Fluency
Oral Reading Fluency
Decoding and Encoding – Beginning
How Children Learn to Read Words: Ehri’s Phases
By Holly B. Lane
“Through decades of research on beginning readers, Linnea Ehri (1995) developed a theory about how word reading skills develop. Her theory helps us understand the phases children move through on their way to proficient reading. Understanding this theory also helps us understand how to promote progress through these phases in both typically developing and struggling readers.”
By Louisa C. Moats
Hands-On Decoding: Guidelines for Using Manipulative Letters
By Paige Cullen Pullen and Holly B. Lane
This article provides evidence for the effectiveness of using manipulative letters to teach decoding skills and guidelines for how to create and implement decoding lessons using manipulative letters.
Blending Wheels: Tools for Decoding Practice
By Holly Lane and Paige Cullen Pullen
Learn about the importance of teaching students to decode and how the use of blending wheels can enhance classroom decoding practice. The article includes directions for how to make blending wheels and how to use them with your students.
Decoding and Encoding – Advanced
Video: Teaching Kids to Read Big Words
By Holly B. Lane
By R. Malatesha Joshi, Rebecca Treiman, Suzanne Carreker, and Louisa C. Moats
“In 1773, Noah Webster stated that “spelling is the foundation of reading and the greatest ornament of writing.” He was right. Good spelling is critical for literacy, and it makes writing much easier—allowing the writer to focus on the ideas to be conveyed, not the letters needed to put those ideas on paper. But ever since Webster’s “spellers” (which focused on how to spell the sounds that make up words and thus taught spelling and reading simultaneously) went out of fashion in the early 1900s, spelling has not received as much attention as reading. The present article discusses why spelling is important and how it can best be taught.”
Word Detectives: Using Units of Meaning to Support Literacy
This article examines overall trends in morphological instruction and offers a view into what effective morphological instruction looks like in K–8 classrooms.
Helping Students with Dyslexia Read Long Words Using Syllables and Morphemes
“Teaching the meanings of common affixes and steps for inferring the meanings of affixed words enhances students’ word learning and fosters their interest in and attention to words.”
A reference sheet listing meanings and examples of prefixes, suffixes, Latin roots, and Greek roots.
By Holly B. Lane
“As students move beyond reading simple texts, they will encounter more and more multisyllabic words. Being able to read those words quickly and accurately is important. To read big words, it helps if students have a strong understanding of how syllables and morphemes work in those words. It also helps to know about etymology, or the origin of words.”
Syllable Types: A Strategy for Reading Multisyllabic Words
By Mary Knight-McKenna
This article provides information about explicit strategy instruction for multisyllabic word decoding. It includes a description of syllable types, how to teach them, and how to help students use knowledge of syllable types to decode multisyllabic words.
Phonological Awareness
Preventing Reading Failure: Phonological Awareness Assessment and Instruction
By Holly B. Lane, Paige C. Pullen, Mary R. Eisele, and Luann Jordan
This article provides an overview of phonological awareness development and its relationship to beginning reading. It also includes methods for formal and informal assessment and strategies for classroom-based instruction in phonological skills for emergent readers.
Recommended Books
Speech to Print: Language Essentials for Teachers By Louisa Cooks Moats
Beginning to Read: Thinking and Learning About Print By Marilyn Jager Adams
Making Sense of Phonics By Isabel Beck and Mark Beck
Equipped for Reading Success By David A. Kilpatrick
Unlocking Literacy: Effective Decoding and Spelling Instruction By Marcia K. Henry and Maryanne Wolf
