Mastering Reading with a 5-Step Lesson Plan:
A Structured Literacy Approach Blog
“If a child can't learn the way we teach, maybe we should teach the way they learn.”
~Ignacio Estrada
Imagine a classroom where every student, regardless of their learning disabilities, becomes a skilled and confident reader.
Picture their faces lighting up with joy as they decode words, comprehend stories, and explore new worlds through the magic of reading.
It's not just a dream; it's a reality waiting to be unlocked, and in this blog, we will uncover the secrets to empowering struggling readers, providing them with the tools they need to master reading and embrace a lifetime of learning. We will delve into the transformative power of a 5-step lesson plan grounded in the structured literacy approach.
Teaching reading requires knowledge! Not only does this mean knowledge of teaching reading, but it also means knowledge of the student you are teaching! Like I always say - knowledge is power!
So before you go any further, you can get that power HERE by taking a reading course with your's truly - me! Gain some additional knowledge on teaching reading HERE - and check out other blogs on this site. All of my blogs are rooted in the research of teaching reading - and most all are focused on teaching reading to students with Learning Disabilities!
Okay, now that we have gotten that out of the way, and you are empowered with knowledge, let's talk how to teach reading with a 5 Step Lesson Plan grounded in the Structured approach to teaching literacy.
Start, gain knowledge of your student! You do this by assessing them in all areas of reading - phonemic awareness, alphabetic principle or phonics, vocabulary, reading comprehension and fluency - plus, spelling.
When we identify a student's strengths, we can leverage them to support any lagging skills, and when we know what our student's lagging skills are, we can directly and explicitly teach those skills.
You can get the reading assessments that I use and highly recommend HERE.
Once you have completed these assessments, you have a profile of your student’s reading strengths and their lagging skills.
Picture their faces lighting up with joy as they decode words, comprehend stories, and explore new worlds through the magic of reading.
It's not just a dream; it's a reality waiting to be unlocked, and in this blog, we will uncover the secrets to empowering struggling readers, providing them with the tools they need to master reading and embrace a lifetime of learning. We will delve into the transformative power of a 5-step lesson plan grounded in the structured literacy approach.
Teaching reading requires knowledge! Not only does this mean knowledge of teaching reading, but it also means knowledge of the student you are teaching! Like I always say - knowledge is power!
So before you go any further, you can get that power HERE by taking a reading course with your's truly - me! Gain some additional knowledge on teaching reading HERE - and check out other blogs on this site. All of my blogs are rooted in the research of teaching reading - and most all are focused on teaching reading to students with Learning Disabilities!
Okay, now that we have gotten that out of the way, and you are empowered with knowledge, let's talk how to teach reading with a 5 Step Lesson Plan grounded in the Structured approach to teaching literacy.
Start, gain knowledge of your student! You do this by assessing them in all areas of reading - phonemic awareness, alphabetic principle or phonics, vocabulary, reading comprehension and fluency - plus, spelling.
When we identify a student's strengths, we can leverage them to support any lagging skills, and when we know what our student's lagging skills are, we can directly and explicitly teach those skills.
You can get the reading assessments that I use and highly recommend HERE.
Once you have completed these assessments, you have a profile of your student’s reading strengths and their lagging skills.
Use my Diagnostic Decision Tree for Reading to determine the focus of your reading instruction, and then, use my 5 Step Reading Lesson Plan to teach your students to read!
What is my 5 Step Reading Lesson Plan?
With my 5 Step Reading Lesson Plan, you will be able to seamlessly implement a best practice, research-based effective reading intervention to help your students have reading success!
My 5 Step Reading Lesson Plan is based on the Science of Reading research and gives you a simple, easy-to-follow lesson plan that targets all Five Pillars of Reading and encoding or spelling, using the principles of Structured Literacy.
What is my 5 Step Reading Lesson Plan?
With my 5 Step Reading Lesson Plan, you will be able to seamlessly implement a best practice, research-based effective reading intervention to help your students have reading success!
