Every teacher wants their students to succeed. Not one teacher out there hopes that there students will perform poorly. So… if there was a simple, easy to implement process that would take your students’ passing rate from 50% to 96% you would jump right on it. Right?

Well, here is Shantell Berrett, Reading Horizons Teacher Trainer and Dyslexia Specialist, sharing why a simple strategy called dictation can dramatically boost passing rates simply by tweaking the way information is presented AND how to use this strategy. The best part? It’s so easy to implement:

So… how do you implement this simple and powerful process of dictation?

Step 1: You (as the teacher or tutor) say the word twice (this can be a word you are having the student read, or a word that is part of their spelling or vocabulary list).

Step 2: Have the students’ say the word back twice.

Step 3: Have the students’ write the word once.

Step 4: Have the students’ read the word once (by having them mark the word, decode it, and then read it).

Results:

Here are the results of one teacher that was trained by Jay Kelly (as mentioned in the video), after using this process for just 2 weeks:

•  25 students in her mainstream 6th grade class.
•  18 mainstream.
•  7 receive special services.
•  Normally about 50% (12-13) of students pass the vocabulary tests.
•  The only thing she did differently in this case was to introduce the words using dictation and give the test using dictation.
•  This time 96% (24/25) passed.
•  All 7 special services students passed.
•  The only student who didn't pass refused to say the words back.

The only student who didn't pass refused to participate in the process.

How’s that for powerful results? From 50% passing rate to 96%! And the only student who didn’t pass refused to participate.

We'd love to hear the results of any teacher that tries this strategy!!

If you want to learn more of these simple, powerful strategies for struggling readers (and all students learning to read)… check out our free 30-day online workshop! >

Developing Fluent Readers with Dr. Neil J. Anderson
Reading fluency is receiving increased visibility in classrooms around the world, yet many programs fail to understand how to fully integrate this essential reading skill into a reading curriculum. Likewise, programs face challenges in knowing how to explicitly develop this important skill.

Teaching All Students to Read: Is It Really Possible with Dr. Joseph Torgesen
Dr. Torgesen is a past member of National Board of Education Sciences, and was given the Orton Award from the International Dyslexia Association in 2006 for his contributions to the science of reading and dyslexia.

Teach the Students – Not Just the Curriculum with Eldering Wyrick
Many bright, gifted students experience failure when the curriculum is emphasized more than the students are. The curriculum is a teaching tool in the hands of a professional teacher.

Our webinars are always free so, take some time to tap into these important trends and tips. And, don't forget to share this blog with other teaching professionals. Listed below are more largely-viewed presentations from the past year:

The importance of Foundational Phonics in Teaching Struggling Adolescent Readers with Linda Eversole

Creating Synergy Between Mainstream Reading Instruction and Special Education with Stacy Hurst

My Road to: “The Reading Room”: An Examination to Today’s Storytelling in Popular Entertainment with Randy Feldman

Tips and Techniques for Successful Proposals with Deborah Ward

You won't want to miss this one! Take a moment to register for our next Branch Out webinar:

Differences Between Success and Failure: The Five Phases of RTI Implementation with Dr. John E. McCook
Many school districts begin RTI as an add on responsibility due to a mandate or best practice document… and never address the phases of implementation.

Dr. Monica Bomengen

It seems to be the message that has pounded our culture for the past few years: exercise more, be more active, take better care of your body, and watch your health habits. Conversely, parents and educators have worried about the ills of sedative activities such as extensive participation in TV viewing, internet browsing, and video games. Through these repetitive messages about exercise and activity I think we have all established in our minds that exercise and activity help our bodies become stronger. Just like increasing the amount of exercise we engage in helps our bodies become stronger, increasing the amount of activity we put into reading increases the strength of reading comprehension.  

Successful readers employ strategies for active reading, whereby the reader engages in activities that require thought beyond simply decoding the text. Active reading strategies increase the likelihood that the child will comprehend what he is reading. There are six strategies commonly associated with active reading:

1. Connecting
2. Visualizing
3. Questioning
4. Inferring Determining Importance in Text 
5. Synthesizing

All of these strategies are modeled in the classroom by effective reading teachers. They can also be employed at home by parents of young readers. Many parents might be surprised to find that they already use one or more of these strategies when they read aloud to their children. This post will focus on utilizing the connecting strategy.


