De Facto Leaders Dr. Karen Dudek-Brannan

The most effective reading instructional practices aren’t always the ones that gain traction.
It’s the ones with the most successful marketing campaigns. 
The best marketer wins; but this certainly isn’t a win for the students who go without effective instruction or the school staff struggling to support them. 
That’s why I was so excited to talk with Dr. Pamela Snow about the growing body of research relating to literacy and its impact on life outcomes; as well as how we can improve the discourse surrounding effective instruction and improve instructional practices.
Pamela Snow is a Professor of Cognitive Psychology in the School of Education at the Bendigo campus of La Trobe University, Australia. She is also Co-Director of the Science of Language and Reading (SOLAR) Lab. Pamela is a registered psychologist, having qualified originally in speech-language pathology and has taught a wide range of undergraduate and postgraduate education and health professionals. Her research has been funded by nationally competitive schemes such as the ARC Discovery Program, ARC Linkage Program, and the Criminology Research Council, and concerns the role of language and literacy skills as academic and mental health protective factors in childhood and adolescence. She has conducted research on the profiles and needs of high-risk groups such as youth offenders, children and adolescents in the state care system and flexible education systems, as well as research advancing evidence in the language-to-literacy transition in the early years of school. 
In 2020, Pamela established, with her colleague, Professor Tanya Serry, The Science of Language and Reading (SOLAR) Lab in the School of Education at La Trobe University. Pamela’s research has been published in a wide range of international journals and she was a member of the 2017 National Year 1 Literacy and Numeracy Panel, convened by the Hon. Simon Birmingham, Federal Education Minister. She is a Life Member of Speech Pathology Australia and a past Victorian State Chair of the Australian Psychological Society. 
Pamela has over 170 publications, comprising refereed papers, books and book chapters, monographs and research reports. In addition to these academic outputs, Pamela writes a popular blog for teachers, parents, and clinicians: The Snow Report - https://pamelasnow.blogspot.com/ and is a founding Associate Editor of The Reading League Journal. 
In this interview, we discuss:
✅The impact of social media on the dissemination of research in education.
✅Can the discussion of reading research become an ongoing feedback loop between people teaching reading and those conducting research?
✅Comprehension and application are the end goals when it comes to the goal of education. But how do we define what “comprehension” is and how we work on it? 
✅Play-based learning vs early reading instruction: Why they aren’t in opposition.
✅Using explicit instruction to build skills needed for problem-solving and successful project-based learning.
✅Whose job is it to work on reading? How much is the responsibility of the schools, and what is the parent’s job?
You can connect with Dr. Snow on X (formerly Twitter) @pamelasnow2 (https://twitter.com/PamelaSnow2) or on her blog at: http://pamelasnow.blogspot.com/
We mentioned the following articles on her blog in this episode including:Balanced Literacy Bingo (Link here: http://pamelasnow.blogspot.com/2022/11/balanced-literacy-bingo.html)
School leaders and reading instruction: Time to demand LESS rather than more autonomy (Link here: http://pamelasnow.blogspot.com/2023/10/school-leaders-and-science-of-reading.html)
You can also learn more about her work on her La Trobe University page at: https://scholars.latrobe.edu.au/pcsnow
You can learn more about the Science of Language and Reading (SOLAR) lab at: https://www.latrobe.edu.au/school-education/about/spotlight
The number of experts and resources were mentioned in this episode, inc

