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21. My child is reading now but very, very slowly. How can I improve his fluency? Some children read very slowly for a long time after they can read quite well. They persist in sounding every sound in isolation even when they just read the same word two lines up. This can be worrying and frustrating for parents. Many parents tend to dread the reading practice for this reason and then the reading (not surprisingly) takes a turn for the worst again. First of all I think it's important for parents to know that this is a completely normal and natural stage that takes many children some time to pass through. The following article from our parenTeacher magazine will arm you with ways to help the transition along. _________________________________________________________ We've all had one, or two. I've had at least a dozen. It's the child who can read, pretty well, but she does so ever so painfully and ever so slowly . You're dutiful as ever, listening to each phoneme. One at a time they come, slow and steady. You wait for that magical day when the pace picks up--when she says a word not preceded by the constituent phonemes. And in many cases it happens! But in others it just doesn't. What to do, what to do? Why is this? Well, it may have to do with lagging ability at blending, which should be dealt with using the tips in the article in the adjacent column, or the child may be a cautious type who wants to be sure first. Or it could be that the child is so focused on the individual sound pictures that she isn't looking at the whole word, but at each sound. Or it could just be that she doesn't know that it's okay to say the word without checking first. Here's a plan that works wonders on all these kids! Working from a story or paragraph that the child has read a few times, choose a simple word that you know she's seen a lot. Maybe the word 'the', or if, for instance, it's a story about frogs, the word 'frog'. Point out the word and say, "You've seen this word a lot. As we read the story, whenever you see this word, just say it. Okay?" Each time the word appears encourage the child with a gesture or a tap on the page to say the word straight away. The next time you read the story add another word. Then move on to another story and this time start with two words and then add a third. There are particular stories that work very well for this purpose, or you can write paragraphs that target the needs of a particular child. The Mouse Tales collection by Harper Collins is very good, with words like mouse and boat and cloud appearing repetitively. Read America welcomes website posts and letters to the editor to advise us of stories that work well for this purpose. When you get your students reading faster you'll have lots of extra time to be on-line.
Click here to request the current issue of parenTeacher magazine at no charge. 22. I keep reading your recommendations to get the kids reading as soon as possible. But, there is no way my son could read a book right now. He's just not ready. Any child can read a book with help. As the parent mentor or classroom teacher, that's your job. The kind and amount of help will determine how instructive the activity is. Here are some recommendations from an article in our parenTeacher magazine. __________________________________________________________ One of the elements of phonics that keeps driving it from the classrooms of English speaking countries, is controlled text. With traditional phonics tends to come basal readers. Teachers don't like to see children stuck in the rut of highly controlled, and often highly contrived basal readers. We agree wholeheartedly. That's why we have only a few coded stories at each level. It can be difficult to make decisions about when to ask a child to read a story or informative piece, based on readiness. This is so with the young reader, and it's so with the older, remedial reader. We feel that children need to be reading books as soon as possible. To this end, we have several suggestions about how to accomplish this easily and painlessly. Buddy Reading Word By Word Buddy reading can be done one on one, in a small group, or as a whole class. The intention is to give the child practice reading the words he can in a real book, not just a reader. The teacher or other trained adult must be involved in buddy reading. Parent helpers can be trained to help with this. 1. Don't be afraid to ask a child to read a book that will be very hard for him. Tell him, "This is a difficult book. You'll need lots of help and I'll help you when you 2. With the child present look through the book or the first page or two if it's a long book, and make a list of the words the child can read. This will make the child feel as if there is much they can contribute to this story. If you're working with more than one child, have each child make a list of all the words. You can even do this with children at varying levels. Simply make multiple lists and say something like this, "Susie, these are the words you can read in the story, Rob these are your words, and everyone else, can read the words on this list here. Please copy down the words I've given you." When this step is done continue on. 3. Begin reading and choose various children to read words that each will be able to read with some ease. Every now and then it can be encouraging to choose a harder word for a child you think can manage it. Then this word can be added to his list. So a class who've had lessons through the adjacent consonant sounds might have a word list like the one pictured right. When the class receives advanced code lessons, more words can be added. 1. When a child is able to do some connected reading but it's slow and laboured, it can be very beneficial to give him a rest while you read for awhile, or if you're working with several children, while the other children read. 2. Explain that the book is difficult but there will be time to rest while someone else reads. 