Alison Clarke

Speech Pathologist

Clifton Hill Child and Adolescent Therapy Group

www.spelfabet.com.au

Learning to read changes the brain Neuronal

recycling gives us access to the spoken language system through vision

http://dana.org/Cerebrum/2013/Inside_the_Letterbox__How_Literacy_Transforms_the_Human_Brain/

Learning to readenhances speech processing

Once literate, the brain responds to speech and writing in the same way.

Comprehension of complex sentences improves

Speech sounds are encoded differently

More verbal working memory in literate people

See Stanislas Dehaene “Reading in the Brain”.

Summary of research Use of context doesn’t drive skilled reading

Context helps decipher word meanings

Good readers process every word in print

Phonemic awareness, decoding skills, and fast, accurate word recognition are most predictive of successful early reading

The primary problem in poor readers is underdeveloped word recognition (accuracy & speed)

(Kilpatrick 2015, Spear-Swerling 2015)

“There is a profound disconnection between the science of reading and educational practice.”

“The methods commonly used to teach children are inconsistent with basic facts about human cognition and development and so make learning to read more difficult than it should be. They inadvertently place many children at risk for reading failure. They discriminate against poorer children.” (Language at the Speed of Sight, p9)

Professor Mark Seidenberg, University of Wisconsin-Madison

The three-cueing system

The Wait To Fail (WTF) system

PIRLS 2012

25% of Australian Year 4s below international reading benchmark

7% “very low”

PISA 2016 The reading literacy performance for Australia and

eight other countries declined significantly between 2009 and 2015. For Australia this decline was 12 points.

61% of Australian students achieved the National Proficient Standard in reading literacy.

Australian Adult Literacy and Life Skills Survey

44% of adults lack the literacy skills required to cope with the complex demands of modern life.

We need to replace WTF with RTI

First grade students below the30th %ile after research-based instruction

Foorman et al 1998 – 5%

Mathes et al 2001 – 6%

Allor et al 2002 – 6%

Mathes et al 2006 – 5%

Felton 1993 – 3.8%

Vellutino et al 1996 – 4.5%

Torgesen et al 1999 – 4%

Torgesen et al 2002 – .7%

Why isn’t there research-based instruction in every school already?

Teachers usually taught about John Dewey (1859-1952)

Jean Piaget (1896-1980)

Paolo Friere (1929-1997)

Lev Vygotsky (1896-1934)

Jerome Bruner (1915-2016)

Maria Montessori (1870-1952)

Marie Clay (1926-2007)

Frank Smith (1928-)

Kenneth Goodman (1927-)

But not

Anne Castles

Charles Perfetti (1948-)

James Chapman

John Sweller (1946-)

Keith Stanovich (1950-)

Linnea Ehri

Louisa Moats (1944)

Maggie Snowling (1955-)

Max Coltheart (1939-)

Marilyn Adams (1948-)

Mark Seidenberg

Maryanne Wolf

Stanislas Dehaene (1965-)

William Tunmer (1947-)

Powerful educational narratives

Progressive/liberal Conservative/traditional

We construct our own reality

Inquiry/discovery learning

School as learning wonderland for self-actualisation

Teacher as Guide on the Side or Peer at the Rear

Sitting in circles

Teaching how to learn

Assess via teacher observation

Whole Language

“Literacies” e.g. digital literacy

There is an objective reality

Direct instruction

School as factory producing workers for capitalism

Teacher as Sage on the Stage dispensing knowledge

Sitting in rows

Teaching content and skills

Assess via objective tests

Phonics

Reading and spelling

Alternative facts taught to teachers

We learn to read in much the same way we learn spoken language.

Reading is a psycholinguistic guessing game.

“Phonics is a flat-earth view of the world since it rejects modern science about reading and writing and how they develop” (1986)

Goodman and Smith on phonics Phonics is irrelevant, people read for meaning not sound.

English is too irregular.

Even the consistent patterns are too complicated to teach.

Children who learn via phonics become poor readers.

Drill-and-kill phonics methods are soul-draining and stifle children’s interest in reading, and are tedious to teach.

Marie Clay 1998 Beginning readers “need to use their

knowledge of how the world works; the possible meanings of the text; the sentence structure; the importance of order of ideas, or words, or letters; the size of words or letters; special features of sound, shape and layout; and special knowledge from past literary experiences before they resort to left to right sounding out of chunks or letter clusters, or in the last resort, single letters.”

Brian Cambourne, Wollongong Uni The ecological research I've completed in schools has convinced

me that a "reading-is-decoding" definition of reading creates teaching practices which alienate many less advantaged children from deep engagement in life-long reading. An American teacher has identified this phenomenon as "Read-i-cide" defined thus: "The systematic killing of love of reading, often exacerbated by the inane, mind-numbing practices found in schools".

Decoding demands intensive drill and practice on the small bits of language before meaningful enjoyable texts can be read. Meaning-making is put on hold until decoding skills are developed. This makes it very difficult for learners to focus on what evolution has designed them to do -- namely go straight to meaning from visual symbol using linguistic clues that are far more useful than sound.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2009-03-24/31284

Misty Adoniou, Canberra Uni

Aust Literacy Educators Assoc

Aust Literacy Educators Assoc

Nobody is recommending“phonics-only instruction”

Publishers sell what sells

A horse came along…Neigh, neigh!

