Literacy Lines

Building Vocabulary: Semantic Feature Analysis

It is helpful for students to learn a new word by associating it with other related words. The related words can be words students already know or new words. Semantic feature analysis is an engaging activity that can be used to make associations.

Joan Sedita | April 4, 2024 | 0 Comments

You May Be Right, I May Be Crazy: MTSS and Tier I Instruction

This is a guest re-post of a blog recently written by Stephanie Stollar, founder of Stephanie Stollar Consulting and creator of The Reading Science Academy. Stephanie's message caught our eye -- she shares some important insights about issues related to implementing core literacy instruction for schools using a multi-tiered system of supports framework.

Stephanie Stollar | March 20, 2024 | 1 Comment

Planning Effective Writing Assignments

When you ask students to complete a writing assignment, how often do you receive something back that does not match what you were expecting from your students? Part of the problem is that students may not have enough information about your expectations. Often the directions for a writing task lack specificity.

Joan Sedita | March 5, 2024 | 0 Comments

Teaching with “W” Questions

The "W" questions -- who, what, when, where, why, how -- are small but powerful words that can be used in a number of ways to develop early elementary students' literacy skills, including oral language and discussion skills, reading comprehension, and writing skills.

Joan Sedita | February 5, 2024 | 1 Comment

In Support of Main Idea and Comprehension Strategy Instruction

This post is focused on making the case for explicit instruction of comprehension strategies, including teaching students to identify and state main ideas. The growing awareness of the role of background knowledge in supporting reading comprehension has led some literacy professionals and journalists to proclaim that building background knowledge is the main solution to addressing students’ difficulties with reading comprehension. They posit that once students have learned decoding skills, having solid knowledge on the subject of the text is the key to comprehension; therefore, schools should spend less time on teaching comprehension strategies and more on teaching subjects such as science and social studies. In particular, they often identify teaching of main ideas as an instructional practice that should be abandoned. I disagree; students benefit from a combination of comprehension strategy band background knowledge instruction.

Joan Sedita | January 3, 2024 | 2 Comments

The Writing Rope: Author Q and A

Since the publication of my book The Writing Rope: A Framework for Explicit Writing Instruction in All Subjects in August, 2022, I have been asked to do several interviews for podcasts, webinars, and articles about the book. The book has also led to inquiries about how Keys to Literacy's professional development courses are aligned with The Writing Rope. For this month's blog post, I have collected questions and answers from these interviews.

Joan Sedita | December 5, 2023 | 0 Comments

Teaching With Challenging, High-Quality Text

All students across all grades should be provided access to complex, grade-level texts that offer opportunities to develop academic language (vocabulary and syntactic awareness) and acquire knowledge about the world, both of which contribute to development of reading comprehension. High academic expectations for all students using challenging text is an important way to support students from multiple ethnic, linguistic, and cultural backgrounds.

Joan Sedita | November 2, 2023 | 0 Comments

Motivating & Engaging Adolescents to Read

A significant number of the teacher trainings that Keys to Literacy delivers at schools and districts are focused on teaching reading comprehension, vocabulary, and writing to students in grades 5-12. A common question teachers ask us is, "How can I motivate students to read and stay engaged while they are reading?" This is not surprising given that there is strong evidence that students' motivation and interest in reading school-related texts declines after they move from elementary to middle school, and this is particularly true for students who have difficulty learning to read (Torgesen et al., 2007; Kamil et al., 2008). This post provides information about this topic and suggests instructional practices associated with improved motivation.

Joan Sedita | October 4, 2023 | 0 Comments

Writing Personal Reactions to Narrative Text

The Writing to Read report summarized the findings from a meta-analysis of the research related to how writing supports reading (Graham & Hebert, 2010). One of the key recommendations was to ask students to respond in writing to narrative text (e.g., a story or a biography), such as writing a personal response to narrative material read or writing about a personal experience related to it. The report suggests that this might take the form of a response journal, for which the teacher asks students to write their feelings, reactions, and questions during or after reading a story or other form of narrative text, such as a biography. Personal responses to narrative text help students clarify and organize what they are reading and become aware of their reactions to the text.

