Reviewed by Anne Boling for Readers' Favorite

For my dissertation and intellectual curiosity I read many doctoral dissertations for education and psychology. Many appeared to be much ado about very little.  So, I was pleasantly surprised reading Dr. Karen Dotson’s, “An Educational Applied Dissertation Model.”

It was well designed and executed and it achieved her goal.  The appendices will be most helpful for any school staff to use in reading improvement.  There are other good models too, but hers is worthwhile.

The success is due to the process of taking the time to truly know a child physiologically, psychologically, socially, and culturally.

She used many “experts” outside the classroom to provide some of this data, but I believe a teacher team would be less costly and more effective in the long run. I did this beginning in 1962.

In Dr.Dotson’s model the key is the working together of the resource support people to train the teachers.  Her belief in their usefulness was part of the modest, but positive results. She assumed apathy was the cause of only 19% attendance in the in-service sessions. I think it was anger!  Good teachers believe they are competent, so they need to be sold, not told about a better way.

In charter schools and schools where one or more teachers volunteer to create their own program there is the highest morale, the greatest energy, and (usually) the best results. Teachers (and students) with the freedom to challenge the status quo and attempt to figure out why something isn’t working come up with appropriate models.  They may research and try several until they discover what works best for them and their students.

To be fair Karen’s results would have been better if she used a larger sample and more students who were in even greater need. I’ve looked like a magician when I’ve taken functionally illiterate students who were misdiagnosed and by building up their confidence and reading with each every day they roared through reading materials.  A few of them would have made a difference.  There are plenty in any low-performing school.

More teachers and students and fewer experts, Karen could have taught them the tools and mindsets that would have made the difference.  They would not need her the next year and they would have the competency and enthusiasm to excite others to learn her model.

Instead of top-down mandates, it would be teachers learning, then inspiring and teaching others. I reiterate that teachers who believe in themselves are those who can get students to believe in their abilities.

Dr. Dotson’s model could be a good beginning.