Phonics Instruction

In this section, I explore the topic of phonics instruction, along with some instructional approaches for fluency. The focus here is how to support students who reach high school and have not mastered sound-symbol correspondence and/or have significant difficulty decoding multi-syllabic words. Many educators, myself included, believe that phonics instruction at a high school level should be used only when educators are absolutely certain it is necessary and only for as long as necessary. But if it is necessary, receiving this knowledge and practice is essential and life-changing for students. The challenge of providing high school students instruction that is typically given at a kindergarten to second grade level and is respectful, engaging and contextualized is quite difficult.

I turn to four educators who are approaching instruction of foundational skills for secondary students in innovative ways. The educators I highlight work in teams and collaborate extensively. Two of the teachers team teach, and the other two teach smaller classes on their own with a similar approach. Collaboration is key to their success. Pictured below are Elizabeth Guli and Alissa Talesnick, co-teachers who have graciously shared their innovative work in this section of the website.

Balance Between Skills and Critical Thinking

In discussing phonics instruction, it is important to note that I believe this instruction must be embedded in contexts that involve critical thinking. The Four Resources Model extends to phonics instruction. Pearson, Cervetti and Tilson explain in a chapter in Powerful Learning: What We Know about Teaching for Understanding (2008) that "Sometimes--all too often, in fact --reading instruction seems to be based on a conceptualization of reading as a single line of development from simpler to more complex thinking tasks: first students develop phonemic awareness and concepts about print, then they move into phonics and decoding skills; then, once they have the words right, they can do text-based (or lower-level) comprehension; and finally, once they have the facts straight, they can more on to more interpretive, analytic, or critical stances towards text" (p. 71). Instead, educators can use the Four Resource Model and can consider code breaking as a skill that students develop while they are also making meaning of, analyzing and critiquing text. In RTI and the Adolescent Reader, Brozo points out how difficult it can be to find "the right balance of engaging text experiences and basic skills instruction for adolescents with very low reading skills and serious word recognition difficulties is, as Beers (2003) aptly points out, 'difficult on good days, beyond frustrating on bad days' " (p. 242). Given how challenging it is to teach foundational reading skills to adolescents, it is important to provide teachers with outstanding professional development, support for implementation, and many collaborative opportunities to evaluate and refine their programs as they work to meet the goal of addressing serious reading difficulties in adolescents.

I have included the following in this section:

• a snapshot of a Newcomer SIFE class at San Francisco International

• a description of word sorts in Words Their Way written by Elizabeth Guli at Sequoia High School in Redwood City, California

• strategies for personalizing instruction with phonics created by Alissa Talesnick and Elizabeth Guli at Sequoia High School in Redwood City, California

• some materials for possible use with secondary students using strategies from the Orton Gillingham approach

• brief summary of additional programs