Joan Sedita | August 28, 2023 | 0 Comments

The Importance of Teaching Prosody as Part of Reading Fluency

Fluency, along with phonemic awareness, phonics, vocabulary, and comprehension, is one of the five components of reading identified by the National Reading Panel (2000). The panel found compelling evidence that instruction to increase reading fluency is critical to both comprehension and future reading success and ease. Fluency plays a role in helping students become motivated readers. It is the ability to read connected text at varying degrees of complexity accurately, appropriately paced, with logical phrasing and prosodic expression, with little conscious attention to the mechanics of reading. Fluency combines rate, accuracy, automaticity, and oral reading prosody (expression), which taken together facilitate the reader’s construction of meaning. Prosody is the rhythmic and melodic aspects of speech. It is reading with good expression, intonation, including pitch, tone, volume, and emphasis on certain words.

Joan Sedita | July 11, 2023 | 0 Comments

Vocabulary Instruction for English Language Learners

Together with my colleagues at Keys to Literacy, I have recently updated the content in our Key Vocabulary Routine professional development course, including information related to vocabulary instruction for English language learners (ELLs). This quote from Michael Graves sums up an important message for teachers of all grades and subjects: “While most of the assistance we provide for ELLs will not be different in kind from that we provide for English only students, many ELLs will need to be taught more words, will need more powerful instruction, and will need to be given particular help in mastering word-learning strategies. This is also true of other students who enter school with small vocabularies.” (2016, p. 41)

Joan Sedita | June 6, 2023 | 0 Comments

Comprehension Strategy Instruction: Grades K-3

What do we know about effective instruction to support comprehension as young students in primary grades learn to read? The Institute of Education Sciences research guide titled Improving Reading Comprehension Through 3rd Grade (Shanahan et al., 2010) offers the following recommendations based on a meta-analysis of research related to comprehension instruction. This post focuses on the first -- teaching comprehension strategies.

Joan Sedita | May 3, 2023 | 0 Comments

Stages of the Writing Process

Beginning in the 1960's, Hayes and Flower (1980) researched the steps that proficient writers take in order to better understand how to teach writing. They initially developed a model of the writing process with three stages: planning, translating, and reviewing. Over the years, the model was informed by new research and modified to include four stages (Hayes, 1996, 2004): Pre-Writing, Text Production, Revising, Editing. Today, it is accepted practice that students be taught to follow the stages of the writing process when they write.

Joan Sedita | April 5, 2023 | 0 Comments

Beginning Writing: Transcription vs. Composing Skills

Transcription skills include spelling and handwriting, basic skills that are needed to transcribe the words a writer wants to put into writing. For students in upper grades, keyboarding in place of handwriting is also a transcription skill. Once students become automatic and fluent with spelling and handwriting, they can focus their attention on higher level composing. If students do not develop fluency with these skills by grade 3, this will put a constraint on writing development as they move into the later grades. One of the four main recommendations in the Institute of Sciences research guide Teaching Elementary Students to be Effective Writers (Graham et al., 2012) is to teach students to become fluent with transcriptions skills, including teaching young writers how to hold a pencil correctly and form letters fluently and efficiently, and to spell words correctly.

Joan Sedita | March 7, 2023 | 4 Comments

Teaching Text Structure to Support Writing & Comprehension

What is text structure, and why should teachers teach it? Text structure is unique to written language, and awareness of text structure supports both writing and reading comprehension. This post explores the different types of text structure that can be taught explicitly to support writing and reading.

Joan Sedita | February 7, 2023 | 2 Comments

Vocabulary Strategy: Use of Context

An important strategy to help students build their vocabulary is use of context – i.e., using the clues or hints provided in the text that surround an unfamiliar word to help guess the meaning without depending on a dictionary. This can include words, phrases, or sentences that appear before, after, or close to the word. It can also include visuals or headings embedded in the text – basically anything that helps a reader understand the meaning of an unfamiliar word. Expository, non-fiction text tends to offer more context clues than narrative text.

Joan Sedita | January 5, 2023 | 6 Comments

What is DIRECT, SYSTEMATIC and EXPLICIT Instruction?

Direct, explicit, and systematic instruction has been recognized as an essential strategy for teaching reading and writing.

