Friday photos # 40: Rollanda O'Connor

Who is one great resource about evidence-based reading instructional practices?

Rollanda O’Connor, whom you may hear addressed as “Randi,” knows reading and reading instruction. Not only does she bring to any discussion the wisdom of having taught students with disabilities for 16 years in public schools, but she also has the perspective of a highly-regarded researcher and teacher educator. So, if some readers have questions about reading, finding her work and reading it should prove helpful.

Rollanda O’Connor beginning a session at the TeachingLD.org conference in 2010. Photo by John Wills Lloyd. Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0)

As I look at the first photo, Randi’s fun-loving-but-skip-the-nonsense approach to the world is evident to me. She rarely wasted anyone’s time. She was “on” when it was time to start and she stayed “on” until it was time to stop. Always organized, always alert, always considerate, never boring. I don’t think I ever saw her give anything less than her best effort. And the content of that effort was way-very solid.

For those who have interest in the very practical side of Randi’s work, I encourage readers to locate¹ and read

• Teaching Word Recognition: Effective Strategies for Students with Learning Difficulties (2nd ed.; ISBN 9781462516193) by R. E. O’Connor, 2015, which thoroughly explains decoding instruction in an accessible way in just 200 pages; and

• Ladders to Literacy: A Kindergarten Activity Book by A. Notari-Syverson, R. E. O’Connor, and P. F. Vadasy (2007; ISBN-13: 978-1-55766-913-1), which is (as one can infer from the title) a collection of teaching recommendations.

Rollanda O’Connor and some old doofus, 2014. Photo probably by Pat Lloyd. Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0)

In case you missed my earlier reference to Randi’s academic chops, I’m going to list a few of her many scientific publications in the sources. Knowledgable readers will note that she’s collaborated with wonderful scholars over the years, that the work spans many years, that she’s published in top-flight journals, and on and on. One of the really great things about Randi’s contributions is that they are remarkably accessible; she doesn’t skimp on the scientific quality, but (as her book reveals) she can sure make the implications clear.

So, consider this as an introduction to the real deal.

Sources & such

O'Connor, R. E., Bell, K. M., Harty, K. R., Larkin, L. K., Sackor, S. M., & Zigmond, N. (2002). Teaching reading to poor readers in the intermediate grades: A comparison of text difficulty. Journal of Educational Psychology, 94(3), 474.

O’Connor, R. E., Harty, K. R., & Fulmer, D. (2005). Tiers of Intervention in Kindergarten Through Third Grade. Journal of Learning Disabilities, 38(6), 532–538. https://doi.org/10.1177/00222194050380060901

O'Connor, R. E., Jenkins, J. R., Leicester, N., & Slocum, T. A. (1993). Teaching phonological awareness to young children with learning disabilities. Exceptional Children, 59(6), 532-546.

O’Connor, R. E., Sanchez, V. M., Jones, B., Suchilt, L., Youkhanna, V., & Beach, K. D. (2022). Continuing CHAAOS: Vocabulary intervention for students with disabilities in eighth grade who are also English learners. Learning Disability Quarterly, 45(2), 108-120.

Footnote

1. I receive no compensation from booksellers, publishers, or authors for referring to these commercial products.