Karen Vaites Profile picture
Feb 5 10 tweets 6 min read
Our brains ARE wired to pick up spoken language naturally. Humans have been speaking for 50,000+ yrs.

But we've only been writing for 5,000 yrs!

Written language is manmade... and needs to be taught.

@carolyn_strom unpacks the brain science at #LiteracyMatters conference. Image
Parts of our brain are naturally wired to understand sounds and words.

But, no part of the brain comes wired at birth to understand letters / words.

With years of reading instruction, we train our brains to recognize words, as @carolyn_strom explains. Image
.@carolyn_strom has been working on ways to explain the neuroscience of reading to families, without all of the scientific jargon, using a storytelling framework.

She has given more accessible names to the parts of brain doing the work of learning language & literacy.
Sound City is the part of the brain where sounds are stored.

Mountains of Meaning is where words and their meaning are stored.

I tried taking a video of @carolyn_strom’s intro to her framework, and oops, it was the time-lapse photo above. 😂

I did get video partway in…
I love hearing @carolyn_strom explain the neuroscience of reading.

I think it’s so accessible to families… and teachers!

#LiteracyMatters
When we teach kids to read, we teach them to break words down to the finest sounds (segmenting), and then we need to train the part of the brain that is wired to recognize faces and objects to ALSO recognize letters.

Then we connect the two.

@carolyn_strom continues:
In the years that kids learn to read, they build new neural pathways to connect these different parts of the brain.

The ability to recognize words with increasing automaticity, and to break down new worlds with ease, grows stronger with practice. Image
What does it look like when children are building these skills?

@carolyn_strom gives us a glimpse of those early years, and talks about the connection between the brain science and what we see with emerging readers.

#LiteracyMatters
Learning to read is like learning to play the piano, ride a bike, or swim.

We don’t learn to play piano by watching someone play or listening to music. We must be taught.

But, we build those reading skills upon the brain’s understanding of the spoken language. @carolyn_strom
Editing myself:

This sentence should have said:

“no part of the brain comes wired at birth to understand letters / written words” Image

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More from @karenvaites

Feb 7
.@DrLeanaWen, @JamesSurowiecki, and the New Jersey Education Association are all chill about ending mask mandates in schools.

Can we please stick a fork in school mask policies?

They’re done. ImageImage
In other news, @NPR is covering the miracle of natural immunity, now that “better data” allows it…
npr.org/sections/goats…

And @tedlieu is preaching it.

If you need me, I’ll be getting treatment for my Monday whiplash.
Read 4 tweets
Feb 6
I was only able to catch part of @DrSarahLupo's session at #LiteracyMatters, but I was delighted to see that she was speaking about the importance of knowledge-building curriculum!

Definitely gonna catch this recording.

#KnowledgeMatters Image
Knowledge-building curriculum isn't just about a healthy dose of nonfiction!

There is SO much more to the intentional design.

I talked about this in my session, too. @DrSarahLupo went into greater detail. Image
We aren't just building new knowledge, we are thoughtful about activating prior knowledge...

#KnowledgeMatters
#LiteracyMatters Image
Read 4 tweets
Feb 6
The End of the Pandemic May Tear Us Apart

A very astute take from @M_B_Petersen.

nytimes.com/2022/02/04/opi…
“As we tentatively approach the end of the crisis period of the pandemic, leaders need to help people put risk into perspective.”

Failure to do so will exacerbate societal divisions.
“When opinions become identities, they warp our understanding and make it harder to change one’s mind as the situation changes.”

This part: Image
Read 4 tweets
Jan 28
No organization has been more responsible for the shameful treatment of children during the pandemic than @AmerAcadPeds.

When we are deciding who gets a pass on their pandemic misses and who deserves extremely hard questions, AAP needs to go firmly in the latter camp.
Don’t forget that @AmerAcadPeds came out for school reopening in June, 2020… then reversed themselves less than 2 weeks later. They went on to stay silent as school closures dragged on for more than a year for kids in some regions.

Still no explanation for the reversal.
Now we see @AmerAcadPeds citing weak evidence for continued masking of kids:
Read 6 tweets
Jan 28
.@michelleinbklyn calls for end of mandatory masking in schools post-Omicron, citing @ElissaPerkins @ErinBromage and recent writing on limited mask efficacy + costs to kids.

Making this the indisputable “Now It Can Be Said” week.

nytimes.com/2022/01/28/opi…
We had foreshadowing in her last column, which began talking about the harms of masking.

I’ll say again what I said the other day (thread)…

I hope @michelleinbklyn is connecting dots btwn voter sentiments and the *timing of* these Now It Can Be Said moments.
The often-misogynist conversation about parent advocacy for school reopening has been oversimplified to “Parents get angry with leaders when schools close.”

In fact, it’s more nuanced. Many have attempted rational tradeoff conversations for years & been rebuffed.

This part:
Read 6 tweets
Jan 28
Now It Can Be Said…

The Last Frontier Edition

sfchronicle.com/opinion/openfo…
As @JenniferSey put it, “When the @sfchronicle is asking… the end is nigh.”

And they are asking, all right.
Wow... I just read it, and @writingblock knocked it out of the park.

I can’t even pull quote it.

For all hitting the pay wall...
Read 5 tweets

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