Joan Sedita | December 1, 2022 | 0 Comments

States Revamp Reading Policies and Teacher Training

Sarah Schwartz has written a series of articles for Education Week about reading and writing instruction and the science of reading. Her July, 2022 piece is titled Which States Have Passed 'Science of Reading' Laws? What's in Them? Education Week tracked the 29 states plus Washington, D.C., that have state legislation or policy related to evidence-based reading instruction requirements.

Joan Sedita | November 7, 2022 | 1 Comment

Anxiety, Executive Functions, and Writing

This is a guest post written by Noel Foy, a Keys to Literacy trainer/consultant who specializes in how anxiety and executive functions affect learning. In this post, she addresses how this is related to student writing. Do your students find it challenging to get started on a writing task? Do they have difficulty with stamina, effort and self-regulation or find it hard to remember the directions/steps of an assignment? If so, anxiety and underdeveloped executive function may be interfering with their productivity and motivation.

Joan Sedita | September 22, 2022 | 2 Comments

New Book: The Writing Rope

I am pleased to announce that Brookes Publishing in August published my new book titled The Writing Rope: A Framework for Explicit Writing Instruction in All Subjects. I am also delighted that my friend and colleague, Jan Hasbrouck, wrote the foreword. The book can be ordered at the Brookes website. I wrote about The Writing Rope framework in a 2019 article, and again in a Literacy Lines January 2020 blog post.

Joan Sedita | August 26, 2022 | 2 Comments

Reading Assessment Basics

Reading assessment is essential for supporting effective reading instruction. Reading assessment data provides teachers important information to guide instructional decisions. It also helps guide school leadership as they make reading curriculum decisions. This goal of this blog post is to share basic explanations of key terms related to reading assessments.

Joan Sedita | July 24, 2022 | 6 Comments

Spelling Rules and Generalizations

The focus of this post is on explicit instruction, with examples, of spelling rules and generalizations

Joan Sedita | June 6, 2022 | 0 Comments

Providing Reading Interventions Grades 4-9

A new research guide titled Providing Reading Interventions for Students in Grades 4-9 was released recently from the Institute of Education Sciences that summarizes research-based instructional interventions for older students who struggle with reading. The report was written by a panel of reading researchers and practitioners, chaired by Dr. Sharon Vaughn after reviewing the research related to intervention instruction for older students.

Joan Sedita | May 5, 2022 | 0 Comments

The Mighty Paragraph

Sentences and paragraphs are the building blocks of writing. One by one, sentences combine ideas to make meaning. Sentences related to the same main idea are grouped into a paragraph. Then, one by one, paragraphs combine to become text. In 2020, I devoted two posts to sharing suggestions for developing sentence writing skills (see Part 1 and Part 2). This post will focus on paragraph structure.

Joan Sedita | April 5, 2022 | 1 Comment

Teaching Handwriting

A few years ago I developed The Writing Rope as a framework to organize the writing skills that are woven into skilled writing. One of the components is transcription skills, which includes spelling and handwriting. When students develop fluent handwriting skills, they can focus their attention on composing. Difficulty with handwriting can have negative consequences for later writing ability. Teaching handwriting should be an essential part of a writing curriculum.

Joan Sedita | March 1, 2022 | 8 Comments

Vocabulary: Templates for Teaching Words In-Depth

This post features two scaffolds that can be used to teach specific words: the Frayer and the Two-Column templates. Effective vocabulary instruction should combine direct and indirect approaches to developing students' vocabularies. Direct methods of vocabulary instruction include teaching strategies for learning new words such as analyzing word parts and using the context to determine the meaning of unfamiliar words. It also includes providing in-depth instruction for specific words. Research has shown that direct instruction of at least 400 words per year produces gains in vocabulary and comprehension (Beck et al., 2002; Biemiller, 2004). The Common Core State Standards (and similar state-specific standards) call for students to "acquire and use accurately a range of general academic and domain-specific words and phrases" (Language anchor standard #6).

