Shifting the Balance: A Conversation With Katie Egan Cunningham

Sara
I have such a special treat for you today. And that’s because a few weeks ago, I had the wonderful opportunity to sit down with Katie Egan Cunningham, who’s an educator with over two decades of experience as a teacher, literacy specialist, consultant, and professor. And she also happens to be one of the co authors of Shifting the Balance: Six Ways to Bring the Science of Reading Into the Upper Elementary Classroom.

Sara
And Katie is an absolute gem of a human and she was so delightful to talk to. One of the things that I loved about our conversation was not only hearing Katie’s insights into the science of reading, and the importance of us providing evidence based instruction, but also hearing her talk about the science of happiness. And she shares a little bit about what leads to happiness, and she explains how these principles can be applied in our classrooms to create a more joyful literacy experience, which I know is something we all want for our students.

Sara
Now, this episode is filled with knowledge, it offers practical tips, and you’re gonna get a ton of encouragement from Katie. I am so excited you get to hear from her. Let’s jump into our conversation.

Sara
Hi, Katie, I am so excited that you are joining me on the podcast today. Thank you so much for being here.

Katie
Thanks, Sara. Yeah, this is a great gift to spend some time talking with you.

Sara
Awesome. Well, I know that you have just so many stories and knowledge and information to share with my audience. So we’re gonna go ahead and jump in because I have quite a few questions that I want to ask you today during our conversation.

Sara
Now kind of starting off, I know that you have such a sort of robust career in the education field, I know that you’ve got over 20 years experience as a classroom teacher and instructional coach, I know you’re currently a college professor. And I know that you’re a huge advocate for really having teachers based their instruction on the science of reading. But I’m curious, has that always been your approach? Or, you know, have you like many kind of had a shift in your understanding of how kids learn to read?

Katie
It’s always fun to look back on our journeys as teachers and think about the different influences that we’ve had. My journey as a teacher has had a few different bends in the road. I first started teaching in 2000, right out of college, and I actually was really blessed to work in schools that were using methods based on the science of reading before we called it the science of reading.

Katie
So as an elementary school teacher, I was using programs like Judith Hoffman’s basic writing skills, which later became the writing revolution, as well as a program called PAF, which stands for preventing academic failure. And that is based on Orton Gillingham approaches. And I did have classroom libraries, you know, that were always organized by genre and topic and author rather than by level.

Katie
But I was a brand new teacher, that was just how the schools that I was a part of how to organize things. I also did have three years where I taught in an international school in New York, with children from all over the world. And that shaped a lot of my thinking about language and literacy. So my background was really based in evidence based instruction for all kids.

Katie
But I this bend in the road that I had, my journey had a bit of a twist. At the end of my classroom teaching days, I was also getting my doctorate at Teachers College at Columbia. And during that time, I became a literacy consultant for what was kind of like a balanced literacy startup. So as a teacher, I worked in schools that were evidence based, and then I became a consultant for a balanced literacy group.

Katie
So I was working with schools on getting structures like the read aloud, shared reading and interactive writing up and running. And I was helping schools create curriculum that did lean more toward balanced literacy at the time. And looking back those curriculum documents that I helped teacher shape really did over emphasize certain things and under emphasized others.

Katie
So strategy instruction, for example, I think was really over emphasized both in the curriculum and in practice. While things like knowledge building and vocabulary development, we weren’t talking about them at the time and they weren’t at the center. But I think those first two decades in the field for me, helped me become kind of a boundary spanner. To see all sides of balance literacy in the science of reading from a few different roles that I’ve gotten to play, and the schools I’ve been fortunate to be a part of.

Sara
Yeah, I love that. And I didn’t realize that you were a consultant for a balanced literacy startup. And I think, you know, to your point, it’s like, everybody can look back and sort of see that our experiences are oftentimes a result of the circumstances that were placed into.

Sara
And also looking back, we can identify things that it’s like, oh, that was really effective. And then there’s also other things that we’ve done that are like, Oh, we overemphasize that or under emphasize that I think everybody looks back and sort of wishes that they could, you know, I always say, Oh, my, my first group of students, I wish that I could go back and reteach them with the knowledge that I have now, but we’re always on a journey as educators.

