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The Science of Reading Intervention Program: Assessment-based Instruction

There’s never enough instructional time to teach students who struggle with reading.

However…

The Science of Reading Intervention Program: Assessment-based Instruction provides diagnostically-based instructional resources to individualize instruction for students grades 4–adult in 25 minutes per day for 18 weeks. Perfect for early-late schedules or Tier 3 pull-out instruction. Ideal for EL and ESL learners or students in Resource programs with IEPs. A great option for students in continuation school settings or community college and adult literacy programs with self-paced instructional modules.

Although it certainly makes sense to teach a comprehensive word recognition program to all struggling readers to ensure a solid foundation, some students and new transfer students will need second-chance instruction with more intense tutoring and practice in easily-managed small groups and independent practice. Only assessment-based instruction affords teachers the opportunity to address the diverse reading deficits of their students with targeted lessons. Make your instructional minutes count!

If time is limited, why waste instructional time with lengthy assessments?

The diagnostic assessments in this program are different. First, they are quick and easy to administer and grade (formatted in print, audio, and Google forms). Second, each assessment couples with short lessons to target each and every assessment item. And each lesson provides a short formative assessment to determine mastery. You choose which assessments need to be given and to which students.

Diagnostic Assessments with Mastery Matrices                                 

  • Vowel Sound Phonics Assessment (10:42 audio file)
  • Consonant Sounds Phonics Assessments (12:07 audio file)
  • Syllable Awareness Assessment (5:48 audio file)
  • Syllable Rhyming Assessment (5:38 audio file)
  • Phonemic Isolation Assessments (5:54 audio file)
  • Phonemic Blending Assessment (5:53 audio file)
  • Phonemic Segmenting Assessment (5:21 audio file)
  • Alphabetic Awareness Assessments (10 minutes)
  • “Pets” Fluency Assessment (2 minutes per student)
  • Heart Words Assessment (5:48 audio file)
  • Spelling Assessment (22.38 audio file)
  • Grammar and Usage Assessment (15–20 minutes)
  • Mechanics Assessment (10–15 minutes)

Corresponding Lessons (all individualized practice except as noted)

  • Phonemic Awareness and Alphabetic Awareness Lessons (Small Groups)
  • Phonics Lessons (Small Groups)
  • Expository Reading Fluency Lessons (YouTube Modeled Readings at 3 Different Speeds)
  • Spelling Pattern Worksheets
  • Grammar, Usage, and Mechanics Worksheets
  • Heart Words and Phonics Games
  • Syllabication and Morphology Lessons
  • Executive Function Skill Lessons
Intervention Program Science of Reading

The Science of Reading Intervention Program

The Science of Reading Intervention Program: Word Recognition includes explicit, scripted instruction and practice with the 5 Daily Google Slide Activities every reading intervention student needs: 1. Phonemic Awareness and Morphology 2. Blending, Segmenting, and Spelling 3. Sounds and Spellings (including handwriting) 4. Heart Words Practice 5. Sam and Friends Phonics Books (decodables). Plus, digital and printable sound wall cards and speech articulation songs. Print versions are available for all activities. First Half of the Year Program (55 minutes-per-day, 18 weeks)

The Science of Reading Intervention Program: Language Comprehension resources are designed for students who have completed the word recognition program or have demonstrated basic mastery of the alphabetic code and can read with some degree of fluency. The program features the 5 Weekly Language Comprehension Activities: 1. Background Knowledge Mentor Texts 2. Academic Language, Greek and Latin Morphology, Figures of Speech, Connotations, Multiple Meaning Words 3. Syntax in Reading 4. Reading Comprehension Strategies 5. Literacy Knowledge (Narrative and Expository). Second Half of the Year Program (30 minutes-per-day, 18 weeks)

The Science of Reading Intervention Program: Assessment-based Instruction provides diagnostically-based “second chance” instructional resources. The program includes 13 comprehensive assessments and matching instructional resources to fill in the yet-to-be-mastered gaps in phonemic awareness, alphabetic awareness, phonics, fluency (with YouTube modeled readings), Heart Words and Phonics Games, spelling patterns, grammar, usage, and mechanics, syllabication and morphology, executive function shills. Second Half of the Year Program (25 minutes-per-day, 18 weeks)

The Science of Reading Intervention Program BUNDLE  includes all 3 program components for the comprehensive, state-of-the-art (and science) grades 4-adult full-year program. Scripted, easy-to-teach, no prep, no need for time-consuming (albeit valuable) LETRS training or O-G certification… Learn as you teach and get results NOW for your students. Print to speech with plenty of speech to print instructional components.

Grammar/Mechanics , , , , , , , , ,

Sound Wall Resources

For older students who struggle with reading challenges, sound walls can be an important instructional resource to make the phoneme (speech sound) to grapheme (print) connection. What’s preventing these students from making this connection? Often, it’s inaccurate or inconsistent recognition and production of the speech sounds. After all, if you can’t say ’em, you can’t read ’em and you certainly can’t spell ’em.

Many teachers who have recognized this problem assume that another dose of Heggerty, Barton, or others with phonemic awareness programs (I also have PA drills in my reading intervention programs) will do the trick, but this is not always the solution for all of your students. Practicing  phonemic isolation, segmenting, substitution, manipulation, reversals, etc., may not solve the problem if students do not know proper mouth formation and speech articulation. In the past, reading specialists and intervention teachers would refer students who lack these reading prerequisites to speech therapists, and this may indeed be necessary. But, with proper coaching, reading teachers can certainly assist most of their students who can’t recognize and produce speech sounds properly.