Joan Sedita | February 3, 2022 | 0 Comments

Culturally Responsive Literacy Instruction

Culturally Responsive Teaching is a pedagogy that recognizes the importance of meeting students where they are culturally and linguistically. It puts students at the center of instruction that validates and affirms students' identities and gives students from historically marginalized communities an equitable education experience. When culturally responsive educators validate and affirm students and bring them where they need to be academically, students are more likely to feel recognized, valued for their contributions, and eager to learn. (Hollie, 2017)

Joan Sedita | January 5, 2022 | 2 Comments

The Not So Simple View of Writing

Recently, I've been receiving questions about The Writing Rope framework for writing instruction that I developed in 2019, which is also part of the title of a new book that will be published in the summer of 2022. (Click here to read a related blog post). Some of those questions go something like this: "Is there also a Simple View of Writing?" in reference to Gough and Tunmer's 1986 reading model The Simple View of Reading. So I decided to focus this post on a model that started out as The Simple View of Writing (Berninger et al., 2002) but was then expanded to The Not So Simple View of Writing (Berninger & Winn, 2006).

Joan Sedita | December 2, 2021 | 1 Comment

What is advanced word study?

Keys to Literacy recently launched its newest professional development program: Advanced Word Study - Grade 4 and Beyond. Sometimes referred to as advanced phonics, instruction for advanced word study teaches students how to read and spell multi-syllable words by using a combination of word analysis that focuses on syllables, and structural analysis that focuses on meaningful units (morphemes - roots, prefixes, suffixes). Learning how to focus on morphemes also helps students determine the meaning of an unfamiliar word.

Joan Sedita | November 2, 2021 | 2 Comments

The Science of Reading Comprehension

The term Science of Reading has been the focus of attention for several years (see my January, 2020 post). The term refers to the research that reading experts, especially cognitive scientists, have conducted on how we learn to read. This body of knowledge, over twenty years in the making, has helped debunk older methods of reading instruction that were based on tradition and observation, not evidence. Much of the discourse around instruction based on the Science of Reading tends to focus on the importance of explicit instruction for phonemic awareness, phonics and fluency. But what does the research tell us about effective instruction for comprehension?

Joan Sedita | October 3, 2021 | 1 Comment

Word Walls, Sounds Walls: What’s the difference?

A hot topic in the field of beginning reading instruction these days is the use of classroom "walls." Word walls, sound walls, spelling walls, morphology walls - so many different kinds of walls! Understanding the difference among these options, and the different purposes for using them can be confusing. To help clear up some of this confusion, here are some brief descriptions and examples of different types of walls:

Joan Sedita | September 1, 2021 | 2 Comments

Teaching the Schwa Sound in Unaccented Syllables

Schwa is one of those phonics concepts that can be really confusing to students as they learn to decode longer, multi-syllable words. The schwa sound is the most common vowel sound in the English language, accounting for 20% of all vowel sounds (Yule, 1996), and it often is the cause of spelling mistakes. The schwa sound is formed with a neutral mouth position, and it replaces a vowel sound in the unaccented syllables of multi-syllable words. It is sometimes called the “lazy” vowel.

Joan Sedita | July 28, 2021 | 4 Comments

Pre-K Literacy Instruction

Keys to Literacy recently introduced a new professional development program titled Keys to Emergent Literacy for Pre-K educators which caused me to review resources related to preschool literacy instruction. A short piece in Psychology Today titled "5 Science-Based Tips for Promoting Literacy in Preschool" (Gentry, 2020) reminded me of the importance of providing developmentally appropriate and research-based literacy instruction to preschoolers.

Joan Sedita | June 3, 2021 | 0 Comments

What is Structured Literacy instruction?

Keys to Literacy recently launched our new "Understanding Dyslexia" online course, and one of the major topics in the course is the importance of using a structured literacy approach to teaching reading to students with dyslexia. Structured literacy is a comprehensive approach to literacy instruction that research shows is effective for all students and essential for students who have difficulty with reading. This approach addresses all the foundational elements that are critical for reading comprehension. It is characterized by the provision of systematic, explicit instruction that integrates listening, speaking, reading, and writing. It includes instruction for multiple levels of language.

Joan Sedita | May 5, 2021 | 0 Comments

Reading Intervention for Older Struggling Students

In the last few months I have seen a growing interest in adolescent literacy. This includes content literacy instruction for all students that is integrated across subject areas, as well as intervention instruction for older students who struggle with reading and writing. Between 2005 and 2015, a number of adolescent literacy research reports were published based on meta-analyses of research on effective practices for teaching reading and writing to older students, and the website AdLit.org was also launched (see the reference list).