The literacy space has become increasingly polarizing since the reading wars began.
There are a number of debates and questions that continue, including:Will kids learn to read “naturally”? 
What did the whole language approach get right, if anything?
Is explicit phonics instruction just a pendulum swing (and is focusing on phonics enough)?Are we teaching kids to read too early? 
When we talk about “early literacy” instruction, what are we actually recommending and how does that look? 
I invited Jane Gebers, veteran speech-language pathologist and author to episode 157 De Facto Leaders to discuss these questions. 
I entered the field right around the time the National Reading Panel study was published, so there was a fair amount of research on evidence-based literacy intervention when I started practicing. 
But when Jane started practicing, much of this research hadn’t been done, and she had the experience of watching the fields of education and reading instruction evolve. She was also one of the early adopters of many approaches that are common practice today, and it was an honor to hear about her work. 
Jane L. Gebers is the author of the popular resource, Books Are for Talking, Too! (Link here: https://www.slpstorytellers.com/2023/09/11/slp-author-book-books-are-for-talking-too-by-jane-gebers/), first published in 1990, and now in its 4th edition as of March 2023. A practicing speech-language pathologist for over 40 years, she has worked in public school, hospital, private, and clinical settings. She has been an adjunct professor at St. Mary's College of California and other universities where she taught Language Development, Assessment, and Intervention courses to students pursuing special education credentials. She currently holds a private practice in Northern California.
In this conversation, Jane and I discuss:
✅Everyone’s talking about “scaffolding”, but what does this word actually mean?
✅Reading practices that have stood the test of time, despite attempts to disprove their effectiveness.
✅The battle between play-based learning and “sight words”; and how to emphasize the right skills at the right time.
✅When building language skills, do we focus on a developmental hierarchy or environmental demands? 
✅Mapping language to print symbols and what to address in the early years to set the stage for reading and writing. 
You can connect with Jane on her website here: https://soundingyourbest.com, and find her book, Books Are for Talking, Too! here: https://www.slpstorytellers.com/2023/09/11/slp-author-book-books-are-for-talking-too-by-jane-gebers/  
The following resources were mentioned in this episode:
Some of the work done by Dr. Carol Westby, Ph.D. (Link here: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/152574019902100107)
The Neuroscience of Reading with Dr. G. Reid. Lyon (Link here: https://irrc.education.uiowa.edu/blog/2023/05/neuroscience-reading-dr-g-reid-lyon)
Teachers’ Use of Scaffolds within Conversations During Shared Book Reading (Dekshmukh, R.S., Pentimonti, J.M., Zucker, T.A., & Curry, B.) (Link here: https://pubs.asha.org/doi/10.1044/2021_LSHSS-21-00020)
In this episode, I mention Language Therapy Advance Foundations, my program that helps SLPs create a system for language therapy. You can learn more about Language Therapy Advance Foundations here:  https://drkarenspeech.com/languagetherapy/
I also mentioned The School of Clinical Leadership, my program that helps related service providers guide their teams to support students’ executive functioning across the day. This program will help you plan direct therapy, but will also help you lead change management on your team, no matter your job title. You can learn more about the School of Clinical Leadership here: https://drkarendudekbrannan.com/clinicalleadership

We’re thrilled to be sponsored by IXL. 

IXL’s comprehensive teaching and learning platform for math, language arts, science, and social studies is a