3. Have each child read an amount of text appropriate to his capability and not exceeding his frustration level. Do error corrections as needed. Keep a table top white board nearby for this purpose. 4. Every now and again stop to recap what's going on in the story. Be sure to do this after a particularly slow reader has a turn, or if many error corrections intervene with an error correction right away. Independent Reading With Monitoring Once a child is ready to do some independent reading we suggest that he be encouraged to self monitor. This can be done in the following ways: Reading to a friend will encourage children to want to read. The friend is not intended as a helper. Just a listener. The reader should keep a written record of any words he's not sure of for later work. Reading into a tape recorder is fun for new readers. It helps them remember to read aloud and to think about what they're doing. The reader should keep a written record of any words he's not sure of for later work. Reading to oneself. We suggest the reader reads softly but aloud. The reader should keep a written record of any words he's not sure of for later work.
Click here to request the current issue of parenTeacher magazine at no charge. 23. Our school is using Phono-Graphix. I know you recommend lots of reading. Is there a particular basal reader series you recommend that we use in with Phono--Graphix? I really prefer actual books in the original rather than the prepared stuff publishers put out in sets. These are often altered (shortened and easier words used), at the expense of the story and the rich vocabulary found in the originals. Unfortunately pedagogy seems to be in a stage of 'products products products'. I hate it and strive to give children 'books books books' instead. Run, don't walk to your nearest children's book store and behold the alternative! The following article from our parenTeacher magazine will help you design ways of using these wonderful stories as the main component of your schools reading content. _________________________________________________________ One of the elements of phonics that keeps driving it from the classrooms of English speaking countries, is controlled text. With traditional phonics tends to come basal readers. Teachers don't like to see children stuck in the rut of highly controlled, and often highly contrived basal readers. We agree wholeheartedly. That's why we have only a few coded stories at each level. It can be difficult to make decisions about when to ask a child to read a story or informative piece, based on readiness. This is so with the young reader, and it's so with the older, remedial reader. We feel that children need to be reading books as soon as possible. To this end, we have several suggestions about how to accomplish this easily and painlessly. Buddy Reading Word By Word Buddy reading can be done one on one, in a small group, or as a whole class. The intention is to give the child practice reading the words he can in a real book, not just a reader. The teacher or other trained adult must be involved in buddy reading. Parent helpers can be trained to help with this. 1. Don't be afraid to ask a child to read a book that will be very hard for him. Tell him, "This is a difficult book. You'll need lots of help and I'll help you when you do." Choose a book that the child or children 2. With the child present look through the book or the first page or two if it's a long book, and make a list of the words the child can read. This will make the child feel as if there is much they can contribute to this story. If you're working with more than one child, have each child make a list of all the words. You can even do this with children at varying levels. Simply make multiple lists and say something like this, "Susie, these are the words you can read in the story, Rob these are your words, and everyone else, can read the words on this list here. Please copy down the words I've given you." When this step is done continue on. 3. Begin reading and choose various children to read words that each will be able to read with some ease. Every now and then it can be encouraging to choose a harder word for a child you think can manage it. Then this word can be added to his list. So a class who've had lessons through the adjacent consonant sounds might have a word list like the one pictured right. When the class receives advanced code lessons, more words can be added. Buddy Reading--Taking Turns 1. When a child is able to do some connected reading but it's slow and laboured, it can be very beneficial to give him a rest while you read for awhile, or if you're working with several children, while the other children read. 2. Explain that the book is difficult but there will be time to rest while someone else reads. 3. Have each child read an amount of text appropriate to his capability and not exceeding his frustration level. Do error corrections as needed. Keep a table top white board nearby for this purpose. 4. Every now and again stop to recap what's going on in the story. Be sure to do this after a particularly slow reader has a turn, or if many error corrections intervene with an error correction right away. Independent Reading With Monitoring Once a child is ready to do some independent reading we suggest that he be encouraged to self monitor. This can be done in the following ways: Reading to a friend will encourage children to want to read. The friend is not intended as a helper. Just a listener. The reader should keep a written record of any words he's not sure of for later work. Reading into a tape recorder is fun for new readers. It helps them remember to read aloud and to think about what they're doing. The reader should keep a written record of any words he's not sure of for later work. Reading to oneself. We suggest the reader reads softly but aloud. The reader should keep a written record of any words he's not sure of for later work.
