Phonological Awareness is the primary building block for reading instruction. It teaches students our alphabet system and trains their brains to understand various sounds. Before students will be successful readers, they need to be able to manipulate phonemes in the following ways:
identity - recognizing sounds
isolation - identifying a single sound in a word
categorization - recognizing sounds that are the same
blending - putting sounds together
segmentation - breaking up a word into sounds
deletion - removing a sound from a word
Phonics is the relationship between phonemes and graphemes. Instruction of phonics should happen alongside the instruction of phonological awareness. Educators must help students create permanent neural models of words by providing quality instruction. For students to read and write independently, phonics instruction should include the following methods:
explicit instruction: the teacher models the desired skill and gives clear explanations
systematic: letter-sound combinations are taught in a specific, logical order which build in complexity
assessment for differentiation: students need to master basic letter-sound combinations before complex combinations are introduced
comprehensive: instruction should integrate reading practice for students to build fluency and comprehension
Fluency supports comprehension because it is the act of reading accurately and with appropriate expression. When students are proficient in decoding words, meaning they already have neural models of many words, they can begin to focus on fluency. Educators can support fluency with the following methods:
repeated reading: students should read familiar texts
reading out loud: students can practice expression by reading out loud
listening to reading: educators should model fluent reading
appropriate reading level: students should read texts that they can decode independently when focusing on fluency
Vocabulary, as we know is related to semantics, syntax and pragmatics. "The anterior temporal lobe is primarily responsible for basic semantic composition" Friederici, pg. 60, 2017). Students need to be able to understand words within their context, and have strategies for learning the meaning of new words. Words can be taught and learned both incidentally and intentionally. According to the CORE reading program, about 10 new words can be directly taught per week. To help students achieve a strong vocabulary, the following methods should be included in the instruction:
intentional teaching: explicit instruction of targeted words
reading: exposes students to a wide variety of words
word consciousness: including word-play and understanding the origins of words
word-learning strategies: explicitly teach strategies for learning new words
Comprehension may be the most complicated component of reading because it combines all of the other elements. Moreover, the brain is firing more neurons to make comprehension possible. Fiber tracks connect the frontal and temporal cortices through dorsal and ventral pathways to deliver information to various parts of the brain. The right hemisphere is also at work to comprehend by processing prosody, like questions vs. statements (Friederici, 2017). The whole process is further complicated by the idea that good readers use metacognitive strategies for comprehension. That being said, strategies vary from student to student, but the following methods can be used to support reading comprehension:
monitoring comprehension: checking to ensure readers comprehend what they read
graphic organizers: give a visual representation of comprehension
answering questions: helps students actively comprehend and monitor comprehension
generating questions: encourages active comprehension and will support students with independent comprehension
story structure: another way to visually comprehend or organize information
summarize: activates other pathways within the brain to deepen understanding