Teaching Phonics and Word Study

Wiley Blevins' book, Teaching Phonics & Word Study in the Intermediate Grades, is a wonderful reference. The online resources that accompany the text are highly useful- including sample assessment tools, game templates and decoding skill templates. I have two previous posts here and here that I have written as I read this book. As a reference, I will definitely keep this on the shelf. It provides a detailed description of why to teach phonics and how to do it. While it focuses on the intermediate grades, it touches on the earlier grades as it does describe interventions for struggling learners.

Initial phonics instruction begins with understanding letter- sound correspondence. This is the first required step. Then it moves to using analogy to help with decoding words. For example, if a student knows that "cat" says cat, they can be taught that "bat" shares the /-at/ and thus should be read as bat. This is at the primary level with normally progressing readers. As students enter the intermediate grades they become exposed to longer words such as sedentary (bed--> sed, den--> en, Harry--> tary). This can be broken into syllables and known words can be used to help with pronunciation, decoding and ultimately comprehension. The challenges with decoding by analogy is that a) students need well developed phonemic awareness and alphabetic knowledge, b) students need a large sight word vocabulary and c) they need to know the word when they say it so that they can identify it as the correct word. When it comes to struggling readers at the high school level, some students still struggle with phonemic awareness (a small percent but they are there) and some have not mastered the alphabetic principles. Some of my students have very limited sight word vocabularies. They cannot search a big word for small words within them that are similar to words they know. Many of these students have limited vocabularies. If they are unaware of the word, they cannot tell if they have gotten it right because they do not recognize it. Unfortunately a percentage of these kids also have suppressed their curiosity about word knowledge and are not eagerly hoping to learn this newly discovered word. As such, teachers of older struggling readers need to carefully assess where the breakdown in reading occurs and provide remediation there, not in the place determined by a curriculum guide. Blevins clearly understands this concept and emphasizes it in his work.

Blevins identifies several reading intervention programs including Wilson reading, with which I am familiar. Using it as a reference, I looked at how it demonstrates good phonics instruction page number represent where in the Blevins text the component of phonics instruction is discussed.

explicit- The teacher teaches letter names, the sounds each letter stands for and reviews it. teaches blending sounds. provides opportunities to blend unknown words in context (p. 42).

readiness skills- the system always begins with level 1 where alphabetic awareness is assessed and taught so that all letters and their most common sounds are introduced- cards are used to teach and review every day. Oral blending and segmentation are taught- cards are used to teach blending and segmentation as is the motor skill of tapping. Blank cards are used to teach relating sounds to graphemes. (p. 47-9)
scope and sequence- the system is composed of 12 steps ranging from simple CVC words to multisyllabic CVC words, through the other syllable types and it includes both exceptions (ex. English words do not end in v, we add an e to the end of the word) and covers rimes and analogy instruction throughout (ex. early word families of -an and later -tion and -sion) (p. 47).

blending- Wilson uses finger tapping to represent blended sounds and to assist with counting sounds. It uses card manipulation and pointing to demonstrate blending. Blending is taught from the very beginning of the program. (p. 47)

dictation- Each Wilson lesson moves from decoding to encoding. The teaching element of the encoding portion of the lesson includes manipulating cards or magnetic letters or writing on a whiteboard to compose dictated words which are then “scooped” to demonstrate syllabication.  Dictation is one element of this as well. Students must write dictated sounds, words and then sentences. (p. 47)

word awareness- opportunities to play with words and combining word parts. Word sorts and studies are one of the 10 parts of a Wilson lesson. Wilson has students read nonsenses syllables that are later used in words. Word cards are used. They can be read and then various word sorts and games can be engaged in. Students are asked to read and write (or build with cards) words and word parts. Students engage in both reading(decoding) and writing (encoding) with the letter/digraph/morpheme cards (p. 47).

High Frequency words- Wilson has a sight word list to teach and reinforces their use through sentence and passage reading as well as dictation activities. (p. 47)

Reading connected text- Wilson has reading passages that include both high frequency words, words taught at earlier steps and novel words displaying patterns currently being taught. The controlled nature of the text means that students are not expected to read spelling/phonetic patterns they have not been taught. In fact the author of Wilson concurs with Blevins in that readers should not be asked to independently reading material beyond their independent reading level- more complex content and vocabulary can and should be introduced through listening comprehension activities. This helps develop skill in reading in general. (p. 48, 331-2)

Wilson clearly demonstrates the characteristics of a high quality, phonics intervention and is appropriate for students with phonics weaknesses.