Joan Sedita | April 8, 2021 | 6 Comments

Phoneme & Letter-Sound Ladders

One of the most well-established findings in beginning reading research is the relationship between phonemic awareness and reading acquisition. Phonics is the system by which symbols (i.e., letters, also called graphemes) represent sounds (i.e., phonemes) in an alphabetic system like English. Some sounds are represented by just a single letter (e.g., b for /b/ as in tub) while some sounds are represented by two or more letters (e.g., bb for /b/ as in rubber). In order to learn this phonics system where "print maps to speech" students rely on their phonemic awareness ability to isolate, blend and segment sounds as they learn which letters/graphemes represent those speech sounds. This is why, of all the phonological awareness tasks, phonemic awareness is most closely associated with phonics and learning to read. One activity that can support both phonemic awareness and learning letter-sound correspondences is Word Ladders, sometimes called Word Chains.

Joan Sedita | March 3, 2021 | 3 Comments

What is adolescent literacy?

Ever since the report of the National Reading Panel in 2000, significant emphasis has been placed on research-based practices for teaching reading in the elementary grades. Early literacy achievement, however, is not necessarily a guarantee that literacy skills will continue to grow as students move beyond grade 3. Scores at the secondary level, where there has been relatively little investment by school districts or states, have remained flat. A growing body of research has developed about what students beyond grade 3 need in order to keep growing their reading and writing skills, why some struggle, and what effective instruction looks like, beginning with two seminal research reports: Reading Next (2004) and Writing Next (2007).

Joan Sedita | January 13, 2021 | 0 Comments

High Frequency Sight Words

Educators sometimes confuse the following related terms: sight words, high frequency words, decodable words, irregular words. Sight words are words that are instantly recognized and identified without conscious effort. High frequency words are the words most commonly used in the English language. Because high frequency words are essential to learning how to read, teachers should begin to teach some high frequency words as sight words to children in primary grades at the same time children are being taught how to use phonics to decode words. Teachers introduce these words as soon as kindergarten if their students are ready.

Joan Sedita | January 5, 2021 | 8 Comments

Semantic Mapping to Grow Vocabulary

Knowledge helps you remember new information, and people who know a great deal about a topic also know its vocabulary. One critical finding from research is that word learning takes place most efficiently when the reader or listener already understands the context well. In fact, we learn words up to four times faster in a familiar context than in an unfamiliar one (Landauer & Dumais, 1997; Hirsch, 2006). Vocabulary instruction that compares and contrasts word meanings and that activates prior knowledge not only helps students learn new words, but also has been shown to improve comprehension of a reading selection (Graves, 2006). Therefore, an important goal of instruction in any subject grade, in any grade, should be to help students acquire the vocabulary associated with the content and to make connections between known and unknown words.

Joan Sedita | December 3, 2020 | 2 Comments

Teaching Literacy Skills Virtually

During this unprecedented 2020 to 2021 school year educators, students and parents across the country are struggling to adjust to ever-changing instructional models that combine in-person teaching, virtual online instruction, and asynchronous online learning. The numbers of students prior to the pandemic who had difficulty developing grade-level reading and writing skills was already too high, and the disruption to teaching and learning will only make things worse. Reading and writing skills are the foundation of all learning, so we must do the best we can to teach students of all grades the literacy skills they will need to be able to access the content in all subjects that they are missing because of the Covid-19 pandemic. I have met and heard about so many dedicated literacy educators and organizations who are meeting the challenge by developing resources to teach literacy skills virtually. This month's post will focus on resources for teaching reading and writing virtually.

Joan Sedita | November 3, 2020 | 1 Comment

Understanding Dyslexia

October is Dyslexia Awareness Month, so I decided to focus this post on providing information and resources related to teaching reading to students with dyslexia. I first learned about dyslexia at the start of my teaching career in the mid-1970's when I started teaching at the Landmark School in Massachusetts. At that time, Landmark was a pioneer in the field of learning disabilities and dyslexia, serving over 400 students of all ages each year. The first thing I learned is that even though dyslexia poses challenges to students, it can also be seen a gift. I say this because, while it may be difficult for many dyslexics to learn to read and write, the same neurobiological factors that cause dyslexia also cause many dyslexics to be extraordinarily bright and gifted in many other areas.