Sara
You talk a lot about and of course, I’m really interested to hear just your response to this knowing that you had some experience with working as a balanced literacy startup, but you talk a lot about the importance of teachers really providing instruction that is based on the science of reading and even instruction that is, you know, joyful. But why is it that educators are grounding their instruction in evidence based practices? Like why is that so important?

Sara
And I think sort of a follow up to that question, knowing that there’s a lot of conflicting programs available. How do teachers find evidence based instruction? You know, I taught for many years in a balanced literacy school, the district gave us this required curriculum. And I assumed that because my district was giving it to me that it was based on evidence, or it was grounded in science. So, you know, why do teachers really have to have that understanding of what evidence based instruction is? And how do they figure out if what they’re teaching is based on the science and evidence?

Katie
Yeah, and I think it can be quite tricky, right as a teacher to know whose voice to follow. And to follow that trail of evidence, especially when so much research is behind paywalls and journal subscriptions that are really costly, and that, as a classroom teacher, I wasn’t subscribing to and now as a college professor, I get access to. So there’s definitely an inequity in the ways in which research is translated for classroom teachers.

Katie
And it’s some of the work I’m so grateful to do with Jan Birkins, and Carrie Yates now to be those knowledge brokers, that dig deeply into this decade’s long interdisciplinary body of research known as the science of reading. And to make sense of it, you know, for classroom teachers so that we make it easier rather than harder for kids to crack the secrets of the code. And so we make it easier rather than harder for teachers to know what to do.

Katie
But you know, part of my story too, is that I did get a front row seat to what happens to children when learning is not evidence based, and it becomes joyless pretty quickly. So my youngest son was diagnosed with dyslexia at the end of third grade. And that year was pretty painful for him. And for me and his as his mom. And for years, I was saying, please look at this child, please look at this child.

Katie
And because of his strong background, knowledge and vocabulary knowledge, he was really good at compensating, and flew under the radar for a long time, until it really did get to a breaking point. And so by third grade, you know, with his all about me assignment, the first week of school, he scribbled all over it and wrote a giant no in purple crayon, rather than risk it going up on a bulletin board, where he knew that it was going to have spelling errors that everyone else would see.

Katie
And that year, they were even some days he was in fetal position on the floor, refusing to go to school. When he did go, he was a frequent flyer to the nurse’s office, you know that the things that have an academic origin become social and emotional for kids, and so much of children’s social emotional reactions in our classrooms have an academic reason behind them that we don’t always know to look for.

Katie
So I’ve seen the ways in which, you know, my son’s journey was impacted by curriculum and instruction that were not evidence based in those critical early years of elementary school, and the ways in which it manifested for him. And also, then you know, that then there was a turning point for him. So after that year, we did place him in a school, specifically for kids with dyslexia.

Katie
And I had a child who went from, you know, fetal position in third grade to the kid that wanted to be the first one at the door, he would literally run out of the car and be the first one in the school building every morning for the entire fourth grade year. And that wasn’t by accident. You know, it wasn’t that he was de-motivated one year and then suddenly motivated the next.

Katie
It was that the teachers were grounded in reading science in his new school. And it made a huge, huge difference to his confidence, his overall well being or family life, and a lot of it came down to how he was being taught to read and spell.

Sara
Wow, I’m so I’m so glad to hear that your son’s story has had just a positive, you know, a positive end to it and that he was able to get the instruction that he needed. I know there are so many students out there that aren’t necessarily getting the support that they need. And it’s you know, because the teachers don’t necessarily have the tools to provide the intervention that is grounded in, in evidence are grounded in the science.

Sara
Now I know obviously, you know, and the story that you just shared, I think is such a great reason or example of why our instruction has to be grounded in science, because that’s how we teach kids how to read and write.

Sara
But also, I’ve heard you talk a little bit about I’ve seen it on your website, this idea of the science of happiness, right? That like instruction is not just about learning to read and write that we want to make sure that we are being intentional about creating joyful classrooms, and that our instruction should promote joy. Why is that something that we need to think about in our literacy classrooms? You know, isn’t really learning to read enough on its own? Why does joy need to be something that we need to try to prioritize as well?