One  important tool that teachers are using to help students learn or re-learn the speech sounds is the instructional sound wall. Sound walls consist of the 43-45 phoneme-grapheme cards posted on the classroom wall and organized into two sections: vowels and consonants. If you are unfamiliar with what a sound wall looks like, the Louisiana Department of Education has produced a wonderful “how-to set up a sound wall” resource.

Vowel Valley and Consonant Sounds Sound Walls

Vowel Valley

Consonant Sounds

The different phonemes associated with vowels are arranged in a “valley” formation on the wall that looks like the opening of the mouth that happens when the vowel sounds are spoken. Vowel sounds produce unobstructed air flow through the mouth, unlike consonants.

The consonants, organized by “manners of articulation” proposed by Dr. Louisa Moats (2020) are posted as follows:

● Stops – airflow is completely obstructed by the lips
● Nasals – airflow is obstructed in the mouth, but released through the nose
● Affricates – begins as a stop, but ends as a fricative
● Fricatives – air flows, but friction is created by small separations between articulators
● Glides – no friction in the airflow, but changes in sound are produced by the placement of the tongue and lips
● Liquids – the tongue creates a partial closure in the mouth that redirects airflow

Sound-Spelling Cards

Animal Cards

Phoneme-Grapheme (Sound-Spelling) Card Components

Sounds: Sound-spelling cards include sound symbols, indicated by slanted lines. For example, /k/ and /r/. Note that the sounds are not the same as the alphabetic letters. The “c” as in card has the /k/ sound, not a /c/ sound. In my reading intervention programs, I include audio files on each digital card.

Pictures: The phoneme-grapheme cards usually feature a picture which has a name that emphasizes the focus sound. The picture acts as a mnemonic to cement the phoneme-grapheme relationship for students.

Phoneme-grapheme cards are useful tools for building phoneme awareness because the abstract sounds and symbols are now tied to concrete representations. Dr. Tim Shanahan also stresses the importance of practicing sound-picture connections.

Many teachers help students memorize the name of the card i.e., the picture, when introducing the sound indicated on the card. In my reading intervention programs, I teach animal chants, because all of my Animal Cards consist of animals.

Spellings: The common sound-spellings are also featured on the cards.  For example, in my reading intervention programs, I use animal cards with photographs that are suitable for older readers. The spellings include blanks to indicate their location within words and to help students select appropriate spellings. For example, if a student is spelling the word, betray, the “ai_” spelling choice would be eliminated from consideration, because the blank indicates that “ai” cannot end a syllable. The “_ay” would be a more informed selection. Here is a set of the Animal Card PDFs for your review.

Sound Wall Songs

To help students remember how to position and move the mouth, I’ve created songs which explain the mouth formations and sound production. The Vowel Valley Chant includes this music, the Animal Chants, and the Vowel Valley graphic representations for each of type of  vowel. The Consonant Sounds Chant also includes this music, the Animal Chants, and the consonant “manners of articulation” graphic representations for each of type of  consonant. Each is provided for your review.

Personal Sound Walls

To add to the traditional vowel valley and consonant sounds wall cards, I would suggest adding separate graphic representations of the sound-print subsections for individual students.

Fricatives: Personal Sound Wall

These “personal sound walls” might consist of separate short vowels, long vowels, digraphs, diphthongs, r-controlled vowels, organized in the classic Vowel Valley configuration.  Additionally, I suggest separate graphic representations of the consonant “manners of articulation” (see Dr. Moats’ organization above). My reading intervention programs include two versions of the Personal Sound Walls, which I include here for your review: Interactive Google Slides (with fill-in text boxes and audio files) and printable PDFs: Sound Wall Printables to print and laminate. With the laminated copies, students can use dry erase markers to write word examples, erase, and practice again.

Mouth Formation and Movement: A unique feature of the posted sound wall cards and “personal sound walls” is that they also include images (photographs or graphics) of mouths articulating the different phonemes, so that students can make the connection between what a phoneme sounds like and how their mouths are formed and move when they are saying that phoneme.

Teachers may choose to have a mirror nearby so that students may see their own mouths while using the sound wall.

*****

Each of the above resources is included for teachers to review components of my two reading intervention programs. Click on the provided links to view video overviews and to download sample lessons.+

Intervention Program Science of Reading

The Science of Reading Intervention Program

Pennington Publishing’s THE SCIENCE OF READING INTERVENTION PROGRAM features both word recognition and language comprehension instructional resources (Google slides and print). The word recognition components feature the easy-to-teach, interactive 5 Daily Google Slide Activities: 1. Phonemic Awareness and Morphology 2. Blending, Segmenting, and Spelling 3. Sounds and Spelling Independent Practice 4. Heart Words Independent Practice 5. The Sam and Friends Phonics Books–decodables 1ith comprehension and word fluency practice for older readers. The program also includes sound boxes and personal sound walls for weekly review.  The language comprehension components feature comprehensive vocabulary, reading fluency, reading comprehension, spelling, writing and syntax, syllabication, reading strategies, and game card lessons, worksheets, and activities. Word Recognition × Language Comprehension = Skillful Reading: The Simple View of Reading and the National Reading Panel Big 5.

