TBCS - Craig - Inquiry - Reading - Phonics

Background

I teach a Year 4-6 class which has a wide range of abilities. I was excited to have new students join my class. One, in particular, a year 4 student I will call "N" came to my class with the label of Dyslexia. It became apparent very early one that she was unable to read. She had not been taught Reading or Writing at all and was functioning at a Year 1 level. What a challenge!
I come from a school where every student was taught using a comprehensive phonics programme and I saw the results with my own children and with the other students I taught in the school. Would this work for N?
Lexia, our normal programme for foundational reading training is not working for her. She was assessed at a year one level and with no prior learning in sounds and no word attack skills, she is struggling and I need to think of another way to help her learn...

Question

How can I best help N  catch up 4 years of learning in English?

Inquiry

Can teaching a full phonics programme to N help her to read and therefore write and reach a Level 2 level in her work?

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From the book, "Effective Literacy Practice in Years 1-4" Ministry of Education, pg 32

"In order to become readers and writers, children need to develop a knowledge of the name and sounds of the letters of the alphabet and of letter-sound relationships."

"Children do not have to be able to name every letter of the alphabet before they begin formal instruction in reading and writing. They do, however, need to develop phonemic awareness and to understand that there is a relationship between spoken sounds and the letters that represent them."

"Phonemic awareness is fundamental to early success in reading and writing. It enables children to develop the understanding of letter-sound relationships that is essential to decoding and encoding. Children have to be able to distinguish sounds before they can match them with the letters that represent them."

"An understanding of phonics also underpins children's literacy learning. Children need to learn through deliberate, focused instruction, which letters represent which sounds. they learn a great deal about letter-sound relationships through writing. Beginning writers constantly engage with the problem of which letters represent the sounds in the words they want to use. In doing so, they lay a sound basis of knowledge about relationships between letters and sounds. Effective teaching helps writing the understandings they gain during reading and oral language activities."

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From the "New Zealand Curriculum" Level One English

Listening. Reading, and Viewing
Processes and strategies
Students will...

Acquire and begin to use sources of information, processes, and strategies to identify, form, and express ideas.

Indicators

• has an awareness of the connections between oral, written, and visual language.
• uses sources of information (meaning, structure, visual and grapho-phonic information) and prior knowledge to make sense of a range of texts.
• associates sounds with letter clusters as well as with individual letters.

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S.E.N.C.O's help was sort.

I tested N in

Maths (J.A.M), Working at Level 1
Reading (Running Record) Level 1 at 50% accuracy
Writing (Sample) 10 minute unassisted  10 words 40% correct.
Spelling (Essential Selling Lists) 5/10 for list 1. 6/20 for list 2

N was separately tested for letter names, both upper and lower case and short sounds of letters.
Letter names 19/26 Short sounds 22/26 Blends7/36

An application was lodged with the R.T.L.B with an I.C.S (In Class Support) Assesment asking for an hour a day teacher aid time to help N and give me extra time to help her.

I talked through the issue with my principal. I shared with him that I wanted to use the phonics programme that had been developed in my last school. He agreed to contact my last school to seek permission to use the programme. Permission was given.

In a meeting with the principal and S.E.N.C.O we talked through the best method of delivery and could we find or modify any teacher aid hours to free me to run this programme with her. It was agreed that room 4 could decrease their time with the teacher aid, giving me 20 mins 4 times a week to run this programme with her.

The programme comprises of 115 individual sheets that cover all letter sounds short and long, blends,

The programme will be delivered in a one on one situation using the sheets along with the teaching strategies of modeling, prompting, questioning, giving feedback, and explaining. (Effective Literacy Practice, Deliberate acts of Teaching pg 76-87)

15th August We started. Spent time on alphabet letter names and short sounds of letters. There were several letters she stumbled on. Three, in particular, were b, d, and p. The sheet worked on the short 'a' sound.

16th August We revised the alphabet letter sounds, redid sheet 1 to check that what we had learned the day before had been 'caught' and introduced sheet 2 which was also on the short 'a' sound.

A similar pattern is followed each session. We always go through all the letter sounds to start. We revise the sheet from last time. I introduce the new sheet. I only shart a new sheet if the previous sheet is completed without error.

The sheets explored the short sounds a, e, i, o, u, and them reviewed them for several sheets.

17 September Sheet 9. We have completed the short sounds of the vowels and are beginning the blends.
It takes a little for N to catch on, but with some modeling, prompting, and explaining, she catches on and we complete the first of the blends.
She quickly takes the concept on board and makes blends of other letters that are not being targetted by the sheets, showing good thought process and transference of knowledge.

16th October Sheet 16. This sheet is working on blends at the ends of words - ft, ld, lf, lk, lp, lt. the blends are not so hard, but the 'e' in the middle of some of the words trip her up. Words like self, weld, and felt with a short e sound that doesn't seem to fit was a stumbling block. I ended up teaching her that 'el' says long l. This departed a little from the lesson with ending blends but made more sense. It took 4 consecutive goes to complete this sheet.

29 October Sheet 18. Today we looked at the ending 'ng'. N made good progress and we will go through the sheet again tomorrow.

Exciting News! N got back to class after completing her phonics lesson and managed to complete 15 units in Lexia! She is transferring what she is learning and it is making a big difference in her classwork. She is proud of herself and I am proud of her too!

31 October Sheet 19. We looked at end blends 'nk' and 'nt'. Steve observed my lesson and in discussion with N after the observation, he found out that I also get N to copy out the words on the sheet. This helps her not only learn the sounds, but also to learn how to correctly form the letters. This is done as an extra to Penmanship which is taught separately. Steve found out that she didn't say the sounds in her head as she wrote them.

From now on I am going to encourage N and the others doing the Phonics programme to say the sounds of the letters and blends as they write them, thus forming stronger connections.
Thanks Steve.


End of Year
Great progress has been made, but we have only just really started... I look forward to continuing next year.

2020

25 February.
The year has begun for real. N is continuing to make pleasing progress and us up to sheet 29.
R is progressing well and is up to sheep 21.
M left the school, so, unfortunately, did not get to finish the program which was a great shame.

Two more students who did not learn phonics in the junior class were identified as students who would benefit from going through the program, so I now have 4 individual lessons to give. Teacher aid time has been given to cover the time required. W has made a quick start and is already up to sheet 11 and K is up to 9.

One new aspect I want to do for my phonics students is to place them in a reading group together where they can have the freedom to sound words and encourage each other to put into practice what they are learning. It will also increase interest and help them see their own progress.



Design for Learning

• Structuring learning tasks so that all ākonga experience a degree of success, but also ensuring that they are required to stretch themselves to fully succeed.

Teaching

• Using feedback from classroom observations to improve learning programmes.
• Seeking advice and feedback from colleagues on planning units, useful resources, and strategies to enhance ākonga interest and engagement.
• Monitoring of ākonga learning during the implementation of a programme of learning, so that the programme can be adapted where needed to better achieve desired outcomes for ākonga.