Katie
Thanks for asking about joy. It’s something I feel really passionate about. And learning to read is huge, and can create seemingly magical changes in children that are joyful in and of themselves. But if we have it within our power to make learning more joyful, why wouldn’t we, right?

Katie
And the science of happiness is a whole other area of research, which started decades ago with a pretty major paradigm shift in the field of psychology. So folks like Martin Seligman out of UPenn, had this bold idea to study people who were really happy, rather than study people who were suffering, which is what the field had for hundreds of years really delved into deeply.

Katie
But there were researchers really calling for what we could learn from people who report really high levels of overall happiness in life. And what they found was a few really key commonalities that I think have a lot of implications for our classrooms, and how we plan literacy instruction for all children.

Katie
So the first like major major finding is not all that surprising, but I think is increasingly important in today’s world, but that we’re social creatures by nature. And so people with higher happiness levels tend to have meaningful relationships in life, they prioritize connection, which is why we’re really here, you know, on this planet in the first place. And so people with higher happiness levels, prioritize that and they find it easier to assume connection, rather than disconnection.

Katie
A couple of other things from the field of the Science of Happiness is that people with higher happiness levels, also feel like they have some agency in life. So they have some Locus of Control, which is especially important that when things come out of seemingly nowhere in life, these are people that are anchored in a belief that things will be okay, because they’ve had practice in that they’ve had practice making decisions. And having some agency.

Katie
It doesn’t mean that these are people who haven’t experienced really hard things, tragedies, even, it just means they have an inner voice that gets them through. And people with higher happiness levels also really lean into things like awe and wonder, which is really an emerging field within the Science of Happiness right now.

Katie
So all of those right have big implications for us as teachers, not just as, you know, planners of literacy instruction, but all facets right of a child’s day. And as an elementary school teacher, you know, it is such a gift to be part of a whole child’s life, and that we actually as teachers spend more time with them than their parents. So we’re kind of this like in locus parenthesis, right? Like the Latin for you kind of are their parent when their parent isn’t there.

Katie
And you know, we teach, when I was a classroom teacher, I taught on Sundays, art, right, and maybe you step into PE and you’re navigating all that’s happening on at recess on the playground, and, in addition, right to literacy, and math, and science and social studies. So there are ways that we can plan our literacy instruction that keeps some of those pillars in mind, right?

Katie
Like when it comes to connection, how do we build connection not only to the content, but among students? So that literacy learning is not a solo act, but something that they’re doing alongside others? So even simple techniques that really draw from balance literacy practices, like turning talks are so vital for children to rehearse their thinking. So it strengthens their learning, but it also lets them connect with the child sitting next to them. Imagine if we didn’t give them those small opportunities, you know, throughout the day.

Katie
And also choice, you know, is a big part of agency and what are the ways in which we can scaffold choice for children? Research has also shown us out of the field of psychology, that choice really shouldn’t be anything goes. Too much choice is actually overwhelming for us as humans, and can lead us to like feel paralyzed, and we don’t even like initiate. We don’t want that to happen for kids either. That it’s not anything goes kind of choice in our classrooms.

Katie
But thinking about the children have opportunities to choose who they read with what they’re reading at sometimes, right? Where in the room they might read. Is there a cozy notebook or a beanbag or, you know, to read at a standing desk. Those are choices that we could offer to kids that don’t have to sacrifice you know anything about instructional time. It just allows students to have some practice and what it means to make choices.

Sara
Yeah, and I love those examples. And I’m so glad to ask you this question, because I think for so many teachers, and I know when I first started learning more about the reading science and evidence based instruction, I was worried about giving up some of those parts of balance literacy that we love so much, right?

Sara
Like, I know, teachers want to teach students how to read, but they also want to cultivate a love of learning, and this, you know, warm, positive environment. And so I love hearing you say that we can have both right, we can have evidence based instruction, and we can still do things that cultivate a joyful classroom and a joyful literacy experience for for our students.