One item that Blevins spends some time at the end of his text focusing on is reading high interest text. He quotes studies that say that the average middle schooler reads 1,000,000 words a year while the struggling one reads 10,000; good first grade readers read 1900 words a week whereas struggling readers only read 16 (p. 332). When you think about what the word deficit is, there is no wonder that students who struggle to read often have poor vocabularies. My daughter, who is a voracious high ability reader, was reading close to 10,000,000 words a year in middle school, a level she tries hard to maintain in light of her work schedule and reading light school assignments. Her junior classmates who are struggling readers cannot hope to have her vocabulary or background knowledge. Our students need access to books they are interested in at their reading level. All too often we give students reading material that does not interest them. We need to work hard to find reading material that engages them. Hi-lo publishers and librarians can be immeasurably useful in this activity. Kids need to read and be read to in order to increase their background knowledge and vocabulary. This is critical to improving their reading comprehension. We need them to read. Anything that engages them. Everything that engages them.

Teaching phonics- word study

When I first heard of word study I was uncertain what on earth people were talking about. I gradually created an understanding of word study. Wiley Blevins's book Teaching Phonics & Word Study in the Intermediate Grades includes a quote from Moats (2000) that "word study refers to the process of learning words, including their spelling, meaning, pronunciation, historical origin, and relationship with other words" (p. 241). When reading teachers talk about word study they often do not mean the entire spectrum of features. Mostly they refer to pronunciation and meaning.

Blevins's includes some general guidelines for word study (p. 239-40):

• Introduce or reinforce the concept that words can be made up of several elements- this includes affixes, compound words and roots.
• Be sure your instruction is explicit- Madeline Hunter rears up again. Direct instruction is the most effective and efficient way to deliver instruction. This is not the place for inquiry learning. Teach the elements of word analysis. Teach how to discover the meaning of the words. Teach how to use the word. Learning words may take a bright student only a couple of exposures, but some students with disabilities might need as many as 100 exposures to the word or root. Teach- review- review. For students with disabilities prioritize the word study to the most common and useful elements.
• During instruction, rely more on concrete, known examples rather than abstract rules, principles or definitions.- Teach the relationship between the word's structure and the role in the sentence. Evaporation- includes -tion which means an act or process. Evaporation is the act or process of evaporating. See it. Highlight it. I worked with a teacher who assigned a vocabulary exercise of locating the vocabulary word in the text and define it. If it was a nomination, they were expected to be able to change the definition to the noun form of an act or process of whatever. If it had an -ly ending, they were supposed to know that it was a characteristic of whatever. The problem is that she never taught how the suffixes did this work. A great beginning if the rule had been taught and a resource, like an anchor chart or sheet of how suffixes change words, were available.
• Alert students to the diversity of English words- English comes from many places- mostly Latin, Greek or Anglo-Saxon origins. Latin and Greek roots are combined to form larger words often found in social studies and science. There is overlap and some words are from other sources as well. English has more words than any other language. This makes English very complicated to learn, but since about 60% of English is derived from Latin or Greek, it makes understanding high frequency roots important.
• Be sure students are aware of the limitations of structural analysis- not all word parts are discrete roots- under is not a combination of in- and -der.  
• Apply, apply, apply. They need to practice the activity repeatedly. This is not limited to any grade or subject. It needs to be done across the curriculum and over the entire spectrum of years.

Photosynthesis is a term introduced in elementary school, and reinforced and expanded upon in middle school and high school. Students can learn about the roots- photo means light, synthesis means putting together. These two roots can be used to understand many other words. From a word study standpoint activities like the one below can be completed by small groups to examine the concept. From a phonics standpoint, reading photo- as a unit becomes a method for reading other words with the root more quickly. It becomes like a sight word making the word, and others using the root, easier to read. Engaging in the activities in the boxes allows students to study the word- photosynthesis, but it also allows for learning about related words as well.

What does photo- mean?	What other words do you know with the root photo-? What does each word have to do with light?
How does photosynthesis showcase the meaning of the root?	Describe the process of photosynthesis.

This represents a word study that could be continued as students learn words like photogenic, photon, and phototropism. Knowing that they all have to do with light means it is easier to learn their specific meaning, pronunciation and spelling.

Throughout the section on word study children's books are suggested to demonstrate concepts. Secondary students can benefit from children's books if they are introduced carefully.  Blevins also includes worksheets to use almost as a graphic organizer to complete word studies.