A cow came along. Moo, Moo!

readingmatters.com.au

littlelearnersloveliteracy.com.au

Prof John Hattie (Melb Uni, AITSL) on effective teaching strategies

Few teachers are taught about Phonology – the 44 sounds, phonotactics

Graphemes, orthotactics

Syllable structure – what’s a CVCC? What’s an open syllable? Effect of stress e.g. record

Shared spellings e.g. soon, good, flood, brooch

Morphology: prefixes, suffixes, word roots/stems

Etymology – the stories of English

If you know it, share it Phonology

Orthography

Morphology

Scientific research about the best way to get ALL children reading

Strategies and resources that are consistent with the research

DSM5 Specific Learning DisorderA. Difficulties with learning and using at least one of

these academic skills, persisting for at least 6 months despite targeted intervention:

Word reading (inaccurate or slow and effortful).

Reading comprehension.

Spelling.

Written expression (grammar, punctuation, organisation, ideas).

Difficulties with number sense, facts, calculation.

Difficulties with mathematical reasoning.

DSM5 Specific Learning DisorderB. Substantially and quantifiably below average on

standardised measures, and causing significant interference with school, work or daily living.

C. Begin during the school-age years but may not be fully manifest till later.

D. Not better accounted for by intellectual, sensory, mental or neurological disorders, psychosocial adversity, language proficiency or inadequate instruction.

DSM5 SLD Subtypes 315.00 (F81.0) with impairment in reading (dyslexia)

315.2 (F81.81) with impairment in written expression

315.1 (F81.2) With impairment in mathematics (dyscalculia)

Mild, Moderate or Severe

Prevalence: 5-15% at school age, 4% of adults

More males (ratios between 2:1 and 3:1)

No neat boundaries

dyslexia

dysgraphia

attentiondeficit

autismspectrum

languagedisorder

dyspraxia

“The characterisation of developmental learning disabilities, including reading, in the current version (of the DSM-5) is idiosyncratic and does not align well with the research literature….

(DSM-5) serves important clinical and administrative functions…but it is not the best source for information about the nature and treatment of these conditions” (Seidenberg 2017)

What value does a diagnosis add?

Can be a relief for child and family -not lack of intelligence or effort.

Can take a long time, be expensive.

Informative for programming?

Extra resources?

Squarely locates problem in child not curriculum.

Word study

Key concepts Words are made of sounds, written with letters

A sound can be written with 1, 2, 3 or 4 letters, e.g. hi, tie, night, height

Most sounds are written a few different ways

Some sounds/spellings go together, or go in specific places in words/syllables

Many spellings are used for more than one sound, e.g. chips, chemist, chef (from different languages)

Word parts can have special spellings and meaning

In the 21st century, spelling is the abandoned stepchild in the family of language arts.

Joshi, Treiman, Carreker & Moats

Spelling instruction NOT memorisation of HF Words or vocabulary lists

NOT look-cover-write-check

Rules aren’t a lot of help – too metalinguistic, not accurate

Instruction should teach something about spelling: A new phoneme-grapheme correspondence,

A new word structure e.g. CVCC

A new grapheme or graphemes e.g. the que in boutique

Where to double letters, where to change y to i

The difference between homophones

How to add prefixes or suffixes

Words with the same Latin or Greek roots

1. Basic Code

All the consonant sounds except /zh/

Common variations e.g. c as in cat, k as in kit, ck as in back

5 vowels: a as in cat, e as in red, i as in bin, o as in hot, u as in cup.

VC and CVC

Then CCVC and CVCC

Maybe try CCCVC and CVCCC and longer words

Plurals e.g. cats and dogs

Past tense e.g. pact and packed

2. Extended Code

19 more vowel sounds,

first major spellings

Then additional spellings, grouped so patterns are obvious

Common consonant spellings that go with these vowels e.g. ce in voice, se in house and please, ge in large.

Homophones e.g. sale/sail, paw/poor/pour/pore

Major syllable types e.g. open/closed syllables, -ing, -le

3. Advanced Code

Unstressed vowel as in butter, actor, collar, sofa, centre, harbour, fixture…

Less common consonants e.g. ch in school, ph in phone, x in xero

Prefixes e.g. disagree, disrespect, incomplete, immortal…

Suffixes e.g. dryer, toaster; careful, hopeful; action, musician

Word parts like the “chron” in chronic, synchronise, chronicle.

Handwriting helps reading Learning how to write individual letters and words by

hand, and doing so fluently, is essential to entrench reading as an automatic skill.

Typing letters does not have the same impact.

“When writing by hand becomes both legible and fluent, reflecting a sense of automaticity, the writer is able to generate more text. Precious, scarce working memory spaces becomes available to select better vocabulary and get it into the page in interesting, organized ways.” (Dr Hetty Roessingh 2013)

Articulation and spelling

From L Twomey, adapted from Shriberg’s order.

Persistent, mild speech production difficulties beyond age 6;9 are associated with literacy acquisition difficulties. (Nathan, et al., 2004).

www.spelfabet.com.au

Free tests @ www.motif.org.au

Now free! At http://uldforparents.com

International Dyslexia Association

https://dyslexiaida.org/knowledge-and-practices