If you only have time for a half-year (or 30 minutes per day) program, the The Science of Reading Intervention Program Word Recognition component (sold separately) features the 5 Daily Google Slide Activities, plus the sound boxes and personal sound walls.

PREVIEW THE SCIENCE OF READING INTERVENTION PROGRAM RESOURCES HERE for detailed product description and sample lessons.

Reading, Spelling/Vocabulary , , , , , , ,

8 Great Spelling Song Videos

8 Great Spelling RulesIntroducing the Eight Great Spelling Song audio files and YouTube video links to 8 memorable songs. Help your students (and you) remember and apply the spelling rules in their writing. Turn ’em up! Your kids of all ages will love these. By the way, your upper elementary and middle school students still need spelling instruction. Don’t believe me? Administer my Diagnostic Spelling Assessment and you’ll change your mind. The assessment pinpoints each spelling pattern deficiency.

Break down the components of each spelling rule and elicit other spelling word examples from your students. Look for exceptions to the rules. Even though there are exceptions, it’s much better to start with the rule and works most of the time and adjust to the rule-breakers. If you’re a baseball fan, you know that hitters “look for the fastball and adjust for the curve.”

Yes, these are available in my spelling programs. See promos below. Thanks!

1. The i before e Rule

Usually spell i before e (believe), but spell e before i after a c (receive) and when the letters are pronounced as a long /a/ sound (neighbor).

The i-before-e Spelling Rule

YouTube Video

2. The Final y Rule

Keep the y when adding an ending if the word ends in a vowel, then a y (delay-delayed), or if the ending begins with an i (copy-copying). Change the y to i when adding an ending if the word ends in a consonant, then a y (pretty-prettiest).

 The Final y Spelling Rule

YouTube Video

3. The Silent e Rule

Drop the e (have-having) at the end of a syllable if the ending begins with a vowel. Keep the e (close-closely) when the ending begins with a consonant, has a soft /c/ or /g/ sound, then an “ous” or “able” (peaceable, gorgeous), or if it ends in “ee”, “oe”, or “ye” (freedom, shoeing, eyeing).

 The Final Consonant-e Spelling Rule

YouTube Video

4. The Double the Consonant Rule

Double the last consonant, when adding on an ending (permitted), if all three of these conditions are met: 1. the last syllable has the accent (per / mit)  2. the last syllable ends in a vowel, then a consonant (permit). 3. the ending you add begins with a vowel (ed).

The Double the Consonant Rule

YouTube Video

5. The Ending “an” or “en” Rule

End a word with “ance”, “ancy”, or “ant”  if the root before has a hard /c/ or /g/ sound (vacancy, arrogance) or if the root ends with “ear” or “ure” (clearance, insurance). End a word with “ence”, “ency”, or “ent” if the root before has a soft /c/ or /g/ sound (magnificent, emergency), after “id” (residence), or if the root ends with “ere” (reverence).

 The Ending “an” or “en” Rule

YouTube Video

6. The “able” or “ible” Rule

End a word with “able” if the root before has a hard /c/ or /g/ sound (despicable, navigable), after a complete root word (teachable), or after a silent e (likeable). End a word with “ible” if the root has a soft /c/ or /g/ sound (reducible, legible), after an “ss” (admissible), or after an incomplete root word (audible).

The “able” or “ible” Rule

YouTube Video

7. The Ending “ion” Rule

Spell “sion” for the final zyun sound (illusion) or the final shun sound (expulsion, compassion) if after an l or s. Spell “cian” (musician) for a person and “tion” (condition) in most all other cases.

 The Ending “ion” Rule

YouTube Video

8. The Plurals Rule

Spell plural nouns with an s (dog-dogs), even those that end in y (day-days) or those that end in a vowel, then an o (stereo-stereos). Spell “es” after the sounds of /s/, /x/, /z/, /ch/, or /sh/ (box-boxes) or after a consonant, then an o (potato-potatoes). Change the y to i and add “es” when the word ends in a consonant, then a y (ferry-ferries). Change the “fe” or “lf” ending to “ves” (knife-knives, shelf-shelves).

 The Plurals Rule

YouTube Video

from The Science of Reading Intervention Program, Teaching Reading Strategies (Reading Intervention), and Differentiated Spelling Instruction (American English and Canadian Versions)

Canadian Spelling

Spelling Programs for Canadians

Differentiated Spelling Instruction Programs

Differentiated Spelling Instruction

 Reading Intervention Program Teaching Reading StrategiesIntervention Program Science of Reading

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The Science of Reading Intervention Program

Intervention Program Science of ReadingDownload 2 FREE lessons (178 slides and a 15 min video) to check out The Science of Reading Intervention Program. Effective. Evidence-based. Accelerated program. Easy-to-teach. Affordable.