This book is an amazing presentation on how to utilize phonics instruction at the intermediate level. Many of his guidelines are equally valid for older students with disabilities as well. I look forward to the rest of the book.

Vacationing beyond your capability

Years ago my son was in a study and I had to fill out a questionnaire about how he impacted our lives. Initially I said he did not prevent us from doing the things we wanted to do. Then I went home and thought about it. He controls what we do. We craft our existence around him. We do not go out to dinner or entertainment as a family. We rarely have people over. We stick to a routine that is crazy strict and have pushed that on our extended families when they interact. Carefully selecting battles becomes essential.

When you have a child who thrives on consistency and routine, vacations are problematic. By their very nature they are not routine or consistent. We spent many years with our vacation bet being how long it would be before a public meltdown. We have had tantrums in any number of places. The best ones do not involve me holding him so he cannot run off through glass and traffic. The meltdown becomes an expectation. The first time we had a vacation without a meltdown, he was in high school. We celebrated.

As a teacher, this path of being a parent of a child on the spectrum has been eye opening. I have mentioned hating vacations to my peers who look at me like I am crazy. Surely I enjoy the time off and away. No, my circumstances have made it extra work. I spent his entire elementary years planning each vacation day- two activities a day. We had a calendar of events and we stuck to it. Schedules were put together ahead of time and explained. Yes, we did lots of crafts. We spent an hour at the museum and drove home. Sometimes we would return in two days to spend an hour doing the same things again. We went to the grocery store with a behavior plan for behaving appropriately. When he was at school, this was his teacher's job. At home, it is mine.

My husband and I came to the conclusion that our vacation hell was partly our fault. We were vacationing beyond his capability.  It frustrated us that every piece of the vacation had to have a plan for him. I'll take one, he'll take the other kid and we each do something specially chosen for the child. We traded off so that the drain of constantly being on edge and planning for contingencies and managing behavior did not wear too heavy. And so that my daughter had the opportunity to do some of the things she wanted to so. Flying meant trading off- the puker- my daughter gets air sick and has used the air sickness bag and my body several times- or the behavior- entertain for the entire trip with a schedule of activities. We had to plan lots of down time because he needs it. We could not have any outing take more than an hour and a half or there would be hell to pay as he reached his limits.

Many comedians have bits about needing a vacation to recover from vacation. I suspect that is true for all parents. It is especially true for parents of children with ASD. It makes me say that a work day is less work than a weekend or vacation day. As teachers we tend to dismiss, or at least not think too much about, the challenges our parents have with their children. We think everyone must relish vacation. So not true.

Personally we have resolved to pay more attention to him in our vacation planning. That means he does not get to go on every trip we take. He can stay home with his amazing grandparents. (I am, without a doubt, hugely blessed to be have family that gets him. So many families of children on the spectrum do not.) Or one of us can stay home with him. It means when he goes on vacation, we can tailor it to him without feeling cheated. Shorter trips, private space, and informal meals become a must with him.

Walking in my shoes has taught me the wisdom of trying to understand the shoes of other parents.

Phonics

One of my first education classes was a reading class that I hated. One of the things we had to do in order to pass the class was pass a phonics test. We bought a book and were told to know the contents by the next class. If we were lucky (I was not), we had been taught to read through phonics and it should not be too hard. For those of us who learned to read with the see and say method (yes, I am dating myself) we were confused. Those of us who had a hard time distinguishing certain sounds were up the creek without a paddle. I had grown up with a mother who pronounced giraffe with a d on the end. I pronounced garage with one syllable. My pronunciation was not good, my spelling was an inventive feat and my knowledge of phonics was negligible. I barely passed that test because of cramming. I spent the first 15 years of my career being grateful that I taught at the secondary level because I did not have to teach "reading," just comprehension. That education class did me a disservice. If the professor had said, "In three weeks we will have the phonics test that you have to pass in order to pass this class. I will be giving instruction in phonics at 9 am on the next three Tuesdays to people who need help to learn it." I would have been golden. I would have learned phonics. Alas the age of whole language prevented much concentration on systematic phonics instruction and I had to wait to really teach myself phonics when I worked with a young lady who was dyslexic. Then, when I had to learn Wilson Reading, I really learned phonics. The long path got me there, but it could have been much simpler.

I know that I was not alone amongst my colleagues having little knowledge of phonics and how to teach reading. In 1995 a study revealed that only half of the student teachers in reading and special education could successfully answer most of the questions on a 15 question phonics survey (p. 26). I was given a secondary student who needed the skill, so I went out and learned it. Not glorious, not easy, but doable. When I consider how many of our learning disabled students are given teachers with exceedingly weak phonic knowledge, I am not surprised at how poor reading instruction is at the secondary level.