No one working in special ed has ever said, “I chose this career so I could do paperwork all evening and weekend.”
Yet many realize after getting into the field that administrative demands can take away from time spent with students or collaborating with colleagues. 
That’s why I was so excited to connect with Sean Klamm, special educator and founder of Playground IEP (Link here: https://www.playgroundiep.com/) in episode 156 of “De Facto Leaders”. 
After starting his career as a teacher and then special education administrator, Sean was inspired to find a solution that would streamline, and potentially remove some of the “behind the scenes” work special educators need to do to manage service plans.
Sean Klamm is the Founder of Playground IEP. Sean is a Special Educator and former Director of Special Education at Butler College Prep in Chicago. After serving as Director for 5 years, Sean transitioned to build Playground IEP; the special education tools he wished he had while working in the school. Playground IEP is a new class of caseload management software that increases collaboration and automates many of the manual caseload management tasks. Sean and his team also built IEPcopilot.ai (Link here: https://www.playgroundiep.com/iep-copilot) which uses AI to assist in writing IEP goals, BIPs, and other sections of the IEP. Sean and his team are committed to building tools that allow teachers to spend more time with students and less time with spreadsheets.
In this conversation, we discuss:
✅ What’s the real motivation behind using AI and technology?
✅ How to keep the entire team in the loop about goals and accommodations (instead of letting IEPs collect dust in a binder on the shelf).
✅ When teachers aren’t supported, IEPs don’t get fully implemented. How do we solve that problem? 
✅ Using AI and technology to make space for better instructional practices and team collaboration.
✅ Systems vs. tools vs. culture: How leadership can avoid the “technology for the sake of technology” trap. 
You can connect with Sean on LinkedIn here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/seanklamm/
Learn more about PlayGround IEP here: https://www.playgroundiep.com/
Create a free IEP Copilot account here: https://www.playgroundiep.com/iep-copilot
In this episode, I mention Language Therapy Advance Foundations, my program that helps SLPs create a system for language therapy. You can learn more about Language Therapy Advance Foundations here: https://drkarenspeech.com/languagetherapy/ I also mentioned The School of Clinical Leadership, my program that helps related service providers guide their teams to support students’ executive functioning across the day. This program will help you plan direct therapy, but will also help you lead change management on your team, no matter your job title. You can learn more about the School of Clinical Leadership here: https://drkarendudekbrannan.com/clinicalleadership

We’re thrilled to be sponsored by IXL. 

IXL’s comprehensive teaching and learning platform for math, language arts, science, and social studies is accelerating achievement in 95 of the top 100 U.S. school districts. Loved by teachers and backed by independent research from Johns Hopkins University, IXL can help you do the following and more:
Simplify and streamline technologySave teachers’ timeReliably meet Tier 1 standardsImprove student performance on state assessments🚀 Ready to see why leading districts trust IXL for their educational needs? Visit IXL.com/BE today to learn more about how IXL can elevate your school or district.

Related service providers are often considered subject matter experts. Our role is to support other members of multidisciplinary teams like teachers, parents and administrators. 
But many clinicians I’ve talked to started their careers feeling like a “jack of all trades, master of none”. 
Some feel that graduate school was all theory and no practice. Others feel it was “drinking water through a firehose”, with way too broad of a scope to feel confident in any specific area.
That’s why it’s so important for professionals in education and healthcare to have a gameplan that helps them navigate all stages of their careers, so they can uncover interests and talents.
In my personal situation, it started when I felt overwhelmed as a new SLP trying to understand my role on the school team supporting language and literacy; which is what inspired me to create Language Therapy Advance Foundations. 
That’s why I was so excited to connect with Brianna Guild from SLP Literacy Corner who went through a similar journey.
Brianna is a private practice Speech-Language Pathologist in Ontario, Canada. She provides virtual speech therapy sessions, primarily in the areas of literacy, language, and articulation, to residents of Ontario. She started her own small business, SLP Literacy Corner, in 2022. She aims to support busy educators by creating resources and sharing activity ideas aligned with the Science of Reading. She is passionate about sharing low-prep resources and ideas for students of all ages, so educators can spend less time planning their literacy lessons. 
Her journey to becoming an SLP was not a traditional one. She received her Bachelor of Science in Biochemistry with a minor in Psychology from the University of Guelph, and then her Master of Health Science in Speech-Language Pathology from the University of Toronto. She loves that the field of Speech-Language Pathology combines her interests in education, healthcare, and research.
In this conversation, we discuss:
✅What is it like to be a struggling reader? (we both share our lived experiences).
✅How to discover your niche as a clinician and find your area of specialization.
✅The “pendulum myth”: Why evidence-based reading instruction is not just another trend.
✅Beyond phonics: How has the Science of Reading evolved?
✅Reading as a basic human right: It’s impact on access to higher education and career opportunities
✅Finding your people and uncovering your version of clinical leadership.
You can connect with Brianna on her SLP Literacy Corner website here: https://www.slpliteracycorner.ca/  on Instagram here: http://@slp.literacy.corner or on her Facebook page here: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082685452676
You can find her SLP Literacy Corner Teachers Pay Teachers store here: https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/Slp-Literacy-Corner 
We mentioned the following resources in this episode:
“The Reading Comprehension Blueprint” by Nancy E. Hennessy, M.Ed (Link here: https://products.brookespublishing.com/The-Reading-Comprehension-Blueprint-P1197.aspx)
The Hanen ABC and Beyond Program for Building Emergent Literacy in Early Childhood Settings (Link here: https://www.hanen.org/Programs/For-Educators/ABC-and-Beyond.aspx)
Ascend SMARTER Intervention Reading and Writing Curriculum (Link here: https://www.ascendlearningcenter.com/dsi-curriculum)
Basics of Decoding and Spelling Instruction by the International Dyslexia Association (Link here: https://www.idaontario.com/wpeducation/basics-of-decoding-and-spelling-instruction/)
National Reading Panel (Link here: https://www.nichd.nih.gov/sites/default/files/publications/pubs/nrp/Documents/report.pdf)
International Dyslexia Association (Link here: https://dyslexiaida.org/structured-literacy-effective-instruction-for-students-with-dyslexia-and-related-reading-difficulties/)
Ontario Language Curriculum (Link here: https://www.dcp.edu.gov.on.ca/en/curriculum/elementary-language)
ONlit

