing and reader skill: delayed feedback enhanced word-reading accuracy, and phonics feedback helped poor readers while better readers performed best with no feedback — related