Click here to request the current issue of parenTeacher magazine at no charge. 24. I've been using Reading Reflex with my five year old this summer. I am a first grade teacher. I'd love to use it at school, but I can't see how it would work. I strongly urge you to consider Word Work, the classroom kit for using Phono-Graphix. You will also find the following article from our parenTeacher magazine helpful in managing Phono-Graphix in your classroom. _________________________________________________________ Ever notice that it's easy to manage your classroom when there's not instruction going on? Managing a lesson and thirty children can be a bit trickier. There are some principles that help. Full Class Instruction How you seat your class is very important when delivering instructional methods that require feedback. Seat the best readers in the back of the classroom and the children who require more attention in the very front. This will enable you to more easily check their work as they respond to your instruction. Carry a small lap top dry erase board with you as you move around the room checking the children's work. This will allow you to make error corrections at the child's desk. Warm up games help ready the children for lessons. Games such as saying a sound loudly when your hand is way up high, and more softly when your hand is way down low are fun for children. There is an extensive list of such activities in each section. Children must learn not to call out when they know the answer. When children call out, do not call on them. It reinforces this negative behaviour. The children can be redirected by giving them something else to do with their mouths rather than calling out. Ask the children to smile if they know the answer. Note that you see lots of smiling faces and then call on one. Avoid asking the children questions that require letter names for answers (EX) "How do we show the sound 'oe' in 'float'?" requires the answer, "ow ay". Questions can be framed so that letter names can be avoided. "Susie, will you come to the board and show us the way we show 'oe' in float?" f l ___ t Or you can write the possibilities on the board and number them.
Small Group Instruction The same principles for activity completion and interrupting mentioned above apply in small groups as well. Small group instruction can be organized in two different formats. The children can break into groups and you can circulate and help them as needed, or you can break the class into five groups and meet with one of the groups each day whilst the other children are doing centres or seat work. If you organize group work while the other kids do centers or seat work, you'll need to prepare ahead of time for possible interruptions. Make a list of all the things in your class that may cause problems while you're teaching a small group. (EX) Someone pushes the pause button on the tape recorder and thinks it's broken. A child needs his shoe tied. A pencil point breaks and the child is unable to sharpen the pencil. For each problem, develop a plan. (EX) Assign a specialist to the tape recorder. There is generally a child who is expert at such matters and willing to take on the responsibility of helping the other children when the teacher is busy. A 'specialist' can probably be found for shoe tying as well. Bring replacement pencils, paper and erasers to the table so you can provide them as needed. When push comes to shove, and in a group of children it usually will, you're the biggest kid of all. Children, all of us, need a leader. That's you.