Wiley Blevins' book, Teaching Phonics & Word Study in the Intermediate Grades, begins with a brief overview of phonics. Reading it brought me back to those early college days and how I can now read and learn the details and nuisances of information that I was unable to grasp back then. I think about the instruction we provide in phonics and spelling- they are reciprocal skills- improving one helps the other- and shudder. We need to know more so we can do more. While not a linguist or a phonics expert, I have learned enough to be a little dangerous.

We need to know that while English is a somewhat crazy language, 84% of it conforms to phonics rules (p. 25). The second chapter in his text was a great review and listing of the major rules. I may copy a couple of the charts he provides since he clearly delineates the rules. The best part of the rules is that there are only a few that are important, common and consistent enough to really present to a student. My favorite rule to not teach is "when 2 vowels go walking the first one does the talking." This is true only about 45% of the time. Teaching it is a waste of energy and confuses children. We need to be smart about it all.

We shall see what the rest of the book has in store. ...

Intervention Strategies to follow informal reading inventory assessment

JoAnne Schudt Caldwell and Lauren Leslie wrote Intervention Strategies to Follow Informal Reading Inventory Assessment: So What Do I Do Now and have revised it three times. I have long embraced my nerdhood and this book just confirmed it. I love the content dense, authoritative, detached style, but not everyone will. This is, in many ways a textbook. The online access to their PDToolKit lasts only a year, but if you want you can buy access from you college bookstore through a program associated with used book purchases. For an active practitioner, it offends me that I must download everything from the site in preparation for being locked out.

Many informal reading inventories (IRI) exist. The coauthors are responsible for the Qualitative Reading Inventory-5. I have an IRI from a fluency book by Johns and Berglund (see my notes about it here and here), Reading Rockets compares 8 on their site. Pearson has one available on line here. Fountas and Pinnell have one associated with their LLI; SRA and DRA have ones also. For me, at least, the easy part is administering the IRI. The tricky part is figuring out how to create a learning program that matches the needs of the student. This book is the first comprehensive source that I have found. LLI would have you identify reading level and follow their scripted program from there. DRA is similar. I believe that a scripted program will not meet the individual needs of all students and, as such they need to be adjusted to be in alignment with student needs. Taking a program that you are mandated by your district to implement means crafting a plan that focuses most attention on student need areas. One thing that the authors point out is that although students present different profiles, they can all benefit from an approach that includes attention to word study, comprehension and fluency. They argue that the time devoted to each component fluctuates based on student needs.

The book does primarily focus on elementary students. Although the 3rd edition has additional sections devoted to ELL and adolescent learner so, they are added more as an afterthought than an integrated component of the text. Part of the challenge presented is the limited amount of research available on reading instruction of students older than 13. As someone who has focused on adolescents, I have found more studies of older students, but they tend to be more in the nature of case studies which are of limited applicability.

One of the things that the authors do include is a table of structures for instruction of struggling readers (p. 39-41). This includes guidelines for format, grade and time. In this era of RTI where interventions need to be evidence based, this is a resource that could be heavily relied upon. Should a parent look for evidence to support the use of a particular intervention approach, this chart could be consulted. Similarly the appendix is a summary of intervention strategies presented in the book with breakdowns of recommendations for ELLs, adolescents and RTI. When creating interventions, this is also a useful chart. That being said, districts that implement one RTI approach for all students (for example READ 180) regardless of the student challenge profile could benefit from a more customizable approach. RTI programs are supposed to provide intervention in the specific area of need, not reading in general, decoding for all (ex. Wilson Reading), or comprehension for all (LLI).

I know that this book will become a well-thumbed reference guide to inform and defend my instructional practice.

The Common Core Coaching Book

Laurie Elish-Piper and Susan K. L'Allier's book, The Common Core Coaching Book: Strategies to Help Address the K-5 ELA Standards, was a book I picked up in the fall. I found the first part difficult to get through. The writing style did not engage me so I put it down and spent most of my professional reading time devoted to professional journals instead. I picked it back up recently and reached the second and subsequent parts of the book which seemed more valuable.

The book, originally published in 2014, in large part discusses adoption and implementation of the CCSS. While the standads are being overturned in many states, they are being replaced by new standards for which the guidelines of working with a "new" set of standards are relevant. Interestingly, the authors do not address the idea that the standards are not universally adopted or accepted or that current political maneuverings have them being revised, rejected and replaced in many states. Further there are only limited references to specific standards so the book is a good resource for phasing in any new standard.

