Despite strong theoretical and empirical evidence suggesting that word meaning knowledge plays a critical role in word reading, interventions for students with word reading difficulties and disabilities frequently target word reading instruction in isolation. This article connects reading theory to practice by describing one approach to integrate…

Students with disabilities often find writing extremely challenging (Harris & Graham, 2016). Special educators can, however, promote tremendous gains in students' ability to write by understanding common challenges students face and mastering specific teaching techniques. Students' writing success depends on reducing how much attention and…

The Common Core State Standards (CCSS) initiative is a state-led effort that establishes a set of clear educational standards for English language arts and mathematics that states can voluntarily adopt. The standards have been informed by the best available evidence and the highest standards across the country and the world. They have been…

Showcasing assessment practices that can help teachers plan effective instruction, this book addresses the real-world complexities of teaching literacy in grades K-8. Leading contributors present trustworthy approaches that examine learning processes as well as learning products, that yield information on how the learning environment can be…

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This article introduces Making and Writing Words Using Letter Patterns (MWW-LP), a variation of the popular Making Words word study and spelling instructional activity. Research indicates that proficient readers use knowledge of letter patterns such as onsets, rimes, and affixes to decode unknown words. The MWW-LP activity uses such letter…

To succeed at reading, children must be able to identify or "read" printed words and understand the story or text composed of those words. For many children, increasing reading and school success will involve increasing oral language competence in the elementary years. Lack of appropriate vocabulary knowledge can result in academic failure. (SM)

Examines options for computer support for reading text within a supportive reading environment called "Responsive Text." Notes that Responsive Text is one of a number of programs that utilize computer speech in concert with graphics, text manipulation, and questions, to make text more accessible to poor readers while providing reading instruction…

Making and Writing Words is a variation of Making Words, a popular spelling and word study instructional activity. In Making and Writing Words, students are guided by their teacher in writing and sorting words using a limited set of letters, then students write the words on a sheet of paper designed to accommodate the activity. Teachers have found…

A student's misreading of the word "statues" as "sanctuaries" and an application of miscue analysis show how students' egos can be boosted. The student expressed surprise when informed of his misreading, wondering how he could confuse the words. The student's reading specialist explained to the student that his…

Discusses development and implementation of an approach to decoding in which students use words they know to decode those they do not know. Discusses how an analogy approach was implemented in a tutorial setting. Offers guidelines for how the approach can be used in regular classrooms, including whole language classrooms. (RS)

Describes the Dunn and Dunn Learning Styles Model, along with selected instructional strategies for teaching word recognition to students who cannot master vocabulary and selected language arts skills through conventional methods. Notes that research has revealed the impact of teaching such students through their learning style…

Elaborates on the use of syllabication in teaching pupils to recognize unknown words. Discusses specific methodologies in teaching syllabication. (RS)

Describes how the author worked with one struggling reader to help him learn to make balanced and consistent use of different cues for word identification (graphophonic cues, how words look, grammatical appropriateness of words, sentence meaning, or background knowledge). (SR)

To understand a text, a reader must engage in three important cognitive activities--recognition, comprehension, and memory. Based on this premise, two experiments were conducted with children to assess individual and developmental differences in speed of word recognition and how these differences related to performance on a variety of memory…