DAILY READING INSTRUCTION
As mentioned above, an effective reading intervention is based on effective reading instruction. Described below are seven basic elements necessary for effective daily reading instruction. Not every element need be included every day; however, most elements should be included most days. The frequency and duration of each would be determined by the age and ability of the students with whom you work. Good teaching is not an algorithm or a recipe to follow. Good teaching is watching your students and responding to their needs.
1. Daily reading practice. All students at all levels need practice reading books that they have selected. Like any skill, one needs to practice in order to get better. Would you expect to learn to play the piano if you never practiced? Could you learn to play the piano if you did not have good music to play? Could you learn to play the piano if all the music given to you was too hard? So it is with reading.
Reading widely is one of the best methods to use to enhance students’ comprehension, word identification, and fluency skills as well as vocabulary and conceptual knowledge (Allington, 2012; Krashen, 2004). Also, reading practice enables students to practice newly learned skills in authentic reading contexts. Nancy Atwell (1998) recommends that 70% to 80% of reading class be used for self-selected reading practice and 20% to 30% be used for skills work. In most classrooms, these percentages are just the opposite. Students are asked to find a book to read only when they finish their “work”. Instead, finding a good book to read should be the main work occurring in reading class.
Thus, instead of reading class, it might be more constructive to think of it as reading practice. Here students would be provided a variety of good books to read at their independent level or below, as well as lots of time to practice and enjoy reading. In this type of an approach to reading instruction (known as reading workshop), small bits of targeted skills instruction would be provided based on students’ individual needs and set within a meaningful context to the greatest extent possible.
2. Social interaction and conversation around good books. This enhances high-level thinking and literacy learning. Social interaction could involve a variety of activities including book talks, literature circles, book clubs, book evaluations and critiques, top-ten lists, journal entries and responses, and planned discussions. These experiences need not be long, but they should be planned and purposeful.
3. Authentic writing experiences. An authentic writing experience is one in which students are asked to use writing to describe, express, and share their ideas and experiences. Like social interaction, these writing activities do not need to be long. As you will see in this book, they can also be designed to be used as pre- or post-reading activities or to reinforce target letter patterns.
4. Activities and instruction to develop all three cueing systems used for word recognition. As will be fully described in Chapter 4, the brain uses three cueing systems to recognize words during the act of reading: phonological, semantic, and syntax. The phonological cueing system uses letter sounds and letter patterns to recognize words. The semantic cueing system uses meaning or context to recognize words. And the syntactic cueing system uses grammar and word order to recognize words. Effective reading instruction includes activities to develop all three. Formal instruction and activities here are generally discontinued when students are reading comfortably at the 3rd grade level.
5. Activities and instruction for word identification strategies. These are what students’ use to identify words that are in their lexicon but not immediately recognized. There are four basic word identification strategies: (a) analogy (word families), (b) morphemic awareness [prefix, suffix, affix, root], (c) context clues [semantics], and (d) phonics. All four of these should be included in a reading curriculum. Formal instruction related to word identification are generally discontinued as word identification strategies when students are reading comfortably at the 3rd grade level. However, they should be continued as part of vocabulary development.
6. Comprehension instruction. Comprehension instruction refers to the specific strategies and skills used to create meaning with narrative and expository text. This is one of the most under-instructed elements in most reading programs (Allington, 2012; Pearson & Cervetti, 2017). Here, study skills are taught for use with expository text. Direct instruction is also used to teach the cognitive operations effective readers use with narrative and expository text.
7. Activities to develop word knowledge (vocabulary). Wide reading is the most efficient and effective way to develop students’ vocabulary. However, there are a variety of pedagogical strategies that should also be used to expand the depth and breadth of students’ word knowledge (Johnson, 2016).
