Explicit instruction in phonemic awareness and phonemically based decoding skills as an intervention strategy for struggling readers in whole language classrooms

2007 ◽  
Vol 21 (4) ◽  
pp. 349-369 ◽  
Author(s):  
Janice F. Ryder ◽  
William E. Tunmer ◽  
Keith T. Greaney
Keyword(s):  
Struggling Readers ◽  
Phonemic Awareness ◽  
Whole Language ◽  
Explicit Instruction ◽  
Intervention Strategy ◽  
Decoding Skills ◽  
Language Classrooms

scholarly journals Common Misconceptions about the Phonological Deficit Theory of Dyslexia

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (11) ◽  
pp. 1510
Author(s):  
David L. Share
Keyword(s):  
Struggling Readers ◽  
Phonemic Awareness ◽  
Phonological Processing ◽  
Reading Ability ◽  
Discussion Paper ◽  
Phonological Deficit ◽  
Core Deficit ◽  
The Common ◽  
Deficit Theory ◽  
Common Misconceptions

In this discussion paper, I review a number of common misconceptions about the phonological deficit theory (PDH) of dyslexia. These include the common but mistaken idea that the PDH is simply about phonemic awareness (PA), and, consequently, is a circular “pseudo”-explanation or epiphenomenon of reading difficulties. I argue that PA is only the “tip of the phonological iceberg” and that “deeper” spoken-language phonological impairments among dyslexics appear well before the onset of reading and even at birth. Furthermore, not even reading-specific expressions of phonological deficits—PA or pseudoword naming, can be considered circular if we clearly distinguish between reading proper—real meaning-bearing words, or real text, and the mechanisms (subskills) of reading development (such as phonological recoding). I also explain why an understanding of what constitutes an efficient writing system explains why phonology is necessarily a major source of variability in reading ability and hence a core deficit (or at least one core deficit) among struggling readers whether dyslexic or non-dyslexic. I also address the misguided notion that the PDH has now fallen out of favor because most dyslexia researchers have (largely) ceased studying phonological processing. I emphasize that acceptance of the PDH does not imply repudiation of other non-phonological hypotheses because the PDH does not claim to account for all the variance in reading ability/disability. Finally, I ask where neurobiology enters the picture and suggest that researchers need to exercise more caution in drawing their conclusions.

Systematic Instruction in Phoneme-Grapheme Correspondence for Students With Reading Disabilities

2016 ◽  
Vol 52 (5) ◽  
pp. 262-269 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gentry A. Earle ◽  
Kristin L. Sayeski
Keyword(s):  
Struggling Readers ◽  
Reading Disabilities ◽  
Special Educators ◽  
Explicit Instruction ◽  
Strong Predictor ◽  
Reading Failure ◽  
Systematic Instruction ◽  
Alphabetic Principle ◽  
Letter Sound ◽  
Common Misconceptions

Letter-sound knowledge is a strong predictor of a student’s ability to decode words. Approximately 50% of English words can be decoded by following a sound-symbol correspondence rule alone and an additional 36% are spelled with only one error. Many students with reading disabilities or who struggle to learn to read have difficulty with phonology, an understanding of how sounds are organized within language. This can result in difficulty grasping the alphabetic principle, the knowledge of the relation between speech sounds and the letters/letter patterns that represent them. Research has demonstrated the benefits of intensive, explicit instruction for developing struggling readers’ capacity to identify phonemes and apply knowledge of phoneme-grapheme correspondence for decoding. In this article, common misconceptions and basic tenets of effective letter-sound instruction are provided to help special educators and reading interventionists plan for effective phoneme-grapheme correspondence instruction for students with reading disabilities or who are at risk for reading failure.

A long-term predictive validity study: Can the CDI Short Form be used to predict language and early literacy skills four years later?