Click here to request the current issue of parenTeacher magazine at no charge. Click here to see our catalogue entry about Word Work, 25. My child's reading is better but his spelling is still not great. The process of spelling is the reverse of the process of reading. When a child reads he sees the symbol and recalls what sound it represents and says the sound (decodes), when he spells he hears the sound, recalls what symbol to use to show it then writes that symbol. Because sounds are completely natural and native to the child, and the code is not, it is an invention, the second process (spelling) is more difficult. When we spell, we use expressive rather than receptive memory of the code. That is harder too. While much of the code can be learned in drills such as those used in Phono-Graphix, much of it requires repeated exposure to words in connected text. For these reasons spelling competency takes about three to four times as long as reading competency. The current issue of our parenTeacher magazine has an article on improving spelling. Click here to request the current issue of parenTeacher magazine at no charge. 26. How is Phono-Graphix different than Phonemic Awareness? Reading requires several things. They are: SKILLS CONCEPT--knowledge of the nature of the code which is... Phonemic awareness is ONLY letters are pictures of sounds. So it is not different to PG, only a small part of it. 27. Do you advise oral or silent reading? I've read contradictory information in various books. The reason you've read contradictory advice is because this is thus far just a matter of opinion. There is no research on the topic. Here are a few things to think about. 1. It is common sense that if a child is having trouble reading she should be reading aloud when practicing. How else could you assess and assist her? The kinds of errors a child makes tell us a lot about what is causing them and how to correct them. 2. Reading aloud causes the child to slow down and to actually read each word. If allowed to read silently many children with reading difficulties skip words that look difficult. For this reason we recommend that even when you're not listening to the child reading, a tape recorder can be. The mere presence of the recorder makes the experience of reading seem more formal and important, and causes the child to read each word. You don't need to listen to the tape, though the contents can be instructive. 3. Likewise many children with reading difficulties make errors and don't even know it. Reading the same word wrong over and over won't help their reading one bit. 4. New readers (and some experienced readers as well) tend to comprehend better when reading aloud. Have you ever read a passage through only to realize that you haven't comprehended it? Many experienced readers in this situation start reading aloud, even if it's only under their breath. The effect is that you literally interfere with the 'noise' in your head, the many thoughts and musings that make their way into your story line. 5. Eventually children need to have some experience at reading silently. I don't recommend that you push that too soon.
28. Do you offer a list of age appropriate reading material? We don't belief in the concept of 'grade appropriate' reading material. Children should be allowed to read what they can (even if it requires quite a lot of help). Material should include what interests them, and what they are studying at school. Try to mix a bit of informative content, biography and fiction. So if your child is interested in space travel, you might have her read informative pieces on the topic (books and newspapers) , a book about John Glenn, and a novel or short story. A valuable book to have is The New York Times Parent's Guide to the Best Books for Children. This book has titles organized in different helpful ways. For instance it's got early years, middle years and young adult. It also has wonderful indexes; by subject, or by author, making it easy to find a book on almost any topic. I also strongly urge the use of magazine subscriptions for children. They love to get something all their own. The pieces are short so they're not too draining for the new or struggling reader, and they are pithy, so there's lots to talk about afterward. There is an article in the current issue of our parenTeacher magazine on this topic.
Click here to request the current issue of parenTeacher magazine at no charge. For British Readers The Following Answer is Provided by Susan Case, Phono-Graphix Trainer; Bath, England Some of the best authors to look for are Jacqueline Wilson, Dick King Smith, Morris Glietzman, these are humourous and come in a few differnt levels--so be sure to check the text level first. Also look for the Banana Book Series for early readers, move on to Buried Alive by J. Wilson. And of course, there's Harry Potter. Also Dillon's Book Stores have a free reading list grouped by age level. 