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Phonics and the Research 1. Begin Teaching at an Early Age 2. Teach each sound-spelling explicitly. 3. Teach frequent, highly regular sound-spelling relationships systematically. 4. Show children exactly how to sound out words. 5. Use connected, decodable text as they learn. 6. Use interesting stories to develop language comprehension. 7. Balance, but don't mix. Read the full research How to Teach Children to Read 5. Use connected, decodable text for children to practice the sound-spelling relationships they learn. The findings of the NICHD research emphasise that children need extensive practice applying their knowledge of sound-spelling relationships to the task of reading as they are learning them. This integration of phonics and reading can only occur with the use of decodable text. Decodable text is composed of words that use the sound-spelling correspondences that children have learned to that point and a limited number of sight words that have been systematically taught. As the children learn more sound-spelling correspondences, the texts become more sophisticated in meaning, but initially they are very limited. Only decodable text provides children the opportunity to practice their new knowledge of sound-letter relationships in the context of connected reading. Texts that are less decodable do not allow the integration of the phonological knowledge the children gain with actual reading. For example, the first sentence children read in a meaning-based program that added an unintegrated phonic component was: "The dog is up." The sound-letter relationships the children had learned up to this point were: d, m, s, r, and t. This is how much of the sentence the children could read by applying what they had learned in the phonic component: "___ d__ __ __". In this case, it is impossible for the children to use their phonics knowledge to read. Here is a different example: "Sam sees a big fist." The sounds the children have learned to this point are: a, s, m, b, t, ee, f, g, and I. This is how much of the sentence the children can read using the sound-spelling relationships they have learned: "Sam sees a big fist." Decodable text is composed of words that use the sound-spelling correspondencies that children have learned to that point and a limited number of sight words that have been systematically taught.   This sentence is 100% decodable. Here the children can apply the sound-spelling relationships they have learned to their reading of this sentence, so the phonics component is integrated into the child's real reading. Only decodable text provides children a context for using their new knowledge of sound-spelling relationships in the context of real reading. The Problem with Guessing Text that is less decodable requires the children to use prediction or context to figure out words. Much research has evaluated the effectiveness of prediction as a strategy for word recognition. Though prediction is valuable in comprehension for predicting the next event or predicting an outcome, the research indicates that it is not useful in word recognition. The following passage is a sample of authentic text (from Jack London). The parts of the text that are omitted are the part that a child was unable to decode accurately. The child was able to decode approximately 80% of the text. If prediction is a useful strategy, a good reader should be able to read this easily with understanding: He had never seen dogs fight as these w__ish c__ f__t, and his first ex____ t____t him an unf______able l_____n. It is true, it was a vi___ ex______, else he would not have lived to pr__it by it. Curly was the v____. They were camped near the log store, where she, in her friend_ way, made ad_____ to a husky dog the size of a full-____ wolf, th____ not half so large as _he. __ere was no w__ing, only a leap in like a flash, a met__ clip of teeth, a leap out equal_ swift, and Curly's face was ripped open from eye to jaw. It was the wolf manner of fight__, to st___ and leap away; but here was more to it than this. Th____ or forty huskies ran -o the spot and not com___d that s____t circle. But did not com____d that s____t in_____, not the e___ way with which they were licking their chops. Curly rushed her ant_____,who struck again and leaped aside. He met her next rush with his chest, in a p_____ fash___ that tum___ed her off her feet. She never re____ed them. This was __at the on____ing huskies had w_____ for. The use of predictable text, rather than this authentic text, might allow children to use prediction to figure out a passage. However, this strategy would not transfer to real reading, as the above passage demonstrates. Predictable text gives children false success. While this false success may be motivating for many children, ultimately they will not be successful readers if they rely on text predictability to read.

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