The book is arranged in five parts. The introduction on coaching around the Common Core, large group coaching strategies, small group coaching strategies, individual coaching strategies and a wrap it all together portion. The strategies have excellent templates, both blank for use and completed examples drawing upon vignettes embedded within the text. This format makes the book a useful resource for people looking at how to take off in the world of coaching.

Of particular note were a few items. One was a reference to Cathy Toll's (2005) "the question:... When you think about the reading and writing you want your students to do and the kind of teaching you want to do, what gets in the way?" I like the way this question frames the concept of coaching. It opens the door to discussion, eliminates the blame game and gets at the heart of the matter. It provides an entry point for coaching and professional development and a focus for collaborative work. I need to search out this work and learn more...

Another place that hit home for me was the author's comments about large group professional development: it provides "opportunities to build a sense of community within a school wherein teachers take collective responsibility for the learning of their students" (p. 76). They outlined effective practice means theat there is a "relevant needs-based focus, careful preparation, active engagement of all participants, and a plan for moving the work from one session forward: (p.76). Using these guidelines, I have participated in both effective and ineffective sessions. Team building activites for the sake of team building does not qualify. In my personal department, we have a faculty serving a very diverse group: preK to super seniors, students in highly competive private schools- students whose disabilities-cognitive, mental health and physical- are so significant they have home instruction, students working in public school programs to private programs to those in homes or public libraries, schools using CCSS to those who do not. It makes identification of relevant needs based focuses challenging. I almost think that we should frequently get together and then break apart into groups based on our target audience and participate in meetings based on personal need. The target audience of the book is far more narrow a group, which makes the concept of providing faculty meeting based PD far easier.

Lastly the part that rang true was when they commented about the time commitment required for an individual coaching experience. Co-planning, co-teaching and debriefing take a serious time set aside.They acknowledge this. Interestingly, in the special ed world, coteaching and inclusion programs rarely have adequate time set aside for the development of truly effective interventions. Consequently it is no surprise to me that coteaching is often the least effective intervention. If you are not going to give both people the time to do the job, it will not be what people imagine as helping students to be successful in the mainstream.

What a child doesn't learn

The most recent Parenting for High Potential- December 2016- includes an article "What a Child Doesn't Learn..." by Dr. Tracy F. Inman that briefly discusses some concerns that I have had about not addressing my child's educational needs. The soft skills that she lists include:

• work ethic
• responsibility
• coping with failure
• self-worth from accomplishment
• study skills,
• decision making and problem-solving skills
• sacrifice.

When I was in high school, I managed to acquire A's with little effort. I paid attention in class quickly completed my homework- only rarely actually reading the assigned readings from textbooks. I had to learn how to learn from reading when was in college. I had a midafternoon class that consistently put me to sleep. I began to read to the book in order to learn the material. When I managed to do , the work became especially easy. I put more time into that class all my other classes combined, and yet it still only amounted to about two hours per week. I am not gifted.

My daughter does not need to put in the effort I did to achieve the A's. Fortunately she has a work ethic from home- she does work that she does not need to do in order to achieve competence. She learned responsibility, decision-making and problem-solving from home and Science Olympiads. Classwork was not involved. In elementary school I would lie about studying because studying without does not teach skills- it wastes time. I do not worry about in high school. She has not ever studied for a final exam or AP exam. I do not know that her undergraduate program will require any study skills for her, but somewhere along the way, she will have to harness discipline and learn something  her own.

Sacrifice and self worth from accomplishment. These are tough ones. Now that she is working 23+ hours a week on top of school she has had to sacrifice some of her reading time, but it is pretty much unrelated to school. As the author points out, it is hard to really feel good about something you achieve without effort.

These soft skills are the skills that will be essential as our children grow up. Without giving our gifted children a chance to develop them, we condemn some to crash and burn when they encounter the challenges of adult life. We need to push our schools to find ways to push our children to learn these skills or at least to offer opportunities to  them. Things like clubs can help- if they are well coached. Parents need to find ways to help develop these skills in spite of school's ease. The CTY program at Hopkins certainly helped, but that level challenge was not available until middle school. We need to find challenge before then. It might mean acceleration beyond grade level while in elementary class. It might mean differentiation in which students are allowed to deeply pursue passions that may seem too old for. The move toward whole group instruction in math and ELA can be devastating to these bright young minds. Let's see what we can do for them.