29. I see that you refer to 'the nature of the code' a lot. What do you mean by 'the nature of the code'? This is a very important question. We've found in reviewing data that the understanding of this is critical to the overall results obtained by those using Phono-Graphix, in particular the length of remediation, as well as the overall spelling gains. I think that the issues surrounding this question involve basic beliefs about the nature of humans. The following article best offers my our answer to this important question. I also suggest that you obtain our book How to Raise Your Child's Verbal Intelligence, which delves more deeply into the issues surrounding how children learn. _________________________________________________________ Some of the most frequently asked questions on our phone lines and web site centre on uncertainty about what is implicit and what is explicit in reading and spelling. Questions such as, "Some of the kids in my class can't recite the code." "My child is reading well now but his spelling is not as good." And "I have this one client who knows most of the ways to show 'ee', but he always forgets ie." This article will attempt to clear up the issue of what Phono-Graphix teaches explicitly and what it teaches implicitly. The difference between implicit and explicit is more than just the first syllable. It could be the difference between spending twelve or one hundred hours teaching a child to read. It could be the difference between fluency and no fluency. This article starts out with what you've all heard before... The nature of the code, and the phonological skills used to read such a code and moves on to supporting research as to why those two things are what we teach explicitly, while we let the actual code become implicit information functioning under the surface. Letters are pictures of sounds The nature of the code--these are pictures of sounds b oa t The nature of the child--We believe that children can understand this perfectly well. Children have a remarkable ability to assess visual figures. At two days a baby can distinguish his mother's face from any other human face. Children assess and use visual figures in the world around them every day. Sometimes a sound picture is one letter and sometimes two or more The nature of the code--the pictures can be made of one b / t or more oa letters. So boat has three sounds, and three sound pictures b oa t The nature of the child--We believe children can manage this. They reuse figures in the world around them every day. There is variation in the code The nature of the code--most of the sounds can be shown with more than one picture b oa t s l ow m o s t t oe n o t e th ough The nature of the child--We believe that children can easily learn that these oa ow o are all a picture of the same sound. There is overlap in the code The nature of the code--some of the pictures are used for more than one sound? ow = sh ow? f r ow n The nature of the child--We believe children can manage this as they easily manage that this The analogy we've demonstrated 'squares and triangles being reused to make houses' is not learned explicitly, but implicitly as children operate on the world around them each day. Just as learning the label or 'word' for house or flower is learned implicitly, so too can the code be learned implicitly. Exactly what is learned explicitly as opposed to implicitly is critical to the instructional formula. So where Phonics has invented rules to try to explain why letters represent the sounds they represent, Phono-Graphix employs hands-on activities and games that offer an explicit understanding that these figures are pictures of sounds to be assessed and used as tools, just as we assess and use all the visual figures in our world every day. We offer here three additional pieces of evidence to support this approach. 1. Reber (1989), Berry (1984) and Berry and Dienes (1993) tested the hypothesis that direct explicit instruction would improve memory for logic based systems. They devised a synthetic phonetic code with rules for combining symbols, and taught it to students under two controls. One group received direct explicit instruction in the rules. The other group was exposed to the code and told that it was a code with rules, but they received no explicit instruction in the rules. The results of these studies clearly indicate that students became proficient with the code whether they received explicit instruction or not. In the Berry (1984) study researchers found that explicit instruction improved the subjects' knowledge about the rules. But--the study also showed that the students who received explicit instruction and acquired knowledge about the rules, performed the same or not quite as well as the students who received exposure only with no explicit instruction in rules. The implication is that explicit instruction in rules impairs performance. It would seem from this study that although it doesn't hurt much, it certainly doesn't help at all--unless your goal is knowledge rather than performance. 2. The premise of Phono-Graphix, that explicit instruction is not necessary to successful use of a phonetic code, is supported by an effect that's well known in the field of perceptual psychology. In 1886 James Cattell discovered what has since become known as the word superiority effect. It has since been replicated in dozens of published studies (e.g., Chastain, 1981, 1986; Jordan & Bevan, 1994; Krueger, 1992; Pollatsek & Rayner, 1989; Taylor & Taylor, 1983; Wheeler, 1970). These researchers have found that when asked to perform a visual pattern recognition task, specifically to locate a target letter in a string of real as opposed to nonsense words, performance is higher with real words than with nonsense words. The implication is that the process of constructing meaning, occurring simultaneously with the process of visual scanning, actually aids the visual scanning process. Based upon this, it would seem that explicit instruction in the rules of the code may distract the learner and actually prove harmful to learning the visual code for our spoken language. It seems that code would better be taught in context--the context of meaningful words which, as it happens, is the very context for which it was intended. 