This evidence-based, SoR-aligned, accelerated program has been designed for struggling readers ages 8-adult. The 54 lessons each include 5 Daily Google Slide Activities:

5 Daily Google Slide Activities (55 minute lessons, 3 days per week, 18 weeks)

    1. Phonemic Awareness and Morphology: Advanced phonemic awareness drills and Greek and Latin Anchor Words to help students learn the high frequency prefixes, roots, and suffixes (5 Minutes).
  1.  Blending, Segmenting, and Spelling: Continuous blending of 4-8 words to learn phonetically regular focus sound-spellings and 2 Heart Words per lesson, plus syllable and spelling rules (10 Minutes). Includes audio and video files.
  2. Sounds and Spellings Practice: Independent practice with text box typing and drag and drop activities for the focus sound-spellings (10 Minutes).
  3. Heart Words Practice: Independent practice with text box typing and drag and drop activities for the 2 words with phonetically irregular sound-spellings (5 Minutes).
  4.  Sam and Friends Phonics Books: Decodable stories with teenage characters and plots for each daily lesson with comprehension questions, margin annotations, and word fluency practice. Beautifully illustrated by noted comic artist, David Rickert. (Slides with text box typing and PDFs in Tablet, Chromebook, and Phone Formats) 25 Minutes

Written for teachers by a teacher. Completely aligned to the science of reading.

Reading, Spelling/Vocabulary , , , , , , , ,

Guided Reading and the Science of Reading

I’ve got to be careful on this topic. I’ve got family members who teach using guided reading, as well as plenty of colleagues, and their students are learning to read. Within the past 35 years, guided reading has become an educational given, accepted common sense, and an all-or-nothing teaching reading strategy. For Fountas & Pinnell and Teachers College, the guided reading method of teaching students with leveled books is a cash-cow. However, all-too-often educators assume and practice what has not yet been proven. Such is the case with guided reading.

Guided Reading

How to Tweak Guided Reading

Guided reading is based upon two theoretical premises: Vygotsky’s (1978) Zone of Proximal Development theory and Bruner’s (1986) application of that research to learning theory in what he termed as scaffolding.  From these premises, Marie Clay, New Zealand’s godmother of guided reading, believed that students learn best in instructional level texts (Vygotsky’s Zone), guided by a teacher to independence (Bruner’s scaffolding), and then on to more and more challenging instructional texts in what she coined as the “ladder of progress.” Clay’s methods of determining independence (91–94%) is running records assessment.

Clay’s guided reading method sounds reasonable and practical. Simply put, it’s the Goldilocks principle: Don’t have students practice in books that are too hard (frustration level); don’t have students practice in books that are too easy (independent level). Instead, have students practice in books that are just right (instructional level) with teacher assistance.

Within the last 35 years, we have made enormous strides in determining readers’ levels of comprehension and matching them to levels of text complexity through Lexile testing or informed teacher judgment using running records. However, we have not yet proven that practicing at optimally determined reading levels produces more learning than reading text that is “too easy” or “too hard.” And we just don’t know if learning is best facilitated with Clay’s ladder of progress model. Is there such a thing as an optimal instructional reading level?

Dr. Timothy Shanahan argues, “Basically we have put way too much confidence in an unproven theory”(https://fordhaminstitute.org/national/commentary/leveled-reading-making-literacy-myth). He elaborates on the guided reading practice of using leveled texts to match optimal reading levels of instruction:

Of the studies that have directly tested the effects of teaching students to read with books at their “instructional level,” not one has found any benefit to the practice. There are several studies that have found no benefit to doing this and there are some that have found it to be harmful (that is, it reduces the students’ opportunity to learn). There is no set level at which texts need to be for students to learn from them, but if the texts are too easy (and traditional instructional level criteria are apparently too easy) learning is going to be limited. This has been found across a variety of grades from Grade 2 through high school and both with regular classroom students and learning-disabled students (https://www.shanahanonliteracy.com/blog/a-gallimaufry-of-literacy-questions-and-answers).

In fact, the authors of the Common Core State Standards would argue that students (with teacher assistance) learn more from complex i.e. frustration level text than instructional or independent text. My son read the entire Harry Potter series as a fourth-grader. While the first few books were add an accessible reading level, the last few certainly were not. My son gained two reading grade levels in a matter of months by reading text at his frustration level.

At this point, I know I’ve lost half of my readers. Teachers believe in the value of research only to a certain extent. When challenged by new or different research that is contradictory to accepted notions, teachers tend to retreat to their own experience. Generally, teachers believe in what they’ve been taught, how they were taught, and what they are now doing. Guided reading teachers see success in their students and the kids are learning to read. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

Leveling Books

Guided Reading

However, for the remaining half of my readers: When they understand that the research does not prove what the majority of teachers are doing, they work through their cognitive dissonance and become more critical consumers of ideas and practice. They’re not afraid to distance themselves from the herd and try something new. A chance to add more tools to their tool belts.

My take is that we don’t have to throw the baby out with the bathwater. Some of guided reading makes complete sense: the structural and instructional components of flexible ability grouping, meaningful busy work for rest of kids, reading with the teacher on a daily basis, and authentic assessment are proven and effective instructional strategies; however a few tweaks are in order. We don’t and shouldn’t abandon guided reading entirely as some Science of Reading colleagues advocate. However, I would ask teachers to try a few adaptations.

My suggestions to make sense of guided reading:

  1. Rather than trying to fine tune your guided reading groups by adding more discrete reading level groups, think of combining groups to maximize instructional minutes, minimize independent work, and improve behavior management. Especially consider doubling the size of the teacher-led guided reading group and reducing the number of total groups. Check out these 10 group rotation schedules.
  2. Look to other means of assessment to determine reading needs and group placements, in addition to running records. Teachers don’t like to hear this, but we are not completely objective evaluators. According to Dr. Louisa Moats, “The reliability of oral reading tests and running records is lower than the reliability of more structured, specific measures of component reading skills. Teacher judgment of the cause of specific oral reading errors (e.g., miscue analysis) tends to be much less reliable” (https://www.aft.org/sites/default/files/reading_rocketscience_2004.pdf). (Download my FREE diagnostic assessments.)
  3. In addition to leveled reading groups, use this alternative assessment data  to drive instruction within your guided reading group stations. Flexible groupings can help you teach r-controlled vowels to a group, or the soft /c/ spellings, or non-decodable sight words, etc. to needs-based groups, formed according to diagnostic assessments.

