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Decoding skills help children translate symbols into sounds, but comprehension also depends on domain-specific vocabulary and knowledge. Treating reading as a transferable skill overlooks knowledge gaps that simple texts reveal. Proposes curriculum-based reading assessments aligned to grade-by-grade content, creating coherent, cumulative learning contexts so vocabulary growth and comprehension can reflect what students were taught.",{"@graph":69,"@context":122},[70,84,105],{"@type":71,"itemListElement":72},"BreadcrumbList",[73,77,79,82],{"item":74,"name":75,"@type":76,"position":8},"https://docshare.wps.com","Home","ListItem",{"item":78,"name":9,"@type":76,"position":14},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/",{"item":80,"name":20,"@type":76,"position":81},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/exam/",3,{"item":83,"name":65,"@type":76,"position":19},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/theres-no-such-thing-as-a-reading-test/592363/",{"url":83,"name":65,"@type":85,"image":86,"author":91,"headline":65,"publisher":94,"fileFormat":97,"inLanguage":63,"description":67,"dateModified":98,"datePublished":99,"encodingFormat":97,"isAccessibleForFree":100,"interactionStatistic":101},"DigitalDocument",{"url":87,"@type":88,"width":89,"height":90},"https://docshare.wps.com/thumbnails/theres-no-such-thing-as-a-reading-test/592363.png","ImageObject",300,407,{"name":92,"@type":93},"McGucket","Person",{"url":74,"name":95,"@type":96},"DocShare","Organization","application/pdf","2026-11-05","2026-10-15",true,{"@type":102,"interactionType":103,"userInteractionCount":29},"InteractionCounter",{"@type":104},"ViewAction",{"@type":106,"mainEntity":107},"FAQPage",[108,114,118],{"name":109,"@type":110,"acceptedAnswer":111},"Why do reading comprehension tests often measure the wrong thing?","Question",{"text":112,"@type":113},"They assume comprehension is general, while comprehension actually depends on domain-specific vocabulary and knowledge. If students lack the background knowledge, they cannot fill in the gaps even if they can decode.","Answer",{"name":115,"@type":110,"acceptedAnswer":116},"What are the two key components of reading comprehension?",{"text":117,"@type":113},"Decoding skills and sufficient vocabulary to understand what is being decoded. Vocabulary itself grows reliably through gradual, cumulative acquisition of knowledge.",{"name":119,"@type":110,"acceptedAnswer":120},"What alternative does the document propose to improve reading test quality?",{"text":121,"@type":113},"Tie reading test content to specific grade-by-grade curricular content, using nonfiction passages from subjects like science where the curriculum provides the relevant knowledge.","https://schema.org",{"og:url":83,"og:type":124,"og:title":65,"og:site_name":95,"og:description":67},"article",{"robots":126,"canonical":83},"index,follow",{"doc_id":128,"site_id":62},592363,1792675081,{"code":4,"msg":5,"data":131},{"doc_id":128,"user_id":132,"nickname":92,"user_avatar":133,"doc_module":4,"category_id":19,"category_name":20,"doc_title":65,"doc_description":67,"doc_content":134,"file_id":135,"file_url":136,"file_type":137,"file_size":138,"view_count":29,"is_deleted":4,"is_public":8,"is_downloadable":8,"audit_status":8,"page_count":14,"language":139,"language_code":63,"site_id":62,"html_lang":63,"table_of_contents":140,"faqs":141,"seo_title":142,"seo_description":67,"update_tm":143,"read_time":24,"preview_page_count":4},1236954412713,"https://us-avatar.wpscdn.com/davatar_29158cc5080c5b710cf443261637dec0","There’s No Such Thing as a Reading Test  \nBy E. D. HIRSCH, JR., AND ROBERT PONDISCIO  \nIt is among the most common of nightmares. You dream of taking a test for which you are completely unprepared—you’ve never studied the material or even attended the course. For millions of American schoolchildren, it is a nightmare from which they cannot wake, a trial visited upon them each year when the law requires them to take reading tests with little preparation. Sure, formally preparing for reading tests has become more than just a ritual for schools. It is practically their raison d’être! Yet students are not prepared in the way they need to be.  \nSchools and teachers may indeed be making a Herculean effort to raise reading scores, but for the most part these efforts do little to improve reading achievement and prepare children for college, a career, and a lifetime of productive, engaged citizenship. This wasted effort is not because our teachers are of low quality. Rather, too many of our schools have fundamental misconceptions about reading comprehension—how it works,  \nE. D. Hirsch, Jr., is the founder of the Core Knowledge Foundation and professor emeritus at the University of Virginia. His most recent book is The Making of Americans: Democracy and Our Schools. Robert Pondiscio is a former fifth-grade teacher; he writes about education at The Core Knowledge Blog. Adapted with permission from E. D. Hirsch, Jr., and Robert Pondiscio,“There’s No Such Thing as a Reading Test,”American Prospect 21, no. 6 (June 2010), [www.prospect.org. All](www.prospect.org. All) rights reserved.  \nhow to improve it, and how to test it.  \nReading, like riding a bike, is typically thought of as a skill we acquire as children and generally never lose. When you think about your ability to read—if you think about it at all—the chances are good that you perceive it as not just askill, but a readily transferable skill. Once you learn how to read, you can competently read a novel, a newspaper article, or the latest memo from your bank. Reading is reading is reading. Either you can do it, or you cannot.  \nAs explained in the articles on pages 3 and 30, this view of reading is only partially correct. The ability to translate written symbols into sounds, commonly called “decoding,” is indeed a skill that can be taught and mastered. This explains why you are able to “read” nonsense words such as “rigfap” or “churbit.” But to be fully literate is to have the communicative power of language at your command—to read, write, listen, and speak with understanding.  \nCognitive scientists describe comprehension as domain specific. If a baseball fan reads “A-Rod hit into a 6-4-3 double play to end the game,” he needs not another word to understand that the New York Yankees lost when Alex Rodriguez came up to bat with a man on first base and one out and then hit a ground ball to the shortstop, who threw to the second baseman, who relayed to first in time to catch Rodriguez for the final out. If you’ve never heard of A-Rod or a 6-4-3 double play and cannot reconstruct the game situation in your mind’s eye, you are not a  \npoor reader. You merely lack the domainspecific vocabulary and knowledge of baseball needed to fill in the gaps. Even simple texts, like those on reading tests, are riddled with gaps—domain knowledge and vocabulary that the writer assumes the reader knows.  \nThink of reading as a two-lock box, requiring two keys to open. The first key is decoding skills. The second key is vocabulary sufficient to understand what is being decoded. Reading comprehension tests are basically vocabulary tests. The verbal portion of the SAT is essentially a vocabulary test. The verbal section of the Armed Forces Qualification Test—which predicts income level, job performance, and much else—is chiefly a vocabulary test. So, to lift us out of our low performance compared with other nations, narrow the achievement gap between groups, and offer low-income students a way out of povert","cbCaitNXyRv2f8jM","https://ap.wps.com/l/cbCaitNXyRv2f8jM","pdf",316336,"English","# There’s No Such Thing as a Reading Test\n## Why reading tests fail to measure real comprehension\n## Decoding vs. full literacy\n## Domain-specific knowledge and vocabulary\n## Reading as a two-key system\n## Curriculum-based reading tests as an alternative","[{\"question\":\"Why do reading comprehension tests often measure the wrong thing?\",\"answer\":\"They assume comprehension is general, while comprehension actually depends on domain-specific vocabulary and knowledge. If students lack the background knowledge, they cannot fill in the gaps even if they can decode.\"},{\"question\":\"What are the two key components of reading comprehension?\",\"answer\":\"Decoding skills and sufficient vocabulary to understand what is being decoded. Vocabulary itself grows reliably through gradual, cumulative acquisition of knowledge.\"},{\"question\":\"What alternative does the document propose to improve reading test quality?\",\"answer\":\"Tie reading test content to specific grade-by-grade curricular content, using nonfiction passages from subjects like science where the curriculum provides the relevant knowledge.\"}]","There’s No Such Thing as a Reading Test | PDF",1792074410]