Connecting Strategy

The Connecting strategy is one that parents can model for young readers at home during story time. Modeling is a powerful instructional technique. The parent can model Connecting by showing the child a book with several pictures, which will engage even readers who struggle. As the parent reads to the child, s/he should stop periodically and “think out loud” about the connections that s/he makes in his or her mind while reading the text.

Making personal connections to the reading increases comprehension by giving young children a frame of reference for what they are reading. Connecting to the text is classified by reading teachers as either text-to-self (T-S), text-to-world (T-W), or text-to-text (T-T).

The Connections strategy is commonly used throughout the reading process (before, during, and after). As the wording suggests, "text-to-self" involves students connecting what they read to their own lives, "text-to-world" is connecting their reading to other people and events, and "text-to-text" is making connections with other reading.

Text-to-self connections occur when the child identifies something in the text that engages or attracts him or her to the text by reminding the child of his or her own life. For example, a young child who is being read Dr. Seuss’s Green Eggs and Ham probably can make the text-to-self connection of disliking certain foods. While reading to the child, the parent could ask questions designed to help the child connect the text to himself or herself, such as “What would you do if I gave you green eggs for breakfast?” or “What is your favorite food to eat for breakfast?”

Text-to-world connections help the child tie what is being read to experiences that the child has had outside of his home. The parent might bring up a family trip or vacation, errands to town where the child has accompanied the parent, or the school that the child attends. To return to our Dr. Seuss example, the parent might ask if the school cafeteria has ever served green food. Answering the question requires that the child activate his or her own knowledge and experiences.

Text-to-text connections involve recognizing when reading a particular text causes the reader to think about another text he or she has read. For young children with little reading experience, it can be helpful to think of watching television programs or films as visual texts, to provide additional references for the little readers. The parent might reference Sesame Street or another educational TV program and ask the child, “What do you think Elmo would do if we gave him green eggs and ham?”

The Connections reading strategy is used to activate students' prior knowledge and to help them make predictions about what they are going to read. These activities are important for young readers because they increase the likelihood that the child will comprehend the words that are read. Parents who employ the Connections strategy can help their children become stronger readers.

P.S.

We will continue to add posts on the other 5 strategies for building reading comprehension. Be sure to subscribe to Reading Horizons RSS feed for automatic updates from our blog!

If you enjoyed this post you may also enjoy:

Building Reading Comprehension through Questioning Techniques

Reading Strategies That Work for Struggling Readers: Annotating Text

Reading Strategies that Work for Struggling Readers: KWL Charts

Guest blog post from, Reading & Other Learning Disabilities: A Blog by Dr. Gary G. Brannigan and Dr. Howard Margolis

Many children with reading disabilities have poor memories. Fortunately, teachers can do a great deal to improve the memory of these children, which, in turn, improves their learning. To do this, teachers must first capture and then keep the children's attention. They must then focus instruction on the acronym REMOS: Repeat It, Elaborate or Explain it, Make it Meaningful, Organize it, and engage in Spaced or Distributed Practice.

In practical terms, the teacher must get the children to:

Attend to What’s Important. Teachers have a good chance of capturing and keeping children’s attention if they're enthusiastic about what they're teaching, make it interesting, use novelty, use words the children can understand, use pictures or multimedia to illustrate what they want remembered, and assign materials the children can read comfortably.

To keep the attention of children with reading disabilities during a lecture, teachers should break the lecture into eight to ten minute blocks. Each block should focus on one concept; the first few minutes should emphasize the main point; the next few minutes should elaborate on it. After each block, the children should take a break. During the break, the teacher might tell a story to illustrate the major concept, or the children might engage in a short group activity, like scripting a podcast, or individually, they might spend five minutes illustrating the major concept. They might even spend a few minutes exercising lightly. To learn more about structuring a lecture to keep a class’s attention, read Brain Rules. In this enlightening book, John Medina describes how and why he divides his lectures into ten-minute blocks.

Repeat It. If you want to remember something, repeat it or lose it. Teachers need to structure their lessons so children with reading disabilities have many opportunities to repeat and practice what they need to remember. Repeat does not mean saying it silently one or two times. If it's important, children should say it six or seven times, maybe twelve to sixteen times, maybe seventeen to umpteen times. However, asking children to repeat what they don't understand often benefits no one. They quickly forget what's not understood, what's not meaningful to them. Elaboration can make things meaningful.

Elaborate on It. To say it another way, teachers should create lots of opportunities for children to talk about it, and talk about it, and talk about it. Children should discuss it. If it’s controversial, they might switch between the “pro” and “con” positions. Talk is important, but it should be meaningful. The more meaningful something is, the more likely it will be remembered.

