I think the real problem here is systemic, rather than being linked to any one cause. Reading is an active process, it's something you have to want to do. Kids mimic the adults around them, so if a child lives in a household or neighborhood where no adults are ever seen reading for pleasure, how is are they supposed to know that reading is something worth doing? Another issue is aversion to hard work: unless you practice the difficult task of trying to understand symbols you don't recognize, you're never going to get better at reading. Those sorts of mental hurdles are unpleasant for most, certainly enough to throw many readers off track.
On another note, who's to say there's any one best way to read? Surely there's more than one way you can get something out of a book. People's brains are wired differently, some might learn better one way than another.
I'm not sure how your comment addresses the article, which spent some time explaining research that does tell us what is more and less effective in teaching reading.
> Surely there's more than one way you can get something out of a book.
Maybe so, but probably not for first graders, which is what this article addresses.
Also if you combine more definitions of success, the appropriate methods become more constrained.
1) Read for the gist of it. 2) Read competently-or-better aloud based on exact recognition of words, with or without precise understanding. 3) e.g. Read precisely enough to see precise meaning if it is there, or recognize if the meaning is not precisely clear.
The understated outrage is that teaching for #1, only, is short-sighted and worse.
Because, as the article describes, the books they're reading are extremely formulaic, to the point where the whole book may be made up of identical sentences, except for the final word.
Well sure, that's one reason they might not be learning well--all I'm saying is there is a larger context outside of the classroom that influences reading
On another note, who's to say there's any one best way to read? Surely there's more than one way you can get something out of a book. People's brains are wired differently, some might learn better one way than another.