My 5 Step Reading Lesson Plan is based on the Science of Reading research and gives you a simple, easy-to-follow lesson plan that targets all Five Pillars of Reading and encoding or spelling, using the principles of Structured Literacy.
Step One
Step One: Sound-Symbol Association Practice
What is it?
A brief, quick-paced 2 to 3 minute sound-symbol practice in which the teacher presents new and previously learned graphemes. Present one grapheme at a time. Review graphemes should be graphemes that assessments are indicated as lagging.
What does it look like?
Sound-Symbol Association Practice should be a quick drill, focusing on the automaticity of retrieval of the letter-sound correspondence. Do this using flashcards or on a projected Google Slide presentation.
Check out my IG reel on Step One and learn more about...
Letter Sound Drills and
Why you should use letter-sound drills!
What is it?
A brief, quick-paced 2 to 3 minute sound-symbol practice in which the teacher presents new and previously learned graphemes. Present one grapheme at a time. Review graphemes should be graphemes that assessments are indicated as lagging.
What does it look like?
Sound-Symbol Association Practice should be a quick drill, focusing on the automaticity of retrieval of the letter-sound correspondence. Do this using flashcards or on a projected Google Slide presentation.
Check out my IG reel on Step One and learn more about...
Letter Sound Drills and
Why you should use letter-sound drills!
Related Resource...
Step Two
Step Two: Phoneme Analysis & Blending Practice
What is it?
Students are explicitly taught how to use sound-symbol associations to decode words through Orthographic Mapping. In this step, students build words and word patterns.
What does it look like?
Students are explicitly taught to use sound-symbol associations to decode words through orthographic mapping.
Click HERE and HERE to learn more about orthographic mapping!
Check out my IG reel on Step Two and learn...
how to teach students to blend sounds into words!
What is it?
Students are explicitly taught how to use sound-symbol associations to decode words through Orthographic Mapping. In this step, students build words and word patterns.
What does it look like?
Students are explicitly taught to use sound-symbol associations to decode words through orthographic mapping.
Click HERE and HERE to learn more about orthographic mapping!
Check out my IG reel on Step Two and learn...
how to teach students to blend sounds into words!
Step Three
Step Three: Fluency Practice
What is it?
This is a quick-paced step, taking fewer than 5 minutes, where students practice reading decodable words and phonetically irregular words (i.e. said) in isolation to build fluency.
What does it look like?
This is a quick-paced step, taking fewer than 5 minutes, where students practice reading decodable words & phonetically irregular words (i.e. said) in isolation to build fluency.
You can use my Oral Reading Fluency Sequence for ALL students or my fluency sequence for students with reading disabilities.
Check out my IG reel on Step Three and...
how to teach scooping for fluency!
What is it?
This is a quick-paced step, taking fewer than 5 minutes, where students practice reading decodable words and phonetically irregular words (i.e. said) in isolation to build fluency.
What does it look like?
This is a quick-paced step, taking fewer than 5 minutes, where students practice reading decodable words & phonetically irregular words (i.e. said) in isolation to build fluency.
You can use my Oral Reading Fluency Sequence for ALL students or my fluency sequence for students with reading disabilities.
Check out my IG reel on Step Three and...
how to teach scooping for fluency!
Related Resource...
Step Four
Step Four: Spelling Practice
What is it?
Students write phonemes, words and 1 to 2 sentences containing patterns from previous steps of the lesson to support learning connections between decoding and encoding. Words should include phonetically regular and irregular (nonsense) words.
What does it look like?
Students write phonemes, words & 1 to 2 sentences containing patterns from previous steps of the lesson to support learning connections between decoding & encoding.
Get the sequence that I use for teaching spelling HERE!
Check out my IG reel on Step Four!
What is it?
Students write phonemes, words and 1 to 2 sentences containing patterns from previous steps of the lesson to support learning connections between decoding and encoding. Words should include phonetically regular and irregular (nonsense) words.
What does it look like?
Students write phonemes, words & 1 to 2 sentences containing patterns from previous steps of the lesson to support learning connections between decoding & encoding.
