Ch 6: Phonics & Sight Words (Instruction and Assessment) (33%)

Question 1

decodable text

Answer 1

single-syllable, regular words and a few high-frequency, irregular sight words can be used to write stories in decodable text

highly controlled vocabulary that includes only recently taught phonics and high frequency words students know

Question 2

the fundamentals of teaching phonics

Answer 2

1) systematic instruction: have a clear list of sound-symbol relationships students should know at their grade level; sequence from simple to complex
2) direct and explicit instruction: teach phonics directly; teach sound-symbol relationships; best taught in small groups who share the same need

Question 3

instructional approaches to direct, explicit teaching of phonics

Answer 3

1) whole-to-part lessons (also called analytic phonics) i.e. basal readers like Houghton Mifflin
2) part-to-whole (also called synthetic phonics) i.e. basal readers like Open Court
* * don’t use in essay ** 3) other approaches: analogy phonics (students taught unknown worse by comparing them to known words in onset and rime) and embedded phonics (students taught phonics incidentally as something that is not the lesson focus)

Question 4

whole-to-part lessons (direct, explicit teaching instructional approach)

Answer 4

starts with sentences, then looks at words, and “end up” with the sound-symbol relationship that is the focus of the lesson
Example for “sh” digraph ending words:
1) teacher presents set of sentence, underlines the target word
2) students read sentence aloud with the teacher, read the underlined word
3) teacher asks what is the same about the underlined words
4) write the sound-symbol relationship “sh” on board, children make the sound
5) children reread the target words one at a time

Question 5

part-to-whole lessons (direct, explicit teaching instructional approach)

Answer 5

begin with the sound and then blend the sounds to build words
Example for “sh” digraph ending words:
1) teacher writes symbol, tells children the sound it makes
2)children say the target sound each time teacher points to it
3) teacher shows letter combos that add to sound to make words (creates cards to put in front of the sound “sh” and makes a word)