The benefits…

  1. Fewer groups means less prep for guided reading groups and other independent learning stations.
  2. Less wasted instruction. When teachers notice reading errors during guided reading or running records which they wish to address via mini-lessons, some, but not all students will benefit.
  3. Targeted needs-based instruction is more efficient than mini-lessons.
  4. Students will progress quicker with the addition of assessment-based instruction.
  5. Less $. Those Fountas & Pinnell A to Z leveled books are expensive. Why not purchase fewer levels?
  6. Less tracking. Traditional guided reading groups stay quite similar from the start to end of the school year, with notable exceptions.
  7. Better behavior management. With fewer groups, fewer transitions are necessary. With more students in the teacher’s group, less idle hands are making mischief.
  8. More teacher-student time.
Intervention Program Science of Reading

The Science of Reading Intervention Program

The Science of Reading Intervention Program: Word Recognition includes explicit, scripted instruction and practice with the 5 Daily Google Slide Activities every reading intervention student needs: 1. Phonemic Awareness and Morphology 2. Blending, Segmenting, and Spelling 3. Sounds and Spellings (including handwriting) 4. Heart Words Practice 5. Sam and Friends Phonics Books (decodables). Plus, digital and printable sound wall cards and speech articulation songs. Print versions are available for all activities. First Half of the Year Program (55 minutes-per-day, 18 weeks)

The Science of Reading Intervention Program: Language Comprehension resources are designed for students who have completed the word recognition program or have demonstrated basic mastery of the alphabetic code and can read with some degree of fluency. The program features the 5 Weekly Language Comprehension Activities: 1. Background Knowledge Mentor Texts 2. Academic Language, Greek and Latin Morphology, Figures of Speech, Connotations, Multiple Meaning Words 3. Syntax in Reading 4. Reading Comprehension Strategies 5. Literacy Knowledge (Narrative and Expository). Second Half of the Year Program (30 minutes-per-day, 18 weeks)

The Science of Reading Intervention Program: Assessment-based Instruction provides diagnostically-based “second chance” instructional resources. The program includes 13 comprehensive assessments and matching instructional resources to fill in the yet-to-be-mastered gaps in phonemic awareness, alphabetic awareness, phonics, fluency (with YouTube modeled readings), Heart Words and Phonics Games, spelling patterns, grammar, usage, and mechanics, syllabication and morphology, executive function shills. Second Half of the Year Program (25 minutes-per-day, 18 weeks)

The Science of Reading Intervention Program BUNDLE  includes all 3 program components for the comprehensive, state-of-the-art (and science) grades 4-adult full-year program. Scripted, easy-to-teach, no prep, no need for time-consuming (albeit valuable) LETRS training or O-G certification… Learn as you teach and get results NOW for your students. Print to speech with plenty of speech to print instructional components.

Grammar/Mechanics , , , , , , , ,

Reading Out Loud

Biden Stuttering Challenge“Mr. Buh-Buh-Buh-Biden, what’s that word?” a nun asked Joe Biden in front of his seventh-grade classmates.

It’s a seventh grade in a Catholic school in Delaware. The teacher, a nun, is doing a read-around of a story about Sir Walter Raleigh. Students take their turns reading out loud in front of the class. Some are nervously awaiting their turns; others, like young Joe Biden, are petrified. Why so? Biden is a stutterer. The nun calls upon Biden to read. Biden is not surprised; he knows that he is the fifth student to be called upon, because the nun is choosing students in alphabetic order. Like many students, instead of reading along silently with the other students, Biden has been practicing the paragraph he predicts will be his to read. Biden begins to read out loud and stumbles over the word, gentleman. The nun cruelly mocks him to correct his pronunciation.

“Mr. Buh-Buh-Buh-Biden, what’s that word?” the nun asks.

Biden says he rose from his desk and left the classroom in protest, then walked home. The family story is that his mother, Jean, drove him back to school and confronted the nun with the made-for-TV phrase ‘You do that again, I’ll knock your bonnet off your head!’ I ask Biden what went through his mind as the nun mocked him.

‘Anger, rage, humiliation,’ he says. His speech becomes staccato. ‘A feeling of, uh… it just drops out of your chest, just, like, you feel … a void.’

“What Joe Biden Can’t Bring Himself to Say,” John Hendrickson, The Atlantic

Other sources confirm that bullying was not limited to this one instance with the nun: “As a child, Biden struggled with a stutter, and kids called him ‘Dash’ and ‘Joe Impedimenta’ to mock him. He eventually overcame his speech impediment by memorizing long passages of poetry and reciting them out loud in front of the mirror” (https://www.biography.com/political-figure/joe-biden).

Biden recounts how he coped with reading out loud in front of the class when students would take turns reading a book, one by one, up and down the rows: “I could count down how many paragraphs, and I’d memorize it, because I found it easier to memorize than look at the page and read the word. I’d pretend to be reading,’ Biden says. “You learned early on who the hell the bullies were” (Hendrickson).