In this episode, I share a special Q & A session I did with the members of Language Therapy Advance Foundations; my program that provides service providers with a research-based framework for language therapy.
I get a lot of questions about how to make the transition between preschool to school-age, what language therapy activities are appropriate for younger children, and when to start direct intervention on linguistic skills like syntax.
While there is not a scripted protocol or curriculum that gives us all the answers, there’s a wide body of research that shows how an effective intervention framework can work. 
Should we focus on the “big picture” structure of language, like narrative structure, or should we focus on the pieces? 
Will kids get the “big picture” if they can’t put the other components together (at the word and sentence level)? Or will developing the structure give them a process that will help them develop those other components. 
In reality, it’s a little of both. 
Should we think from a developmental perspective; making sure that kids are developmentally ready to learn certain skills before introducing them? Or should we think from more of a behavioral, or cognitive/linguistic perspective, and operate from the assumption that teaching will facilitate skills?
Again, it’s a little of both.
In this episode, I clarified some of that nuance, as well as how I’ve considered these things in the framework I teach. 
✅How to structure your therapy session; including how to set expectations, how to think about modeling and scaffolding, and where "drill" activities come in to play
✅Where does narrative language intervention apply to language therapy? 
✅Are some students too young for direct work on vocabulary and syntax? 
✅How do we make the transition from preschool to school-age language therapy?
✅Describing a pattern vs. diagnosing: How does gestalt language processing fit in to a language therapy framework?
The following resources were mentioned in this episode:
De Facto Leaders EP 64: Are kids ready to work on complex sentences in elementary school? (Link here: https://drkarendudekbrannan.com/ep-64-are-kids-ready-to-work-on-complex-sentences-in-early-elementary-school/)
Spencer & Douglas (2020). Narrative Intervention: Principles to Practice (Link here: https://pubs.asha.org/doi/10.1044/2020_LSHSS-20-00015)
The Informed SLP: Let’s give them something to gestalt about (Link here: https://www.theinformedslp.com/review/let-s-give-them-something-to-gestalt-about)
In this episode, I mention Language Therapy Advance Foundations, my program that helps SLPs create a system for language therapy. You can learn more about Language Therapy Advance Foundations here: https://drkarenspeech.com/languagetherapy/

We’re thrilled to be sponsored by IXL. 

