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Reading Teachers Chatboard

Sight Words

by CthePower

Sep 27, 2012

What are your thoughts on teaching of sight words ? Do you see any long term effects on this type of program for teaching reading on future generations?

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Debbie On 9/27/12, CthePower wrote: > What are your thoughts on teaching of sight words ? Do you > see any long term effects on this type of program for > teaching reading on future generations? Sight words are words that students can read without sounding them out & those that don't follow the standard rules of English. These words appear in...See More

Oct 3, 2012

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Nicole/MO SIGHT WORD PHONETICS The problem with sight words is that they are too often taught as whole words. They are taught one word at a time without teaching the sounds in the word. THIS DOES NOT WORK. It is just plain awful how many new reading programs drill an alarming amount of sight words. Of the 220 most commonly taught words (called Dolch words), ...See MoreSIGHT WORD PHONETICS The problem with sight words is that they are too often taught as whole words. They are taught one word at a time without teaching the sounds in the word. THIS DOES NOT WORK. It is just plain awful how many new reading programs drill an alarming amount of sight words. Of the 220 most commonly taught words (called Dolch words), 150 are completely phonetic and can be easily learned by "Saying the sounds and reading the word." Yes, I mean SOUNDING OUT. Why, oh why, are teachers abandoning basic synthetic phonics teaching?

The other 70 Dolch words that aren't completely phonetic, 68 conform to simple patterns of exceptions and can be taught PHONETICALLY. Sight words should not be taught at all in a pure phonics program, but should be merely taught phonetically along with other words. Reading programs like Reading Mastery teach sight words this way with great success. I have used it for ten years and have seen students make remarkable progress without the nonsense drilling of sight words. Students with dyslexia or problems with short-term (working) memory should NOT be given a large number of sight words to memorize. It is so frustrating for them and slows down their reading progrss. Plus, it is a waste of instructional time when teachers focus too much time on it.

When memorizing words as a whole, the eye jumps all around the word. Too many words taught as wholes by sight encourages the development of dyslexia. Sounding out all words from left to right encourages proper left to right eye movement while reading. Moreover, pictures and words are processed on different sides of the brain. Thus, not only do sight words encourage incorrect eye movements, they also confuse the brain.

My students begin our program with a past development of guessing habits from too many sight words. When students have been drilled to read words as wholes, they tend to NOT slow down while reading to examine the spellings of words (letter cues). You hear errors such as was for saw, started for stared, on for no, yes for eyes, and even for over. You can understand how the eye is jumping around the word in those such errors instead of looking through the word left to right.

I have a great post on the UK Reading Reform forum ([link removed]:

PART 1: Sight Word Drilling--yay or nay [link removed]

Part 2: Sight Word Drilling—yay or nay? [link removed]

If you aren't signed up as a member on the UK RRF website, I would recommend that you do so. I have learned more on that site about how to become an effective reading teacher that I did in my graduate and undergraduate teaching classes. UK students (especially Finland, Swedan) are making much higher reading gains as compared to US students. In my opinion, it is because US schools are still utilizing methods such as sight word drilling/whole word methods.

This post was written quickly and probably contains spelling/grammatical errors. I apologize for this matter.

Nicole/MO

Oct 5, 2012

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language Arts

by Sarah

Sep 29, 2012

Can anyone offer advice as to how to implement Lead21 successfully? I am having lots of problems getting everything done that the program expects you tobe able to do in 25 to 35 minutes...It has been very frustrating..Would appreciate any help.....

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language Arts

by Sarah

Sep 29, 2012

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HOMOPHONE list with link to dictionary

by Al Aloisi

Oct 2, 2012

HOMOPHONES: Word pairs/groupss that sound alike with different meanings and spellings. This is a free site that helps teachers, students & parents in the USA and visitors from over 40 countries learn and use the correct word when the spoken word is converted to writing.

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FAVORITE SPOOKY READ ALOUDS

by Nicole/MO

Oct 16, 2012

Spooky Read Alouds

I have a few favorite spooky halloween-ish books that I choose to read aloud to elementary classrooms around Halloween. I've stuck to the same two stories for the past 10 years because they are fun and frightening and out of print. I like to choose stories that I know the students have never heard of and are folktales. <...See More

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Inferring and reading

by Eri-cat

Oct 20, 2012

I know what inferring is and how to teach it, but I want to know what it really has to do with reading. I know we all make inferences all the time in life. When we're reading, we make inferences too, automatically. It's a natural response. How can we teach something that already comes naturally? And why do we need to teach this?

