Humpty Dumpty and Scarborough's Stink'n Rope

* This is an excerpt from my forthcoming book, 'Making Sense of The Science of Reading: Context Matters'.? It will be published by Guilford sometime in 2025.

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The SoR is based on the simple view of reading (Cervettie, et. al, 2020; Duke & Cartwright, 2021; Hoffman, 2017).? According to this theory, skilled reading is a result of decoding and language comprehension (Gough & Tunmer, 1986) (see Figure 9.1). ?In other words, you decode each word (sound it out) and then listen to the decoding occurring in your head.? What could be simpler than this? ?Yes?

Later iterations of this theory would change it slightly.? Scarborough (2001) created her now-famous reading rope based on this (see Figure 9.2).? According to this conceptual framework, skilled reading is like a rope comprised of two sets of strands.?

Word recognition strands.? The word recognition strands represent three low-level skills related to: (a) phonological awareness (syllables, phonemes, etc.), (b) decoding (alphabetic principle and spelling-sound correspondence), and (c) sight word recognition (orthographic mapping).? These skills are to be learned and practiced until they become increasingly automatic.? That means that students do it without thinking.

Language comprehension strands.? The language comprehension strands represent five higher-level skills related to: (a) background knowledge, (b) vocabulary, (c) language structures (syntax and semantics), (d) verbal reasoning (inferring, predicting, and (e) literacy knowledge (print concepts, genres, etc.).? These elements are to be learned in ways that enable students to consciously apply them as needed. ?(They become increasingly strategic.)

To teach reading, you simply provide direct instruction related to each of the strands.? As the smaller strands within each set become increasingly intertwined, the two sets of strands eventually become intertwined as well.? And as the intertwining becomes increasingly tighter, one becomes more skilled as a reader.? What could be simpler than that?

A Perfectly Fine Theory

Scarborough’s rope is a perfectly fine conceptual framework – for a rope.? However, for reading, there are some limitations.? Nine of these are identified here:

1. It does not differentiate between word recognition, word identification, and decoding.

2. Semantics, syntax, and vocabulary are not strategies consciously applied as illustrated in this model.? Instead, they’re bits of information used automatically to recognize words while reading.? Strategies consciously applied to identify words include analogy, morphemic analysis, context, and phonics.? These are not included in the rope.

3. Separating word recognition from language comprehension assumes that we encounter words floating in space, outside of meaningful contexts or nonsense words.? This only happens on DIBELS tests.? Words are always recognized in the context of a sentence, a sign, a product, or a situation.

4. Teaching each of these eight strands is neither necessary nor sufficient for all students.? Words can be recognized, and comprehension can occur without some of these elements (such as phonemic awareness or syllabic knowledge).? Similarly, teaching these eight strands may not be sufficient for many students.

5. Comprehension can occur with minimal levels of (a) word recognition accuracy, (b) knowledge of syllables and phonemes, (c) knowledge of spelling-sound correspondence, and (d) literacy knowledge.? After a minimal level is obtained, more of these things don’t result in greater reading comprehension.?

6. The rope represents linear thinking.? Human brains don’t operate linearly; instead, they operate in an associative fashion, expanding outward, making increasingly more and more complex connections and associations.?

7. The rope is still largely bottom-up.? It does not represent the two-way flow of information that takes place during the act of reading.

8. There are several elements (strands) not included in the rope (see Figure 9.4).? Comprehensive reading instruction includes 12 strands that interact and are interdependent in the act of learning to read.?

9. It represents Humpty-Dumptian thinking.?

Humpty-Dumptian Learning Theory.

Humpty-Dumptyism or Humpty-Dumptian learning theory is a form of mechanistic materialism, a philosophical theory whereby it is believed that complex things can be understood by breaking them into their component parts.? In education, this is sometimes called task analysis.? Here a complex task is broken down into parts and taught one part at a time.? There are times and places where this is appropriate.?

However, Humpty-Dumptism applied to reading would break the complex act of creating meaning with print (reading) into a series of little reading subskills (little parts).? To teach reading one would teach each little reading subskill, one little reading subskill at a time in a predetermined order.? To learn to read children would need to master each little reading subskill.? Children’s ability to read would be quantified by measuring their ability to perform little reading subskills.? Higher scores on tests of little reading subskills would be associated with higher reading ability.

It just makes sense, yes?

No.

Humpty-Dumptyism is the basis of orthographic mapping, Orton-Gillingham, and structured literacy.? Humpty-Dumptian learning theory works great if you want to put a big egg back together.? It doesn’t work so great if you want to enable children to achieve their full literacy potential.? Reading is more than the sum of its parts.? Also, the parts related to reading are interacting, interconnected, and interdependent.

Systems Theory

The process of reading is best understood in the context of systems theory.? Systems theory states that the universe and all entities within are made up of integrated parts that cannot exist independently of the whole (Von Bertalanffy, 1968). ??As such, we can never come to know the whole of anything by isolating variables in order to examine small parts. In other words, science cannot understand how the universe works by taking it apart in the same way one would take apart a mechanical clock. Instead, universes and all the entities within them are a system of systems in which the parts interact and interconnect with each other. As such, the whole is much more than the sum of its parts. Thus, any entity is best understood by examining the principles that govern behavior within the system.?

Systems Theory of Reading

And so, it is with reading and the reading process.? We cannot come to understand the complex process human beings use to create meaning with print (reading) by trying to break it into its component parts.? Reading is a system of interconnected and interdependent elements all working together to create something greater than the sum of its parts.? Trying to teach component parts in isolation is not nearly as effective as addressing the various interdependent and interacting elements holistically within a meaningful context (see Figure 9.4).? This is the basis of whole language, which will be described in the next chapter.

References

Al-Khalili, J. (1999). Black holes, worm holes & time machines. London: Institute of Physics Publishing.

Cervettie, G.N., Pearson, P.D., Palincsar, A.S., Afflerbach, P., Kendeou, P., Biancarosa, G., Higgs, J., Fitzgeral, M., & Berman, A. (2020. How the reading for understanding initiative’s research complicates the simple view of reading involved in the science of reading.? Reading Research Quarter, 55, 161-172

Clark, E.T. (1991). Holistic education: A search for wholeness. In R. Miller (Ed.), In New Directions in Education, 53-62. Brandon, VT: Holistic Education Press.

Duke, N., & Cartwright, K., (2021). The science of reading progresses: Communicating advances beyond the simple view of reading.? Reading Research Quarterly, 56, 25-44.

Hoffman, J. (2017).? Comprehension is not simple: Considering the persistent dangers in the simple view of reading comprehension, pp. 57-69.? In S. Israel (Ed), Handbook of research on reading comprehension (2nd ed.).? New York, NY.? The Guilford Press.

Gough, P., & Tunmer, W. (1986). Decoding, reading, and reading disability. Remedial and Special Education, 7, 6–10.

Scarborough, H. S. (2001). Connecting early language and literacy to later reading (dis)abilities: Evidence, theory, and practice. In S. Neuman & D. Dickinson (Eds.), Handbook for research in early literacy (pp. 97-110). New York: Guilford Press.

Talbot, M. (1991). The holographic universe. New York. HarperPerennial.

Von Bertalanffy, L. (1968).? General system theory: Foundations, development, applications.? New York: George Braziller