Sara
Now, I know that you’re a co author of several books, and most recently, you’ve worked with Kari Yates and Jan Birkins, to write the book Shifting the Balance: Six Ways to Bring the Science of Reading into Upper Elementary. And I’ve loved that book that is one of probably my favorite science reading books that I’ve read.

Sara
Now, in the acknowledgments section, Jan, and Kari mentioned how you are the one that approached them about the collaboration because you really saw that there was a gap that this book could fill. Can you tell us a little bit about what you really wanted to achieve with writing this book and why you decided to co author the book with them?

Katie
Yeah, I mean, I, like so many teachers around the world when that cater to book that Jan and Kari crafted in 2021, when it landed on my doorstep, I was so blown away by what they had done and how they made the science of reading research so digestible, and accessible and immediately useful. So I read it cover to cover, like a lot of us in one weekend. And then I emailed the two of them.

Katie
And it expressed how I was so grateful for their book and how I needed it personally and professionally. The timing couldn’t have been better. For a lot of us, we were all still in the thick of COVID. If you think back to it, vaccines were just coming out my own son was diagnosed with dyslexia that season. And so there were just a lot of things that were percolating in my mind about the reading brain and what gets in the way when things aren’t clicking for children.

Katie
And how both of my sons, their teachers were so big hearted, and so well intentioned, but that things weren’t clicking for one of my sons. And so with a teacher’s head, I had a whole lot of respect for the work that they done. And really for the architecture of the book, the ways in which the shifts are organized, the concept of misunderstandings and new understandings, the instructional routines, all of it just really spoke to me.

Katie
And I, at the time, had been doing already a lot of workshops for schools that was focused on upper elementary, because that’s where I spent my years as a classroom teacher. So I was already doing workshops that were about primarily language comprehension, and the role of knowledge building and vocabulary development in particular, and writing about reading. So I was doing those workshops. And I was like, you know, this book is really about those primary years what comes next, for teachers and for kids?

Katie
And I also was thinking about kind of the cliff that some kids are kind of stuck on between second and third grade, or third grade and fourth grade. And then if they haven’t locked in all the secrets of the code, by the time maybe a phonics program is like done and dusted. What are we to do? And so I felt like teachers really needed a resource, just like the first shifting the balance book, but designed for upper elementary teachers to help them make the most of reading science in their classrooms.

Katie
And so five of the shifts really are devoted to the language comprehension side of skilled reading. And we do have one chapter that focuses on word reading specifically, and also one about you know, the bridging process of fluency, but that a lot of the book is more tilted towards the language comprehension strands of Scarborough’s rope, for example.

Katie
And yeah, I’ve been so grateful to be on the journey with Jana Kari, it took us over two years to write the book. We were making revisions up until like, the final minute of the final deadline, because we knew that we had to get it right. We had to make sure that teachers had the knowledge they needed. They had the instructional routines that they could apply right away. So they’ve been phenomenal thought partners.

Sara
Well I am so glad that you guys created that resource. I you know, the majority of the teachers that listen to my podcasts are upper elementary teachers and I remember when, you know science of reading started to become much more of a buzzword and people were talking about it and recognizing that you know, there’s there is research that tells us you know, how we learn to read and how we can effectively teach reading.

Sara
And so many upper elementary teachers are like there’s so much about phonics and phonemic awareness and like word recognition. But what does this look like in upper elementary? So I know that there is such a need for it. And the book is absolutely beautiful. I’ve read it cover to cover a couple of times now.

Sara
And I know you briefly mentioned how the majority of the book really, you know, identifies the language comprehension strands and Scarborough’s reading rope. But how was it a difficult process for you guys to identify the six shifts? Or was it relatively clear where it’s like, okay, these are the six areas we need to talk about. How did you guys really come to the conclusion that it’s like these are the six things that upper elementary teachers need to be doing in their classroom?

Katie
Yeah, I mean, we did a lot of digging into research on the past few decades. Because I was an upper elementary classroom teacher and I was doing a lot of workshops for those grade levels around the science of reading. I don’t think it was too difficult for us to land at those six shifts, but the details within them were the hardest part.