3. Our premise that explicit instruction is not necessary or helpful to successful use of a phonetic code is further supported by another research piece. Anne Treisman and others (Treisman & Schmidt, 1982; Treisman & Souther, 1986) have isolated what they call an illusory conjunction. These researchers asked subjects to scan text composed of nonsense words such as dax and kay, explaining that they would be asked questions about the text after having studied it for a brief period. The researchers found that subjects reported having seen words like day, which could be constructed with parts of the nonsense words, such as dax and kay, appearing in the text. The implication is that the construction of meaning is a powerful overriding force in the processing of visual stimuli, and must be a primary part of the instructional mix. We've demonstrated thus far what knowledge is needed to be able to understand the nature of the code. To be able to use that code, three skills are also needed (C. McGuinness, et al, 1996) 1. Segmenting--the ability to separate sounds in words, so when you hear 'frog' you can say the isolated sounds 'f' 'r' 'o' 'g'. 2. Blending--the ability to blend sounds into words, so when you hear the sounds 'f' 'r' 'o' 'g' you hear the word 'frog'. 3. Phoneme Manipulation--the ability to manipulate sounds in and out of words, so when you read 'brown' with the sound 'oe', and you realize it's not a word, you can drop the 'oe' and add the sound 'ow'. br 'oe' n... "not a word"... br'ow'n. Bingo! These skills are are not an invention. They are a result of the brain trying to work out our writing system, just as rotating both legs in a clockwise motion simultaneously is the brain sorting out how to ride a bike. Such skills are best learned in context of the procedure for which they are needed. In the case of bike riding we teach the skill of pedaling on a bike. In the case of reading and spelling, we teach the skills of segmenting, blending and phoneme manipulation using real code--reading and spelling real words. This kind of 'learning by doing' is called latent learning. Latent learning is quite common for the learning of procedural skills. Procedural knowledge is implicit. We can be completely proficient at the skills and completely unable to talk about the intricacies of the process. So the child must learn (explicitly) the nature of the code, (implicitly) the skills needed to use the code, and (implicitly) the symbols of the code. Phono-Graphix maximizes instruction by teaching all of these simultaneously. This is instructionally sound for two reasons, again based on the nature of the code and of the child. 1. The nature of the code--The code doesn't exist in isolation from the process of segmenting, blending and manipulating phonemes. Neither do these processes exist without the code. One without the other will always be two halves of a whole. So we teach these together in the context for which they exist--reading and spelling words. 2. The nature of the child--Humans learn best when material and procedure are linked and embedded in context (Bandura, 1985; Flavell, 1977). One final piece of the instructional mix that Phono-Graphix has recognized is the importance of error correction. This piece comes to us from the fields of learning theory and motivation psychology. While Systematic or analytic Phonics seems bent on controlling every word that falls before a child's eyes so that there is no chance of failure, Phono-Graphix knows better! According to motivation psychology it's errors that get our attention. Motivation psychologists call this an orienting response. Without error, there's no disequilibrium, no limit, no reason to take in new information, no reason to do what psychology calls 'orient'. Hence--no motivation. Motivation psychologists Miller and Dollard coined the term learning dilemma to describe this phenomenon. They explained that old skills and information must be activated in order to solve problems. When a problem cannot be solved with existing skills and information, failure occurs resulting in anxiety. New skills and information are taken into the learner's repertoire in order to solve the problem and relieve the anxiety. The dilemma--learning follows failure. In Phono-Graphix this process is made easier for the student and teacher through lessons that externalize what the child doesn't know, and a system of error corrections that offers just the right amount of missing information to keep the child engaged in the problem solving process. In this way each new error is an opportunity to learn. Carmen and Geoffrey McGuinness presented this article to the English government at the Office of Standards in Education- Conference on Phonics in March, 1999. 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do." Choose a book that the child or children you're working with can read at least a fourth of the words without help.
square 
triangle 
house--no rule was needed to recognize this as house. So why would they need a rule to recognize oa as 'oe'?
can be a picture of a ball, a circle, a moon, a dot, and more!