PHONICS & DECODING

Chapter 6

BACKGROUND & RESEARCH By Rachel Jensen

BACKGROUND

*Phonics: how spellings are related to speech sounds (letter-sound relationships)

*Decoding: using your knowledge of phonics to read unknown words; also includes structural analysis, onset and rime, body and coda, and use of sight words

RESEARCH 2 Questions to ask:

1. WHICH phonics skills are important for children to learn?

2. HOW might you teach these skills in your classroom?

A teacher must be a phonics EXPERT in a classroom where students are still learning to read.

syllabication

r-controlledsoft vs. hard sound

CVCVCe

morphemediphthong

onset & rimebody & coda

EXPLICIT & SYSTEMATIC

There is a need for explicit and systematic phonics instruction.

Phonics should be part of a comprehensive reading program; don’t teach it in isolation.

Include the systematic code instruction with the reading of meaningful connected text. writing

vocabulary

comprehension

reading fluency

PHONICS

APPROACHES 5 approaches to phonics instruction:

Synthetic= traditional; children taught to read unknown words by “sounding it out”

Embedded= NOT systematic; teaching phonics along with reading actual text; waiting for “teachable moments”

Analogy-based= using knowledge of word families to identify new words (e.g. knowing the word “might” can help me read the word “light”)

Analytic= starts with a whole word, and has the student analyze part of it; studying previously learned whole words to discover letter-sound relationships

Phonics through Spelling= segmenting spoken words into phonemes, then writing letters that represent those sounds

Modify or combine any of these approaches based on your students’ needs.

PHONICS THEY WILL USE (Teacher’s Book of Lists is an excellent resource!)

Letter Names & Sounds: There are 26 letters, but 44 speech sounds. And they are represented 350 ways!!)

Common Rules Governing Letter Sounds The C Rule The G Rule The CVC Generalization Vowel Digraphs The VCE Final E Generalization The CV Generalization R-Controlled Vowels

Special Consonant RulesSingle ConsonantsConsonant Digraphs Initial Consonant Blends or “Clusters”

Double ConsonantsPH and the /f/ Sound

Special Vowel RulesSchwa /ǝ/DiphthongsY Rules

RESEARCH CONTINUED By Marilyn Barrett

RESEARCH ON OTHER DECODING SKILLS Syllabication (segmenting words into syllables)

Onset & Rime: “Word Families”

Body & Coda body= onset plus vowel coda = all sounds following the vowel in a syllable

RESEARCH ON OTHER DECODING SKILLS

Structural Analysis (studying the meanings of word parts) *free morpheme= words or word parts, also known as “root words.” *bound morpheme= must be attached to a root word to carry meaning (prefixes & suffixes)

Sight Words high frequency vocabulary words; best learned through memorization (more in chapter 8)

SCOPE & SEQUENCEpg. 170

ENGLISH LEARNERS (EL)

Phonics instruction is CRITICAL to English learners!

Keep in mind that the basic differences between English and Spanish languages may cause problems in the learning of phonics.

e.g. the letter “e” in Spanish has a long /ā/ sound, as with “eight.”

TEACHING STRATEGIES Ten Things to Do:

1. Sequence your instruction.

2. Be very direct (explicit AND implicit) in your instruction.

3. Have daily lessons and review sessions.

4. Focus on ONE skill at a time.

5. Keep lessons brief.

6. When practicing a new phonics skill, use easy reading materials.

7. Help kids become “wordsmiths.”

8. Adjust the pace of instruction to meet the individual needs of students.

9. Link phonics instruction to spelling.

10.Make clear what you want kids to do.

TEACHING STRATEGIES

What NOT to do!1. Avoid round-robin teaching.

2. Try not to direct students too quickly.

3. Avoid drill-and-kill teaching.

ASSESSMENT OPTIONS By Karen Nelson

PHONICS ASSESSMENT OPTIONS…

Nonsense Word Fluency

Early Names Test

Core Phonics Survey

Starpoint Phonics Assessment (including Analyzing the Miscues)

Running Records

Words Their Way

Sight Word Assessments

NONSENSE WORD FLUENCY

EARLY NAMES TEST

CORE PHONICS SURVEY (PHONICS PORTION)

INTERVENTION OPTIONS By Shellie Rush

PHONICS INTERVENTION OPTIONS…

Phonics Fish Card Game

Tongue Twisters

Creating Nonsense Words

Explicit Phonics Instruction

Letter-Sound Cards

Spelling in Parts

Sound Swirl

“Button” Sounds

Stomping, Clapping, Tapping, and Snapping Sounds

Making Words

Wide Reading

Word Boxes

Word Detective

PHONICS FISH CARD GAME

TONGUE TWISTERS

I thought a thought But the thought I thought Wasn’t the thought I thought I thought!

CREATING NONSENSE WORDS

Example using the –ish word family:

One fish, two fish,Red fish, blue fish.

One kish, two kish,Red kish, blue kish.

OTHER IMPLICATIONS / RESOURCESwww.MrsJensen.comSight Word activitiesFluency Graph options for keeping track of progress