IXL’s comprehensive teaching and learning platform for math, language arts, science, and social studies is accelerating achievement in 95 of the top 100 U.S. school districts. Loved by teachers and backed by independent research from Johns Hopkins University, IXL can help you do the following and more:
Simplify and streamline technologySave teachers’ timeReliably meet Tier 1 standardsImprove student performance on state assessments🚀 Ready to see why leading districts trust IXL for their educational needs? Visit IXL.com/BE today to learn more about how IXL can elevate your school or district.

Our thoughts, feelings, and behaviors don’t have to define us. 
This is an important thing to remember for adults dealing with professional burnout and compassion fatigue; and it’s also important to model for kids.
When school discipline focuses on punitive measures alone, we miss out on opportunities to teach kids how to manage emotions or repair mistakes. 
That’s why I’m so excited to share this second half of my conversation with Crissy Mombela in “De Facto Leaders” episode 153, where we talk about the importance of debriefing, maintaining safe school communities, and teaching kids how to restore relationships. 
Crissy Mombela is the Program Director for the REACH initiative through the Partnership for Resilience. She leads the REACH Communities of Practice (CoP). Her work allows her to be a thought partner and leader in the implementation and evaluation of the REACH Initiative, a strategic partnership with the Center for Childhood Resilience at Lurie Children’s Hospital, and the support of the Illinois State Board of Education. With over twenty-five years of public education experience as a special education teacher and administrator, Crissy’s focus is on developing systems that support connection, innovation, and belonging within school communities. Crissy earned her B.S.Ed. with a concentration in special education from Northern Illinois University and her M.Ed. in Educational Administration from Loyola University. 
Crissy currently holds an Illinois Professional Educator License for teaching and administration with endorsements for directing special education programs and teaching English Language Learners. In her free time, Crissy enjoys traveling with her family, baking, and scrapbooking.
*In this conversation we discuss some sensitive topics relating to traumatic events in schools. In this second half of our conversation, we discuss:
✅Why does skipping the debrief after a crisis situation increase the likeliness of compassion fatigue?
✅Crisis prevention: How do we take a proactive approach to de-escalation?
✅The impact of social-emotional learning for adults: Why it’s not just about the kids.
✅Restoring a safe community after physical altercations between students.
✅Minimizing retraumatization during the debriefing process.
✅Teaching relationship repair and the impact it has on the well-being of all parties.
✅Why debriefing should be a part of crisis drills.
The following resources were mentioned in this episode:
The REACH Initiative at the Center for Childhood Resilience (Link here: https://childhoodresilience.org/reach)
The Partnership for Resilience (Link here: https://partnership4resilience.org/)
Elena Aguilar Coaching Resistance Podcast Series (Link here: https://www.brightmorningteam.com/podcast/coaching-resistance-part-1-what-is-resistance)
Neurodiversity Strengths Checklist (Link here: https://literallyausome.com.au/neurodiverity-strengths/)
Ladder of Inference TED Ed by Trevor Maber (Link here: https://www.ted.com/talks/trevor_maber_rethinking_thinking/transcript)
Reclaiming Youth At Risk (Link here: https://www.amazon.com/Reclaiming-Youth-Risk-Hope-Future/dp/1879639866)
The Whole-Brain Child (Link here: https://amzn.to/43d2dNT)
National Center on Safe Supportive Learning Environments (Link here: https://safesupportivelearning.ed.gov/trauma-sensitive-schools-training-package)
Conscious Discipline - Bailey (Link here: https://consciousdiscipline.com/free-resources/book-portal/)
Relationship, Responsibility, and Regulation (Link here: https://amzn.to/3PjP5Ra)
CHAMPS (Link here: https://ancorapublishing.com/product/champs-third-edition/)
Hacking School Discipline (Link here: https://amzn.to/4a6ppPY)
We Want to Do More Than Survive  (Link here: https://amzn.to/4c6cShg)
Other People's Children - Cultural Conflict in the Classroom (Link here: https://www.amazon.com/Other-Peoples-Children-Cultural-Classroom/dp/1595580743)
In this episode, I mentioned The School of Clinical L