Make It Meaningful. The more children understand something, the more likely they'll remember it. Teachers can give meaning to an abstract concept by helping children relate it to their lives. To reinforce and extend the meaning of the word practical, the teacher might begin a discussion by asking, “So in your house or near it, what do people do that's practical? What makes it practical? After the discussion, the teacher might ask the children to “take five minutes to draw a picture of someone doing something practical and something impractical.” To make practical even more meaningful, she can have the children share their pictures: “Show your pictures to your neighbor. Tell your neighbor what was practical and impractical in your picture. And tell them why it was practical and impractical.”

Organize the Information. When teachers help children with reading disabilities to organize information—in ways the children find meaningful—they'll remember the information better than if it's random or unorganized. Here's a list of ten words: pineapple, collie, cantaloupe, chihuahua, bulldog, apple, grape, terrier, boxer, peach. If children try to remember all the words as one list, they'll forget most of them in a week. If they organize the words into the categories of dogs and fruit, they'll remember many more of them. Even their mistakes will fall into the two groups: dogs and fruit. Try it.

The teacher must also:

Schedule Spaced or Distributed Practice. When referring to children with reading disabilities, spaced or distributed practice refers to assessing the effects of instruction a day or two after the initial instruction and then re-teaching children what they didn't remember or master. For maximum effect, teachers should repeat the process some three to four weeks later. They should assess what was taught and re-teach what was forgotten. This can have a profound effect on the children’s memory and application of skills.

The good news about gaining and maintaining children's attention and using REMOS is that the principles are straightforward. Teachers can use them—easily. So can parents.

Resources
Medina, J. (2009). Brain rules. Seattle, WA: Pear Press.

Howard Margolis, Ed.D. © Reading2008 & Beyond www.reading2008.com
A version of this column was originally published by Howard Margolis, Ed.D. on www.reading2008.com.  Howard is also co-author of Reading Disabilities: Beating the Odds.

As the school year ends, we know most teachers are excited for a break. There will be a point where reflection is necessary to evaluate how the year went and what to do differently for next year. We do understand, however, that at this point you are just grateful you survived!

When you are ready to reflect and evaluate, we would like to offer a few suggestions that might be helpful for teaching reading in years to come. When evaluating your teaching experience over the past school year, here are some questions to consider:

• How do you feel your students did in regards to reading? 
• Did you feel like you knew how to reach all of your students, even those that had a difficulty with reading? 
• Were you frustrated or overwhelmed at any point with your instruction?
• Did you ever question whether your teaching was effective? 
• Did you feel like you knew specifically how to teach reading?

If you aren’t satisfied with your response to these questions, you are not alone. Beginning reading instruction is one of the most difficult subjects to teach. Some reasons for this include:

1. Since learning to read is an automatic process for most, it is difficult to instruct others in a step-by-step approach to learning to read.

Most people remember reading as children, but few remember specifically how they learned to read. This is because, for most, learning to read is an automatic process. Because we do not remember how we learned to read, it is difficult to explain to others how to develop the skill.

2. The English language has a complicated structure.

We probably understand basic rules, like i before e except after c, and know the phonemes, such as ch says /ch/. However, there is usually very little that we can explain about the structure of our language. 

3. There are several theories and arguments as to what is the most effective type of reading instruction.

Since it is difficult to remember how we learned to read, it is also difficult for us to know how to teach someone else to read. Over the years researchers have studied several different methods for approaching reading instruction, often with contradictory results. This is because for around 70% of students, they learn to read regardless of the reading instruction they receive. The type of reading instruction used is primarily important for the 30% of students that do not automatically learn to read. Research has proven these students must be taught to read systematically and explicitly. Teachers must be trained in how to do this to be effective and to help all students become efficient readers.

Although systematic and explicit reading instruction is only necessary for struggling students, it is beneficial to all students, even automatic readers. A systematic, explicit phonics program provides students with the “why” behind our language. It empowers them with useful reading strategies to handle unfamiliar words rather than forcing them to guess and memorize the word for future use.

SOLUTION

To help reading teachers improve reading instruction to help all students, not just 70% of their students, Reading Horizons offers online teacher training. Every teacher who participates in this online teacher training over the summer could go back to school in the fall ready to help all of their students effectively gain reading skills.

Sign up for a Free 30-day Trial: Reading Horizons Online Training for Reading Teachers