What’s the best way to organize your decodables? There are many different ways to go about this. Here, K-5 reading specialist, Savannah Campbell, shares some helpful tips and tricks to make your classroom library user friendly. Now that you have decodables, how do you organize them? I’m lucky to live in a district that…
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I’m a reading girl, but let’s talk math. If you were teaching long division to your students, what does that practice look like? Are you giving children 2 division, 4 multiplication, 18 addition, and 2 simplifying fraction problems (even though they’ve never seen them) for a challenge? Of course you aren’t! In math, ample amounts…
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So often in the past, I have had parents sit in my reading tuition lessons observe their child, a struggling reader, learn to read. With a structured phonics program and decodable books that support it, the child begins to decode words independently. At first it is laborious and some children may need a great deal…
Read MoreAs conversations about effective literacy instruction continue in schools and on social media, questions about the definition, use, and purpose of decodable texts inevitably arise. I’ve even heard these books described as a “battleground.” I recently watched a presentation on literacy to the school committee in a local district, where phonics teaching is currently layered…
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As summer vacation draws to a close and thoughts turn to the coming school year, you may be interested in a unique (and free) opportunity for professional development. Reading researcher Mark Seidenberg, author of Language at the Speed of Sight, and Molly Farry-Thorn, a postdoctoral research associate at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, have been…
Read MoreThe news has been spreading that Lucy Calkins, head of the Teachers College Reading and Writing Project (TCRWP), has been learning about the Science of Reading and making changes to her guidance and widely used curricula. Throughout her career, she has often characterized phonics as ‘low-level’ work that should be minimized and has promoted top-down…
Read MoreMost teachers approach teaching in a child-centered way so dictation goes against the grain. It may seem old-fashioned and yes, a bit dictatorial. But actually, it is a really powerful tool which is particularly useful for struggling or emerging readers and spellers. What more, kids enjoy it because it consolidates their learning and they experience…
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