I don't r...See More

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Sara On 10/20/12, Eri-cat wrote:

What do you infer about human nature from reading Lord of the Flies? What's the message of the book? Do you see a book as a straight plot and that's it? Most often books are more than the plot and what else they are - you infer. Does Lord of the Flies ever say outright that people left on their own are really l...See MoreOn 10/20/12, Eri-cat wrote:

What do you infer about human nature from reading Lord of the Flies? What's the message of the book? Do you see a book as a straight plot and that's it? Most often books are more than the plot and what else they are - you infer. Does Lord of the Flies ever say outright that people left on their own are really like animals? If it did, it would only need one page to say that.

But it's a book of many pages and you're inferring throughout. When one person says "I see Piggy as a very brave person who had the courage to be himself" and the next says "I see Piggy as a wimp who got what was coming to him" - those two people are inferring something different. Their inferences are differences. When you analyze a book, you're doing that on the basis of what you've inferred.

How can you be teaching inferring if you don't see what it has to do with reading??

Inferring does NOT come naturally to everybody - some kids don't think at a reflective level. Some adults don't think at a reflective level. My husband leaves a party and has no idea that anyone at the party was upset that night or had had too much to drink or was flirting with him. He does not infer anything. It's either directly said or - it doesn't exist.

His Lit teacher never taught him to infer...

And even those who are gifted at something naturally still have something to learn even in the area of their gift.

Unless you're asking questions like "Then what happened" almost any question about a book asks one to infer. The 'why' questions about a book rely on inference for their answers.

Why was Simon like that in the book? What does he represent? Why was Alice so curious about the White Rabbit? Are all little girls like that or was Alice special? Why did Dorothy want to leave Kansas? Did she hate Kansas or was she just bored by it? Infer the answer from the book. Where are Dorothy's parents anyway? Let's infer what that did to Dorothy's childhood.

>> > I don't see how inferring is related to good readers. What > I truly think the skill is for is for students to be able > to answer a question that a worksheet or test asks. That's > all. Any ideas?

Oct 26, 2012

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Nicole/MO THINKING IN-DEPTH

Many students have trouble "thinking while they read." The strategy of inferring requires the reader to think more in- depthly about characters, plot events, etc. If the main character is dressed in dirty, tattered clothes and sleeps on a park bench every night, then the reader can infer that the character is homeless. In...See More

Oct 26, 2012

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Getting teachers to use the leveled library

by ruth

Nov 16, 2012

We have a beautiful leveled library at our school. The teachers aren't using it-they are using basals that they have used for years. I want any suggestions to get to use it.

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Tex On 11/16/12, ruth wrote:

> We have a beautiful leveled library at our school. The

> teachers aren't using it-they are using basals that they

> have used for years.

> I want any suggestions to get to use it.

We had a similar situation at our school. My suggestion is to talk with some of the...See More

Jun 27, 2013

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A Long Way from Chicago - anyone

by pm

Nov 16, 2012

use this book? I started reading this book aloud with my 5th graders, but they are not getting into it much. I need suggestions for how to engage them more in this novel.

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4th I loved this book (an A Year Down Yonder), but I don't think most kids today can really relate to them. I think they are both very funny, but kids don't have much of a frame of reference for the stories. Sorry I'm not more help, but maybe just enjoy the books yourself, and find something different for them.

On 11/16/12, pm wrote: > use ...See More

Nov 17, 2012

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pm On 11/17/12, 4th wrote: > I loved this book (an A Year Down Yonder), but I don't think > most kids today can really relate to them. I think they are > both very funny, but kids don't have much of a frame of > reference for the stories. Sorry I'm not more help, but maybe > just enjoy the books yourself, and find something different &g...See More

Nov 18, 2012

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Has anyone used Lexia computer

by 4th

Nov 17, 2012

assisted reading instruction? What is your opinion of it?

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How to Introduce a Story to Build Retelling Skills

by Teachers.Net Gazette

Nov 30, 2012

How to Introduce a Story to Build Retelling Skills

For children to be able to retell a story accurately, they need to KNOW the story. They need to “own” it. These are all things you can do in your classroom to help your students:

[link removed]

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