McQuillan, Jeff. (1998). The Literacy Crisis: False Claims, Real Solutions. Reviewed by Jeff MacSwan

McQuillan, Jeff. (1998). The Literacy Crisis: False Claims, Real Solutions. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann. Pp. 109 $15         ISBN #0-325-00063-8 Reviewed by Jeff MacSwan Arizona State University September 4, 1998 In The Literacy Crisis: False Claims, Real Solutions, Jeff McQuillan debunks common myths about U.S. literacy and offers valuable solutions to help children learn to read. In Chapter 1, McQuillan addresses a number of common myths about reading. Based on data from the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), McQuillan shows that reading scores have been stable for U.S. children since 1971, the first year the test was administered. McQuillan then addresses attempts to set "objective cutoff scores" which designate some readers as basic, others as proficient, and still others as advanced. Following Glass (1978), the author argues that no effort to establish objective cutoffs is free from arbitrariness, amounting to little more than "pseudoquantification" since one person's "below basic" score may be another ’s "advanced" score. It does not help much, either, to appeal to the collective judgment of reading experts as to what should constitute good reading, since there will be considerable variation in their views, as McQuillan illustrates by a comparison of state-by-state standards with national standards on reading (p. 4). "The only thing we can really determine from reading tests (or math tests or social studies tests) is whether children are doing better or worse than their age peers of previous years. And what we know about such performance in reading is that it has been completely stable for the past two-and-a-half decades" (p. 5). Other myths McQuillan debunks include the following: Twenty percent of our children are dyslexic Children from the baby boomer generation read better than students today Students in the United States are among the worst readers in the world California's test scores declined dramatically due to whole language instruction In Chapter 2, McQuillan outlines a model of reading acquisition, focusing on the crucial roles of access to print and external (metalinguistic and elaborative) assistance in the process of learning to read. The model McQuillan develops predicts that access to reading material leads to opportunities for children to read comprehensible text (with external assistance), and this in turn results in the acquisition of reading. A crucial "real solution" in the book, then, consists in making considerably more reading material available to children than one currently finds in public schools. Chapters 3, 4 and 5 are devoted to an impressive discussion of research on the use of context, the types of assistance readers benefit from in early reading, and claims made regarding the necessity of teaching "phonological awareness" as a step in teaching reading. In these chapters, and in Chapter 6, McQuillan responds to common objections to "whole language" approaches to reading, and concludes that "the notion that an emphasis primarily on skills and phonics instruction produces superior results to programs centered on providing children with a lot of interesting and comprehensible texts is not supported by the available evidence" (p. 66). While the author believes that some children do benefit from overt instruction in "phonics" (sound-letter correspondences for beginning readers, for instance), the overwhelming focus in the approach McQuillan develops is on exposure to comprehensible, interesting reading material for children and adults who are learning to read. Indeed, in the final chapter of the book, McQuillan argues that efforts to improve reading achievement need first to be focused on issues of access to reading materials, "without which no instruction program can succeed." (p. 86) McQuillan's book offers a new perspective on the reading wars. While so many are engaged in the "Great Debate" over whole language vs. phonics, children suffer from a basic lack of access to reading materials, which, McQuillan contends, is where our explanation of large-scale differences in reading achievement must begin. McQuillan's book is a major contribution to our understanding of literacy and also of our current needs in providing children with real solutions. Without a doubt, the book is essential reading for anybody interested in literacy, and is accessible to teachers, program developers, people in political office, and researchers. Reference Glass, G. V (1978). Standards and criteria. Journal of Educational Measurement, 15, 237-261. About the Reviewer Jeff MacSwan is an Assistant Professor in the College of Education, Arizona State University. His PhD is from the University of California, Los Angeles. His dissertation will appear in print in 1999 from Garland Press: A Minimalist Approach to Intrasentential Code Switching. Outstanding Dissertations in Linguistics Series.