Did you know?

“In the most basic sense, a stutter is a repetition, prolongation, or block in producing a sound. It typically presents between the ages of 2 and 4, in up to twice as many boys as girls, who also have a higher recovery rate. During the develop­mental years, some children’s stutter will disappear completely without intervention or with speech therapy. The longer someone stutters, however, the lower the chances of a full recovery—­perhaps due to the decreasing plasticity of the brain. Research suggests that no more than a quarter of people who still stutter at 10 will completely rid themselves of the affliction as adults” (Hendrickson).

Vice-President Biden largely overcame the repetitious stammering that is widely understood as stuttering. With the help of brief speech therapy and practice, Biden’s stuttering is nowhere near as pronounced, nor as problematic, as that of King George VI. You no doubt have seen the Academy Award Winner, The King’s Speech and the king’s struggles with public speaking. However, Biden still blocks on certain sounds. In The Atlantic article quoted above, Biden describes in detail and models how he prepares for speeches and debates. He writes out key phrases and clauses and uses his own coding system of marks and slashes to indicate accents, pauses, and breaths. When speaking extemporaneously, Biden uses circumlocution (word or phrase substitution) as a coping strategy to switch to more easily pronounced sounds. Often, people notice what appear to be unnatural pauses as Biden searches for alternate words. Occasionally, these substitutions produce forced syntax (the order of words in a sentence) or even gaffes. Obviously, Biden’s stuttering doesn’t explain all of his verbal miscues, but perhaps more can be attributed to this challenge than we think.

For our purposes, Joe Biden’s story can be instructive as we teach and practice reading in the classroom. 

A few points from this M.A. Reading Specialist (yours truly), who of course, loved to read out loud in class:

Why Reading Out Loud is Important

Reading out loud helps developing readers practice their reading skills. Only by practicing reading out loud can students hear and adjust to pitch, vocal variation, accents, and attention to punctuation (Shakthawatt). Additionally, reading research confirms that reading out loud improves automaticity in terms of sounding-out phonetically regular words, blending multi-syllabic words, and recalling sight words (non-phonetic memory words). These skills do transfer to silent reading fluency.

Reading out loud is a necessary social skill. Students need to be prepared for public speaking. Adults will be called upon to read in front of audiences in meetings, business, church, etc. Again, allowing student to practice in advance, as Vice-President Biden does, affords optimal performance and less stigma.

When teachers listen to students reading out loud, the teacher can provide helpful feedback and correction. Obviously, teachers can’t correct a student’s silent reading.

What Kind of Reading Out Loud is Effective

Assessment: 

Most teachers use individual fluency assessments (download a free diagnostic at the end of this article) in which students read out loud for a set time. Teachers record the number of words read during the prescribed time, less the miscues, on a progress monitoring matrix. reading assessments to monitor reading fluency progress are we, but the one student-teacher reading is a controlled experience. Ensuring that the assessment is administered privately, away from the class, will reduce student anxiety and produce more accurate results.

Many teachers use running records to analyze and correct student miscues during guided reading. Suggestion: Rather than pulling aside a student to read individually, why not sit behind or next to the focus student and listen in as all students in the group are reading?

Practice:

Use choral reading fluency practice in which students are grouped by fluency levels. The student reads with others, not to others.

Practice reading with a modeled reader. Online readings at the students’ challenge levels is helpful and improves fluency, including accuracy and speed. Check out my reading intervention program below, which includes 43 YouTube expository articles, read at three different speeds for ideal modeled reading practice.

Repeated readings out loud produces transferable gains to cold, unpracticed reading. One effective technique is for a guided reading group to non-chorally read with six-inch quiet voices (not whispering) short texts over and over again. In other words, students read at individual paces, not in unison with others. To facilitate, the teacher can stagger start times. Students get used to the white noise of others quietly reading, and teachers can listen in to individuals and even take running records.

Paired reading out loud can be beneficial if care is provided to match students, in terms of reading fluency levels, and compatibility.

What Kind of Reading Out Loud is Not Effective

Isolated reading out loud in front of peers is counter-productive, not only for stutterers, but also for below grade level readers, ELL, ESL, ESOL students, special education students, shy students, etc. Traditional methods of isolated reading out loud include the following: round-robin (take turns in a certain order to prevent surprise), popcorn (call on students to intentionally surprise and ensure that they are following along), and guided reading, in which students take turns and the teacher completes running record assessments of the individual readers.

Don’t use individual students to read through a story (even if students volunteer to read). First, calling on individuals to read interrupts the flow of the reading and reduces listening comprehension. Second, why select a non-fluent reader, who will make mistakes, or even the best student reader in class and so ensure less than optimal listening comprehension? Instead, to facilitate optimal listening comprehension and the best modeled reading, the teacher or audio book narrator should read the story out loud with occasional pauses to discuss a passage. To build independence, avoid reading every line of text out loud. 

Don’t practice any individual reading out loud that takes away from the entire class reading out loud. Any form of individual reading in which a student only reads out loud for 30 seconds in a 15 minute read-aloud is not adequate practice.

Not all choral reading practice is ideal. When students, led by the teacher, are expected to read chorally, the teacher is forced to read too-slowly for the fluent readers, just right for some readers, and far too quickly for less fluent readers. Teachers can’t put what belongs in a small group or individual box into a whole class box. Only practice choral reading in the context of level reading fluency groups, in which each student is reading at a certain reading fluency.