Katie
And we did look really closely of course, at models of skilled reading like the simple view, Scarborough’s, robe, Duke and Cartwright’s active view of reading came out in 2021. So that was a big influencer as well, you know, and that their model also thinks about things like the research on motivation, and executive functions, which is still a really a very emerging area of reading science that we still have a lot to learn.

Katie
We looked closely at national reports, like the National Reading Panel Report, but also the RAND reading study group, as well as dozens and dozens of individual studies. We looked at a lot of meta analyses, which keep coming out with really important evidence for the ways in which we can actually help kids not just learn knowledge, for example, about one topic, but that knowledge has like a snowball effect. And we weren’t always sure whether or not that was possible that like, if you learn about one thing, can it apply to something else. And research is showing us now that it can.

Katie
And a highly influential article for us was ending the reading wars, reading acquisition from novice to expert by castles Rasul the nation. That is a phenomenal article if people haven’t checked it out. But we continue to be super interested in ending the reading wars, and really leaning on the evidence, which continues to grow, to better understand how we can do this work better.

Katie
And also, like with some humility, that the field is always going to be moving forward. There are still things for us to learn about how reading happens in the brain and where it breaks down. But that how do we use science at this point, and empirical studies and meta analyses to do this work better right now for the kids who are in our classrooms today?

Sara
Yeah, I love that. And I’m so glad that you guys wrote this book, I know that it is serving teachers, so well. And so thank you for the impact that you guys have had on education.

Sara
Now, I love what you just said how we are always, we’re always learning, right? We’re always learning new things. And as a result, our practices are getting better. But for teachers who are just starting to learn about the science of reading, right, they’re just discovering the science and the evidence based practices.

Sara
You know, what advice do you have when it comes to them trying to shift their instruction to align to the science of reading? You know, as they’re reading through your book, and they’re recognizing, it’s like, okay, I have not been doing these things like I need to make some shifts, what advice would you give them?

Katie
Oh, yeah, I think first is Be kind to yourself, it can be easy to feel guilty about things that we could have done differently, or children that we could have supported better. If we known then what we know now. I mean, I still go through that every semester, as a college professor, you know that I know that there are some students that I reach more than others. And I’m always trying to figure out the human side of this work, right, the art part, alongside the science part.

Katie
And that, especially in the elementary years, it’s the mix of those. So be kind to yourself. We talk a lot at the six shifts, and across the shifting the balance books about committing to one small step, no matter how small or imperfect, and that that’s really an act of bravery to do that.

Katie
And to have an open heart and an open mind. Because the field is going to continue to move forward. The shifts that we offer in this upper elementary book are shifts that we found the field would benefit from reconsidering and rethinking right now. But teaching will always require us to re examine some things from new lenses and new perspectives that we didn’t have before. And to make shifts again.

Katie
I think we all have to get comfortable with this idea of not constantly shifting, but being comfortable with shifting, and that we can commit to revisiting things and taking action again and again and again, throughout our careers. And that, you know, certain things about childhood are also changing with each new generation that require new things of us that me as a teacher in 2000, didn’t have to think about.

Katie
So the world is always changing. And so are children and so must our classrooms. But Jan, Kari and I do talk a lot amongst each other, and in our work with teachers about how teaching is hard work, but it’s also heart work. And so we need to, you know, take care of our own hearts, if we’re going to be able to do that for children, too. So that’s my advice.

Sara
I love it. That’s beautiful. And I think, yeah, I love how you say, committing to one small shift, no matter how small it is, is an act of bravery. I think that’s so important for teachers to recognize that change is not always easy. And the profession of education requires us to constantly be changing. And so teachers who are willing to jump in and make that commitment that’s just says a lot about them as educators.

Sara
Katie, this has been so wonderful. I just love I love hearing your, your stories. I love hearing how your experiences has just shaped your ability to have this huge impact in the field of education. Thank you for writing this book and sharing it with teachers. Thank you for being willing to come on the podcast today and share about it with my audience. I know they’re going to enjoy listening to this episode. So thank you so much. I appreciate you coming on the show today.

Katie
Well, thanks, Sara. This was a real treat. I really appreciate it.