Videos: Shorts

Teachers often turn to nonsense words for phonics practice, believing they build decoding skills. But is this practice worth our instructional time? We look into the role that nonsense words play in assessment and instruction.

Quick, practical ideas to help build readers' accuracy and confidence. Learn how simple changes to practice can make a big impact on accuracy and fluency.

Subskill automaticity targets practicing a foundational reading subskill (e.g., letter names, letter-sound correspondences, word reading) with isolated, structured repetition. A comprehensive, step-by-step guide on how to use this practice to cement the skill to the point of effortless retrieval.

Students with different reading profiles struggle in different ways. Knowledge of the general characteristics of students with specific comprehension deficits, dyslexia, and mixed-type reading difficulty can guide effective classroom support.

Encoding is the process of taking a spoken word, segmenting it into smaller parts, and representing those parts in written form. It is the reverse process of decoding and a component of spelling. Spelling is often used synonymously with encoding, but spelling refers to a broader linguistic process. While some words can be spelled using encoding alone, others require writers to apply spelling conventions unique to each written language system.

This routine for spelling multisyllabic words supports students in applying a simple and consistent strategy to encode words with more than one syllable. A comprehensive, step-by-step guide on how to use this routine to break the encoding process into manageable chunks.

Discover how small shifts in word work or spelling instruction can strengthen reading and writing skills.

Word sorts are categorization activities that reinforce previously taught phoneme-grapheme (sound-letter) correspondences. A comprehensive, step-by-step guide on how to use word sorts to support students' attention to orthographic details and the precision needed for accurate spelling and fluent reading.

Decoding is the process of using learned letter-sound correspondences to sound out words and typically precedes more automatic, effortless word recognition. When a student demonstrates automatic word recognition, they access the word as if by sight. Decoding is the reverse process of encoding.

The Advanced Decoding Routine equips students with a powerful tool for reading complex multisyllabic words. A comprehensive, step-by-step guide on how to use this routine to help students apply their knowledge of morphemes and syllables to decode unknown words.