Joan Sedita | October 6, 2020 | 2 Comments

What are Cohesive Devices and how do they affect comprehension?

I was recently developing some PowerPoints and activities for a comprehension training session about the role that text structure plays in reading comprehension. One of the related topics that is unfamiliar to many teachers was Cohesive Devices (sometimes called Cohesive Ties, and also known as anaphors). I thought I'd devote this post to explaining cohesive ties and how they might affect reading comprehension, especially for younger students or English language learners.

Joan Sedita | August 19, 2020 | 17 Comments

The Power of Transition Words

What are transition words and phrases? Sometimes called linking words, transitions connect sentences, paragraphs and sections of text. They also allow us to connect ideas when we speak. Instruction about transitions supports student reading and writing. When students are aware of transitions while reading, they provide powerful clues to support comprehension. When students include transitions when writing, the message and ideas they want to convey are clear and organized.

Joan Sedita | August 5, 2020 | 1 Comment

Syntactic Awareness: Teaching Sentence Structure Part 2

I posted part 1 of Syntactic Awareness on June 2. As noted in that post, the ability to understand at the sentence level is in many ways the foundation for being able to comprehend text. The ways in which authors express their ideas through sentences greatly affects a reader’s ability to access and identify those ideas. Sentences that are complex, contain a large number of ideas (also called propositions), or have unusual word order will make it difficulty for students to comprehend what they are reading, especially students who enter school with limited oral language exposure or for whom English is a second language. Developing sentence skills is also essential to becoming a good writer.

Joan Sedita | July 7, 2020 | 4 Comments

Literacy and Equity in Education

Having solid reading and writing skills is at the heart of student achievement and therefore must be part of the solution to achieving greater equity in the United States. As Suzanne Carreker points out, "With literacy comes academic success, informed decision-making, improved self-esteem, personal empowerment, greater economic opportunities, and active participation in local and global social communities. Ultimately, it is the gateway to lifelong learning... Without equity in literacy education, achievement gaps will persist and too many students will not reap literacy's innumerable benefits." Unfortunately, too many students do not have access to quality literacy instruction. As the recent publication of the AFT's American Educator devoted to reading instruction notes, "Today, about 20 percent of elementary students across the country struggle with learning to read, and another 20 percent are not meeting grade-level expectations in reading. But these nationwide averages mask a tragedy: among students growing up in under-resourced communities -- mainly African American and Hispanic students and students whose home language is not English -- about 60 to 70 percent have weak reading skills." (p. 3)

Joan Sedita | June 12, 2020 | 11 Comments

Syntactic Awareness: Teaching Sentence Structure (Part 1)

The ability to understand at the sentence level is in many ways the foundation for being able to comprehend text. The ways in which authors express their ideas through sentences greatly affects a reader's ability to access and identify those ideas. Sentences that are complex, contain a large number of ideas (also called propositions), or have unusual word order will make it difficulty for students to comprehend what they are reading, especially students who enter school with limited oral language exposure or for whom English is a second language.

Joan Sedita | June 2, 2020 | 5 Comments

The Role of Orthographic Mapping in Learning to Read

Every word has three forms – its sounds (phonemes), its orthography (spelling), and its meaning. Orthographic mapping is the process that all successful readers use to become fluent readers. Through orthographic mapping, students use the oral language processing part of their brain to map (connect) the sounds of words they already know (the phonemes) to the letters in a word (the spellings). They then permanently store the connected sounds and letters of words (along with their meaning) as instantly recognizable words, described as “sight vocabulary” or “sight words”.

Joan Sedita | May 5, 2020 | 53 Comments

How the Brain Learns to Read

Reading is a relatively new cultural development. While there were some people who could read dating back to the invention of writing during the 4th millennium BC, it was not until after the Industrial Revolution in the 1800’s that large numbers of the population in many countries learned to read. The human brain did not evolve to be able to read the way it did for spoken language. In order to read, the brain has to learn to re-purpose brain functions that were developed over thousands of years for other, more basic needs.

