Best practice in literacy instruction

Teachers’ decision to use a particular literacy grouping strategy in order to reduce classroom problems must be made with full appreciation of the potential social, instructional, psychological, and moral outcomes of such a choice on children, not based solely on reducing management complexity.

Reutzel (2014) in his research “Organizing Effective Literacy Instruction Differentiating Instruction to Meet Student Needs” noted a practical model for teachers is, to begin with, a simple, limited, and manageable small-group instructional plan. A simple small-group instructional model may then be steadily enlarged toward modifying complexity and making use of a wider range of instructional differentiation strategies, including:

  • Intensive

  • Extensive student progress monitoring assessments

  • Teacher-guided instruction to meet individual differences

Different literacy instruction expresses two moral imperatives:

  1. Teachers need to recognize that the process of becoming literate follows a developmental path from the simple to the complex, from the

        1. Concrete to the symbolic,

        2. Unconventional to the conventional,

        3. Cradle to the grave.

  2. Some schools tend to create a “one size fits all” curriculum, which when fully implemented will not meet the needs of all children (Raphael et al., 2003; Tyner, 2009).

Children depending on their level of literacy development, need daily, sustained, and high-quality literacy instruction according to the following essential elements of literacy instruction:

1- Oral language

2- Concepts about print

3- Phonological and phonemic awareness

4- Alphabetic principle to include letter names and sounds and phonics

5- Fluency

6- Vocabulary

7- Comprehension strategies

8- Writing and spelling

Current research also strongly suggests that these essential elements of reading and writing need to be taught explicitly.

Small-group differentiated reading instruction plays out in a five-part lesson structure:

1- Rereading: repeated reading of a familiar book or selection;

2- Word bank: sight word and vocabulary word work;

3- Word study: spelling and decoding work;

4- Writing: including interactive and dictation writing;

5- New read—applying previously instructed concepts, skills, and strategies in an unfamiliar book.

Concept-Oriented Reading Instruction: Learning from Information Books:

1- Observe and personalize.

  • Hands-on experience

  • Relate hands-on experience to prior experiences

  • Teacher-led discussion

  • Form theories

  • Generate questions for further study

2- Search and Retrieve.

Teacher introduces search strategies for finding answers to their questions

  • Goal setting (what they want to learn)

  • Categorizing (learning how information is organized and presented in books and how to find information in the library or on the Internet)

  • Extracting (taking notes, summarizing, and paraphrasing information)

  • Abstracting (forming generalizations)

3- Comprehend and integrate

Teacher modeling and students’ discussions about

  • Comprehension monitoring (metacognition)

  • Developing images or graphics

  • Rereading to clarify

  • Modifying reading rate to match the purpose and varying text types

  • Identification of central ideas and supporting details

4- Communication

Communication of new knowledge through such media as

  • Debates

  • Discussions

  • Written reports

  • Technology (e.g., PowerPoint presentations)

  • Poetry

  • Dramas

  • Raps or songs

  • Graphic illustrations

Concept-Oriented Reading Instruction, (Camille Bent, 2014)

Reading process & guidance

Reading process in guided reading, (Devoogd, 2022)

Susan Nolan teaches an Orton Gillingham lesson with a dyslexic child. (AlexEverettmedia, 2013)