Get the The Pets Fluency Assessment FREE Resource:

Intervention Program Science of Reading

The Science of Reading Intervention Program

The Science of Reading Intervention Program: Word Recognition includes explicit, scripted instruction and practice with the 5 Daily Google Slide Activities every reading intervention student needs: 1. Phonemic Awareness and Morphology 2. Blending, Segmenting, and Spelling 3. Sounds and Spellings (including handwriting) 4. Heart Words Practice 5. Sam and Friends Phonics Books (decodables). Plus, digital and printable sound wall cards and speech articulation songs. Print versions are available for all activities. First Half of the Year Program (55 minutes-per-day, 18 weeks)

The Science of Reading Intervention Program: Language Comprehension resources are designed for students who have completed the word recognition program or have demonstrated basic mastery of the alphabetic code and can read with some degree of fluency. The program features the 5 Weekly Language Comprehension Activities: 1. Background Knowledge Mentor Texts 2. Academic Language, Greek and Latin Morphology, Figures of Speech, Connotations, Multiple Meaning Words 3. Syntax in Reading 4. Reading Comprehension Strategies 5. Literacy Knowledge (Narrative and Expository). Second Half of the Year Program (30 minutes-per-day, 18 weeks)

The Science of Reading Intervention Program: Assessment-based Instruction provides diagnostically-based “second chance” instructional resources. The program includes 13 comprehensive assessments and matching instructional resources to fill in the yet-to-be-mastered gaps in phonemic awareness, alphabetic awareness, phonics, fluency (with YouTube modeled readings), Heart Words and Phonics Games, spelling patterns, grammar, usage, and mechanics, syllabication and morphology, executive function shills. Second Half of the Year Program (25 minutes-per-day, 18 weeks)

The Science of Reading Intervention Program BUNDLE  includes all 3 program components for the comprehensive, state-of-the-art (and science) grades 4-adult full-year program. Scripted, easy-to-teach, no prep, no need for time-consuming (albeit valuable) LETRS training or O-G certification… Learn as you teach and get results NOW for your students. Print to speech with plenty of speech to print instructional components.

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Silent Reading Fluency

Speed Reading

Silent Reading Fluency

A bad habit is hard to break, especially when it’s a bad reading habit. However, replacing bad reading habits with good ones can significantly improve silent reading fluency. In other words, you’ll read faster and with better understanding. Check out these four tips to build comprehension.

  1. Improve your reading posture. Your body position affects how well you understand what you read. For good reading posture, sit up straight in a straight-backed chair at a desk or table with good lighting and keep your feet flat on the floor. Place two hands on the reading. Keep the distance from eyes to book about the same distance as that of your forearm. Don’t angle the book too much so that you can keep your head straight.
  2. Improve your concentration. When reading at home, put away your phone, get away from the television and computer, and find a quiet room. Anything competing with full concentration reduces reading reading comprehension. Good reading cannot include multi-tasking. Stop taking mental vacations during your reading. For example, never allow yourself a pause at the end of a page or chapter–read on!
  3. When reading silently, don’t pronounce the words quietly or in your head, and don’t move your lips. These sub-vocalizations interfere with your understanding of the text. Focus on the meaning of the text, not on saying and hearing the words. Some students find that clenching their teeth or reading with a clean pencil in their mouths helps break the lip movement habit.
  4. Establish a rhythm in your silent reading. The reading pace should be hurried, but at a consistent pace. To pace your reading, place your left hand on the left page and the right hand on the right page. Put three fingers together and place your hand under the first line on the page. If right-handed, place your index finger under the first letter of the line. If you are left-handed, place your ring finger under the first letter of the line. Now, slide your hand underneath the first line at a comfortable, but hurried pace while reading the words on the line. When the index (or ring) finger reaches the last letter of the first line, quickly slide the hand back to the first letter of the line and drop down to the second line. Continue to read in the same manner, but slow down your pace when you sense that your comprehension has decreased because of difficult text.

Using the pacing hand prevents re-reading, skipping lines, and daydreaming. Shortening the stroke of the hand across the page, after practice, will also help expand your peripheral vision across the page. This is important because reading research tells us that good readers have fewer eye fixations per line. When the eyes move from fixation to fixation, there is little reading comprehension. So, focus on the center of the page and use your peripheral vision to view words to the left and right as you are reading.

FREE DOWNLOAD TO ASSESS THE QUALITY OF PENNINGTON PUBLISHING RESOURCES: The SCRIP (Summarize, Connect, Re-think, Interpret, and Predict) Comprehension Strategies includes class posters, five lessons to introduce the strategies, and the SCRIP Comprehension Bookmarks.