Joan Sedita | April 7, 2020 | 4 Comments

How Parents Can Support Their Children During School Shutdowns

Given the stress that educators, students, and their parents are under because of the current national health crisis, I thought it would be helpful to share this post written by one of our Keys to Literacy trainers, Noel Foy. She is also a neuroeducational consultant. As you step in and support your child’s learning, a certain amount of stress is to be expected. Your child’s well being is a priority, and so is yours. Since parents don’t leave the hospital with their newborns and a parent toolbox in tow, allow me to equip you with a crash course of information, tips, and strategies about the science of learning and managing stress. If there was ever a need for a parent toolkit, it’s now.

Joan Sedita | April 2, 2020 | 2 Comments

Systematic Phonics Scope and Sequence

Systematic phonics instruction follows a sequential and planned set of phonics elements that gradually builds from base elements to more subtle and complex structures. Teachers follow a scope and sequence, as opposed to implicit phonics instruction that addresses phonics as it comes up in text. While there is no universally agreed upon scope and sequence, any logically ordered sequence begins with the most basic phonics concepts and progresses to more difficult concepts, with new learning building on prior knowledge (Carreker, 2011). Sequences vary somewhat among phonics programs. If teachers are using an explicit, systematic phonics program it is best to follow its sequence for the order of teaching. If this is not the case, or if the program is not systematic enough, Keys to Literacy has developed a "generic" scope and sequence.

Joan Sedita | March 3, 2020 | 0 Comments

Levels of Language & Literacy

Question: What role does knowledge of language play in reading and writing? Answer: A huge role! Teachers tend to focus on the “five components of reading” when thinking about what’s needed to teach students to be good readers (i.e., phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, comprehension). But there is another model that should be considered: the seven levels of language.

Joan Sedita | February 4, 2020 | 1 Comment

Science of Reading in the News

As the number of articles, podcasts and blog posts related to the science of reading grows, I've been updating a list I started for our Keys to Literacy trainers to share. We have been getting so many requests about the list, that I decided to make it the focus of this post.

Joan Sedita | January 17, 2020 | 3 Comments

We Need a “Writing Rope”!

The literature and discourse related to literacy instruction tends to focus on reading, even though writing is just as important for student literacy achievement. In addition, significant attention is paid to the multi component nature of skilled reading, while writing tends to be referred to as a single, monolithic skill. With a nod towards Hollis Scarborough’s “Reading Rope”, in 2019 I developed a model that identifies the multiple components that are necessary for skilled writing: The Writing Rope: The Strands That Are Woven Into Skilled Writing. In 2001, Scarborough published a graphic that depicts multiple components of language comprehension (i.e., background knowledge, vocabulary, language structures, verbal reasoning, literacy knowledge) and word recognition (i.e., phonological awareness, decoding, sight recognition) as strands in a rope. As students develop skills in these components they become increasingly strategic and automatic in their application, leading to fluent reading comprehension.

Joan Sedita | January 6, 2020 | 5 Comments

Previewing Vocabulary Before Reading

Existing background knowledge is a critical component for comprehension, and word meanings are part of larger knowledge structures about a topic. Knowing the vocabulary words associated with a given topic enables students to connect their background knowledge to what they are reading. What if students aren't unfamiliar with some of the vocabulary in the text? Many studies have shown that previewing unfamiliar words before students read improves comprehension.

Joan Sedita | December 5, 2019 | 0 Comments

We Need to Pay Attention to the Science of Reading!

The scientific evidence base on how we learn to read and how to best teach reading has been growing and converging over 40 years. This includes brain imaging studies that show how our brains learn to read and underlying causes of why some students have difficulty learning read.

Sadly, teachers often do not have access to this evidence base. Many teachers report that their preservice education in college did little to prepare them for teaching reading. Many veteran teachers report a lack of quality professional development once hired that could help them improve their reading instruction. And for too long, the reading wars have confused teachers and administrators. These wars started in the 1990's when whole language advocates succeeded in convincing too many schools that learning to read comes naturally without the need for explicit instruction in decoding skills. Even today, there are many reading "experts" that say they promote a "balanced" approach to beginning instruction, but what that actually represents is a little bit of incidental phonics thrown in on top of the same approaches to reading instruction that have not worked for the past 25 years. The latest scores from the National Assessment of Educational Progress, also known as the nation's report card, were just released—and things aren't looking good for the country's young readers.

Joan Sedita | November 4, 2019 | 3 Comments