2012 ◽  
Vol 40 (4) ◽  
pp. 821-835 ◽  
Author(s):  
DILARA DENIZ CAN ◽  
MARIKA GINSBURG-BLOCK ◽  
ROBERTA MICHNICK GOLINKOFF ◽  
KATHRYN HIRSH-PASEK
Keyword(s):  
Language Development ◽  
Early Literacy ◽  
Predictive Validity ◽  
Phonemic Awareness ◽  
Short Form ◽  
Parent Report ◽  
Literacy Skills ◽  
Hierarchical Regression ◽  
Expressive Vocabulary ◽  
Decoding Skills

ABSTRACTThis longitudinal study examined the predictive validity of the MacArthur Communicative Developmental Inventories-Short Form (CDI-SF), a parent report questionnaire about children's language development (Fenson, Pethick, Renda, Cox, Dale & Reznick, 2000). Data were first gathered from parents on the CDI-SF vocabulary scores for seventy-six children (mean age=1 ; 10). Four years later (mean age=6 ; 1), children were assessed on language outcomes (expressive vocabulary, syntax, semantics and pragmatics) and code-related skills, including phonemic awareness, word recognition and decoding skills. Hierarchical regression analyses revealed that early expressive vocabulary accounted for 17% of the variance in picture vocabulary, 11% of the variance in syntax, and 7% of the variance in semantics, while not accounting for any variance in pragmatics in kindergarten. CDI-SF scores did not predict code-related skills in kindergarten. The importance of early vocabulary skills for later language development and CDI-SF as a valuable research tool are discussed.

scholarly journals Annotating digital text with phonemic cues to support decoding in struggling readers

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Patrick M. Donnelly ◽  
Kevin Larson ◽  
Tanya Matskewich ◽  
Jason D. Yeatman
Keyword(s):  
Digital Media ◽  
Struggling Readers ◽  
Intervention Group ◽  
Intervention Research ◽  
Educational Technologies ◽  
Control Group ◽  
Digital Text ◽  
Decoding Skills ◽  
Text Annotation ◽  
Based Instruction

An advantage of digital media is the flexibility to personalize the presentation of text to an individual’s needs and embed tools that support pedagogy and practice. The goal of this study was to develop a tablet-based reading tool, grounded in the principles of phonics-based instruction, and determine whether struggling readers could leverage this technology to improve their decoding skills. The tool presents a small icon below each vowel to represent its sound. Forty struggling child readers were randomly assigned to an intervention or control group to test the efficacy of the phonemic cues. We found that struggling readers could leverage the cues to improve pseudoword decoding: after two weeks of practice, the intervention group showed greater improvement than controls. This study demonstrates the efficacy of a text annotation, grounded in intervention research, to help children decode novel words. These results highlight the opportunity for educational technologies to support and supplement classroom instruction.

Learning correspondences between letters and phonemes without explicit instruction

1999 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
pp. 21-50 ◽  
Author(s):  
G. BRIAN THOMPSON ◽  
CLAIRE M. FLETCHER-FLINN ◽  
DAVID S. COTTRELL
Keyword(s):  
Whole Language ◽  
Explicit Instruction ◽  
Language Instruction ◽  
Phonological Recoding ◽  
Knowledge Sources ◽  
Learning To Read ◽  
Letter Names

Three studies examined the sources of learning by which children, very early in learning to read, formed correspondences between letters and phonemes when these were not explicitly taught in the whole language instruction they received. There were three classes of predicted knowledge sources: (a) induced sublexical relations (i.e., induction of orthographic–phonological relations from the experience of print words), (b) acrophones from letter names, and (c) transfer from spelling experience. The results of Study 1 indicated that children used both sources (a) and (b). Study 2 results showed that source (a) dominated when the letters were initial components of pseudowords rather than isolated items. The transfer from phoneme-to-grapheme correspondences of the children's spelling was examined in Study 3. The results were not consistent with the use of source (c). The findings of these studies have implications for the question of how early in learning to read children are able to use knowledge from their experience of print words as a source for phonological recoding.

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