Get the sequence that I use for teaching spelling HERE!
Check out my IG reel on Step Four!
Step Five
Step Five: Read
What is it?
Students practice reading decodable texts and non-controlled texts to generalize learned skills and to build fluency decoding words in connected text.
What does it look like?
Students practice reading controlled & non-controlled texts.
Please read about using decodable texts during reading intervention HERE! It’s important to understand the true purpose of using decodable texts with students who struggle with reading before you start using them!
And continually, progress monitor!
What is it?
Students practice reading decodable texts and non-controlled texts to generalize learned skills and to build fluency decoding words in connected text.
What does it look like?
Students practice reading controlled & non-controlled texts.
Please read about using decodable texts during reading intervention HERE! It’s important to understand the true purpose of using decodable texts with students who struggle with reading before you start using them!
And continually, progress monitor!
Remember - data drives instruction! So use that initial assessment data (and your continued progress monitoring data) to make instructional decisions. (You can read more about progress monitoring your students HERE.)
My Diagnostic Decision Tree for Reading helps to determine the focus of your reading instruction, and then, you use my 5 Step Reading Lesson Plan to teach your students to read! You want to teach each part each day, but you should spend more time during each lesson on the parts of the lesson plan that my Diagnostic Decision Tree for Reading has determined to be the focus of your reading instruction.
What do I mean by this?
Let’s say when I look at my student’s assessments, my student demonstrates lagging skills in reading comprehension, oral reading fluency, word recognition with phonetically regular and irregular words, and grade level decoding and encoding skills.
My Diagnostic Decision Tree for Reading tells me that the focus of my instruction should be to work on spelling, word recognition, fluency, vocabulary and comprehension skills. This does not mean that you should not teach phonemic awareness skills too because you still do!
Let me give you an example! Let’s say the focus needs to be on fluency and comprehension, I would plan for the following schedule:
My Diagnostic Decision Tree for Reading helps to determine the focus of your reading instruction, and then, you use my 5 Step Reading Lesson Plan to teach your students to read! You want to teach each part each day, but you should spend more time during each lesson on the parts of the lesson plan that my Diagnostic Decision Tree for Reading has determined to be the focus of your reading instruction.
What do I mean by this?
Let’s say when I look at my student’s assessments, my student demonstrates lagging skills in reading comprehension, oral reading fluency, word recognition with phonetically regular and irregular words, and grade level decoding and encoding skills.
My Diagnostic Decision Tree for Reading tells me that the focus of my instruction should be to work on spelling, word recognition, fluency, vocabulary and comprehension skills. This does not mean that you should not teach phonemic awareness skills too because you still do!
Let me give you an example! Let’s say the focus needs to be on fluency and comprehension, I would plan for the following schedule:
And remember - You should still make sure to include direct teaching of any lagging skill areas that were identified in the reading assessments in my 5 Step Reading Lesson Plan.
I know what you are thinking -
how do I fit this all in?
You don't need to remember to fit all of this in. My 5 Step Reading Lesson Plan includes all critical areas required for an effective intervention. You just need to adjust the timing of each component to make it work in your schedule - and when do you ever hear that?
Get my 5 Step Reading Lesson Plan HERE!
And...
Gain more knowledge to become an even more powerful teacher than you already are with my book - A Guide to Designing Reading Instruction for Students with Learning Disabilities. In my guide, I teach you my 3 step approach for designing reading instruction for intervention, based on the science of reading. Click HERE to get my guide today!
Happy and Healthy Teaching!
PEACE,
Miss Rae
Note: Teachers should consider a student’s cognitive profile when designing instruction. Learning is the result of cognition. Every cognitive profile is different and every student is an individual. Learning to read comes at the end of a series of cognitive processes. Some cognitive profiles may respond to rote memorization and/or recommended practices better than others. This is why it is recommended that the teacher consider a student’s cognitive abilities when designing instruction in the area of reading. School psychologists are great resources to help support a teacher’s understanding of the role a student’s cognition will play in their learning to read.