Get the SCRIP Comprehension Strategies FREE Resource: 

Intervention Program Science of Reading

The Science of Reading Intervention Program

The Science of Reading Intervention Program: Word Recognition includes explicit, scripted instruction and practice with the 5 Daily Google Slide Activities every reading intervention student needs: 1. Phonemic Awareness and Morphology 2. Blending, Segmenting, and Spelling 3. Sounds and Spellings (including handwriting) 4. Heart Words Practice 5. Sam and Friends Phonics Books (decodables). Plus, digital and printable sound wall cards and speech articulation songs. Print versions are available for all activities. First Half of the Year Program (55 minutes-per-day, 18 weeks)

The Science of Reading Intervention Program: Language Comprehension resources are designed for students who have completed the word recognition program or have demonstrated basic mastery of the alphabetic code and can read with some degree of fluency. The program features the 5 Weekly Language Comprehension Activities: 1. Background Knowledge Mentor Texts 2. Academic Language, Greek and Latin Morphology, Figures of Speech, Connotations, Multiple Meaning Words 3. Syntax in Reading 4. Reading Comprehension Strategies 5. Literacy Knowledge (Narrative and Expository). Second Half of the Year Program (30 minutes-per-day, 18 weeks)

The Science of Reading Intervention Program: Assessment-based Instruction provides diagnostically-based “second chance” instructional resources. The program includes 13 comprehensive assessments and matching instructional resources to fill in the yet-to-be-mastered gaps in phonemic awareness, alphabetic awareness, phonics, fluency (with YouTube modeled readings), Heart Words and Phonics Games, spelling patterns, grammar, usage, and mechanics, syllabication and morphology, executive function shills. Second Half of the Year Program (25 minutes-per-day, 18 weeks)

The Science of Reading Intervention Program BUNDLE  includes all 3 program components for the comprehensive, state-of-the-art (and science) grades 4-adult full-year program. Scripted, easy-to-teach, no prep, no need for time-consuming (albeit valuable) LETRS training or O-G certification… Learn as you teach and get results NOW for your students. Print to speech with plenty of speech to print instructional components.

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FREE Phonics Assessments

FREE RtI Phonics Assessments

FREE Phonics Assessments

My free vowel sounds https://blog.penningtonpublishing.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/Vowel-Sounds-Phonics-Assessment.pdf

and consonant blends https://blog.penningtonpublishing.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/Consonant-Sounds-Phonics-Assessment.pdf phonics assessments are comprehensive (not random samples, for example all 6 most common long e sounds-spellings are assessed as separate test items), nonsense syllables/words (to exclude sight word knowledge), and teachable (corresponds to most phonics programs, including Open Court and my own. The 52 vowel and 50 consonant blend test items correspond to most instructional sound-spelling cards). Includes both teacher and student test versions.

Plus, get the audio files (10:42 and 12:07), which include the admin instructions, and recording matrix. I developed this test with the input of dozens of fellow reading specialists years ago in a large Northern California district. We field-tested and revised over the years to ensure reliability. These are assessments that produce teachable data… not assessments that merely indicate “problem areas” for students. In 23 minutes, you will have all the needed data to screen for RtI placement and teach.

Why do I offer these quality assessments as freebies? I know they’ll help your students. Plus, I know you’ll check out my reading intervention program 🙂

*****

Intervention Program Science of Reading

The Science of Reading Intervention Program

The Science of Reading Intervention Program: Word Recognition includes explicit, scripted instruction and practice with the 5 Daily Google Slide Activities every reading intervention student needs: 1. Phonemic Awareness and Morphology 2. Blending, Segmenting, and Spelling 3. Sounds and Spellings (including handwriting) 4. Heart Words Practice 5. Sam and Friends Phonics Books (decodables). Plus, digital and printable sound wall cards and speech articulation songs. Print versions are available for all activities. First Half of the Year Program (55 minutes-per-day, 18 weeks)

The Science of Reading Intervention Program: Language Comprehension resources are designed for students who have completed the word recognition program or have demonstrated basic mastery of the alphabetic code and can read with some degree of fluency. The program features the 5 Weekly Language Comprehension Activities: 1. Background Knowledge Mentor Texts 2. Academic Language, Greek and Latin Morphology, Figures of Speech, Connotations, Multiple Meaning Words 3. Syntax in Reading 4. Reading Comprehension Strategies 5. Literacy Knowledge (Narrative and Expository). Second Half of the Year Program (30 minutes-per-day, 18 weeks)

The Science of Reading Intervention Program: Assessment-based Instruction provides diagnostically-based “second chance” instructional resources. The program includes 13 comprehensive assessments and matching instructional resources to fill in the yet-to-be-mastered gaps in phonemic awareness, alphabetic awareness, phonics, fluency (with YouTube modeled readings), Heart Words and Phonics Games, spelling patterns, grammar, usage, and mechanics, syllabication and morphology, executive function shills. Second Half of the Year Program (25 minutes-per-day, 18 weeks)

The Science of Reading Intervention Program BUNDLE  includes all 3 program components for the comprehensive, state-of-the-art (and science) grades 4-adult full-year program. Scripted, easy-to-teach, no prep, no need for time-consuming (albeit valuable) LETRS training or O-G certification… Learn as you teach and get results NOW for your students. Print to speech with plenty of speech to print instructional components.

The print copies of the Animal Fluency Articles include challenge words in the upper right corner for the teacher to pre-teach. Word counts are provided in the left margin for fluency timings. The YouTube videos of each article include a picture of the animal and a modeled reading, but do not include the challenge words or word counts.

Additionally, the Animal Fluency Articles are available as YouTube videos for individualized fluency instruction. Each article has been recorded at three different reading speeds (Level A at 95-115 words per minute; Level B at 115-135 words per minute; and Level C at 135-155 words per minute) to provide modeled readings at each of your students’ challenge levels. A total of 129 videos!

Get the Pets Fluency Assessment FREE Resource:

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