What is the Real Score in Reading?: An Introduction to

Explicit and Systematic Phonics

"For to everyone who has, more shall be given, and he will have an abundance; but from the one who does not have, even what he does have shall be taken away.”

-Matthew 25:29

The Matthew Effect

Early success in acquiring reading skills usually leads to later successes in reading as the learner grows, while failing to learn to read before the third or fourth year of schooling may be indicative of life-long problems in learning new skills.

Some Important Things You Should Know About Literacy

According to UNESCO, one-fifth of the world’s adult population can not make informed decisions because of their lack of literacy skills.

According to former Undersecretary Juan Miguel Luz, “We are graduating people who learn less and less.”

What is Reading?

Reading is acquiring meaning from written texts.Reading is a paradox because it looks so simple, yet, it is so difficult to learn.

READING IS CRITICAL“Reading and literacy skills are some of the most important skills a child with learning disabilities and other reading difficulties can master during the early years of schooling, because reading skills are the basis for subsequent mastery of almost every subject area.” -William N. Bender and Elizabeth J. Larkin

EARLY LITERACY RESEARCH

• Reading is not natural (Moats, 1999).

• Reading is a cultural invention (Pinker, 2004).

• Failure in one’s ability to read results in unpleasant experiences for children with reading difficulties and it hinders academic achievement (Stanovich,1994).

• Exposure to print is a good predictor of general knowledge skills (Stanovich and Cunningham, 1998)

WHAT SHOULD BE DONE?

• Instruction should be based on explicit and systematic phonics (National Reading Panel, 2000)

• Young readers need phonological instruction in early literacy instruction

• Teaching of reading should be based on evidence-based practices.

The Components of Reading

WHAT SHOULD YOU KEEP IN MIND IN TEACHING READING?

• Reading is complex to learn and complicated to teach.

• A positive attitude in teaching reading is simply not enough.

• In teaching reading, you have to know all the steps and, most importantly, recognize the missteps (Carnine and colleagues, 2010).

WHAT IS SYSTEMATIC AND EXPLICIT INSTRUCTION?

• Systematic entails that lessons are carefully sequenced and planned

• Explicit means that a teacher is telling the children what he or she is trying to teach.

• At present, publishers use the term systematic and explicit phonics the wrong way.

SYSTEMATIC INSTRUCTION

• Systematic instruction has 2 important terms: scope and sequence.

• Scope includes the content of the phonics instruction.

• Sequence defines an order of teaching letter-sound correspondences.

• Lessons are carefully planned and sequenced.

• Systematic is across a period of time.

EXAMPLES• Typical letter sequence taught in

schools: a, b, c, d, e, f, g…..• Carefully sequenced introduction of

letter sounds: a, m, t, s, i, f…..• Letter sounds with great utility are

taught first and similar letters are sequenced far apart to avoid confusion

EXPLICIT INSTRUCTION• Teaching kids directly what they need

to learn.• Instruction is scaffolded to ensure

mastery and success.• Teacher follows a My Turn-Together-

Your Turn model in teaching.• There is provision for error correction

EXAMPLES• My Turn: I will sound out this word:

/s/-/a/-/t/ “sat”.• Together: Sound out this word with

me: /s/-/a/-/t/ “sat”• You Turn: Sound out this word:

/s/-/a/-/t/ “sat”

READING PROGRAM COMPONENTS

• Phonemic Awareness Skills• Phonics and Word Identification• Explicit instruction on reading fluency to

enable kids to read fast and accurately• Explicit strategies on vocabulary and word

analysis.• Explicit and guided instruction on reading

comprehension

HOW DO WE ASSESS?• The DIBELS measures assess the 5 Big Ideas in

early literacy identified by the National Reading Panel:

• Phonemic Awareness • Alphabetic Principle • Accuracy and Fluency • Vocabulary • Comprehension

Phonemic awareness

• Phonemic awareness is the ability to hear, identify, blend, segment and manipulate individual sounds in spoken words.

• Phonemic awareness instruction helps all children improve their reading, including normally developing readers, children at risk for reading difficulties, disabled readers, preschool readers and elementary readers (National Reading Panel, 2000)

• Focus only on blending and segmenting.

PHONICS AND WORD IDENTIFICATION

• Systematic and explicit phonics instruction is most effective for children with learning disabilities when combined with synthetic phonics (National Reading Panel, 2000)

• Systematic synthetic phonics improve spelling abilities of children

VOCABULARY• Children learn meanings of words

indirectly by engaging in conversations, listening to adults and reading on their own.

• Direct instruction is useful alongside natural word learning.

FLUENCY• Guided, repeated oral-reading

procedures that improve reading fluency have a positive impact on word recognition and comprehension

• Fluency can be improved by having students read and reread at a certain number of times or until a certain level of accuracy and speed are reached (National Reading Panel, 2000)

READING COMPREHENSION• Fluency instruction leads to gains in

comprehension. (RRSG, 2002)• Text comprehension can be

improved by instruction that helps readers use specific comprehension strategies (National Reading Panel, 2000)

THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION! ;)