Planning Needs-Based Instruction

Sharon Walpole

Michael C. McKenna

Georgia Reading First

What have you told us?

64% report that you need more support in providing intensive intervention59% report that you need more support in designing needs-based instruction

We will focus on needs-based instruction first; it may prevent some intensive intervention

Goals for the day

Examine data from recent reports of the external evaluationBuild knowledge of SBRR strategies for needs-based instructionExamine materials for first-grade instruction and establish individual LC goals for improving needs-based instruction

Agenda for the day

Time and activities for LCNeeds-based instruction– Strange materials today?

• We decided to write a new book

– New strategy: Listen, Read, Discuss• Please don’t “go ahead” in the materials; that

will spoil some of the activities

We will go slowly and finish what’s left in later sessions

Fantasy land

What constitutes literacy coaching?

How do you define it?

Literacy coaching is _________, so literacy coaches __________.

Time and activities for LCs

National Reading Conference presentations in December indicated– LCs around the country are doing many,

many things not related to coaching– LCs around the country are spending too

few hours in direct support of teachers• Discussing data, providing pd, observing with

feedback, modeling

What’s the problem with that?

Literacy coaches will only be “around to stay” if their efficacy is provenLiteracy coach efficacy will only be established by providing direct causal links between coaching and achievementAchievement will only be improved if instruction is improved

How about in Georgia?

The UGA evaluators asked questions about time and activities during the month of October

Here’s what they reported

GARF LC activities, October

Activities Average time

Whole-school PD 2.74 hours

Grade-level PD 3.60 hours

Modeling 2.75 hours

Observation and feedback 2.75 hours

Total direct coaching 11.84 hours

New Year’s resolution

What can you do to increase the amount of time that you personally spend in direct coaching activities?

Program design issues

Select core program materialsSet an instructional schedule– Choose and use a diet of whole-group and small-

group instruction

Evaluate and reevaluate the instructional schedule– Observe to provide differentiated support to

teachers– Analyze student data to determine effectiveness

Implement intensive interventions

Three-Tiered Instruction

Tier 1Whole-Group Instruction

Tier 2Needs-Based Instruction

Tier 3Intervention

What’s the evidence?

Bursuck et al. describe a successful project, Project PRIDE, where three-tiered instruction promoted student achievement, measured with DIBELS subtests.

Bursuck, W. D., Smith, T., Munk, D., Damer, M., Mehlig, L., & Perry, J. (2004). Evaluating the impact of a prevention-based model of reading on children who are at risk. Remedial and Special Education, 25, 303-313.

But is it fair?

Three-tiered instruction means that some children get different types and amounts of instruction. A recent study indicates that this is not only “fair,” it is effective for children with different profiles at the start of first grade. Connor, C. M., Morrison, F. J., & Katch, L. E. (2004). Beyond

the reading wars: Exploring the effect of child-instruction interactions on growth in early reading. Scientific Studies of Reading, 8, 305-336.

First grade evidence

Beginning Profile Maximum Growth

Weak decoding/ Weak vocabulary

More time in teacher-managed, explicit instruction

Strong decoding/

Strong vocabulary

More time in child-managed implicit instruction

How can we use that data?

We can plan more teacher-directed explicit instruction for our struggling readers; we can provide more practice for our higher-achieving readers.

But you told us to be faithful to the core!

Think about the core as a road. You can go backwards, forwards, or take a side trip and still be on the same trip.

Step One: Gather your resources

Find and examine the scope and sequence of instruction in your core and supplementary materials for phonics skills, high-frequency words, oral vocabulary, and comprehension strategies.

Locate and organize any informal achievement or placement tests that are associated with your materials.

Locate and organize any informal assessments provided in the professional books that your grade level is reading.

Step Two: Consider your children’s needs

Review the most recent grade-level data and determine whether additional informal data are needed.Choose two areas to target for differentiation in a given session (e.g., phonemic awareness and phonics, phonics and fluency, fluency and comprehension, comprehension and vocabulary).Choose differentiation strategies in those areas.Gather or make materials for three weeks’ needs-based instruction.

Step Three: Try it out!

Pilot your plan for three weeks.Gather to evaluate and fine-tune, considering the changing needs of children and teachers.

15-minute time out

Please read pages 4-8 of your handout.

Discuss with your colleagues.

Generate questions.

Phonemic Awareness

Question: Should phonemic awareness instruction connect oral blending and segmenting to letter name instruction?

Odeans, M. K., Sr. (2003). Integration of letter-sound correspondences and phonological awareness skills of blending and segmenting: A pilot study examining the effects of instructional sequence on word reading for kindergarten children with low phonological awareness. Learning Disability Quarterly, 26, 258-280.

Answer

Read pages 9 and 10 to find the answer.

Given the design of the study, how powerful are the findings?

15-minute tryout

Let’s review the developmental sequence for phonological awareness.

The sequence comes from the Kame’enui and Simmons curriculum maps (http://reading.uoregon.edu/appendices/maps.php)

Check yourself on page 11; read page 12.

Instructional Strategies for PA

Read pages 13-18. Then we’ll try them.

Initial sound sortingOral segmenting and blendingSay it and move it

Please keep the manipulatives together; we’ll post a set if you want to make them for your teachers.

Video Examples

Watch Sara work to build phonemic awareness in needs-

based groups.

Building Word Recognition

Roberts, T. (2003). Effects of alphabet-letter instruction on young children’s word recognition. Journal of Educational Psychology, 95, 41-51.

Question: How do letter-name instruction and finger-point reading influence word recognition strategies for emergent readers?

Building Word Recognition

Fry, E. (2004). Phonics: A large phoneme-grapheme frequency count revised. Journal of Literacy Research, 36, 85-98.

Question: What are the most frequently-represented consonant and vowel spelling patterns?

Building Word Recognition

Heibert, E. H., & Martin, L. A. (2002). The texts of beginning reading instruction. In S. B. Neuman & D. K. Dickinson (Eds.), Handbook of early literacy research (pp. 361-376). New York: Guilford.

Question: If emergent readers read only in predictable materials, are their fluency and word learning increased?

Building Word Recognition

Question: Can books leveled for Reading Recovery (which teaches children to use context for word recognition) be used to teach children to rely on phonetic cues?

Cunningham, J. W., Spadorcia, S. A., Erickson, K. A., Koppenhaver, D. A., Sturm, J. M., & Yoder, D. E. (2005). Investigating the instructional supportiveness of leveled texts. Reading Research Quarterly, 40, 410-427.

Building Word Recognition

Question: If you first implement high-quality Tier 1 instruction, what do we know about the relative effectiveness of different interventions?

Mathes, P., Denton, C., &Fletcher, J. (2005). The effects of theoretically different instruction and student characteristics on the skills of struggling readers. Reading Research Quarterly, 40, 148-82.

Answers?

Read pages 19-22 to find out. We’ll start with 15 minutes.

15-minute tryout

Let’s review the developmental sequence for phonics and spelling.

The sequence comes from the Kame’enui and Simmons curriculum maps

(http://reading.uoregon.edu/appendices/maps.php)

Check yourself on page 23; Review the phonic elements on page 24.

Which of these HF words are hardest ?

the that with from what there their

of it his or all use if

and he they one were an will

a was I had we each up

to for at by when which other

in on be word your she about

is are this but can do out

you as have not said how many

When they get to a new word

Ideally, teachers should coach them to apply knowledge and strategies.

Read page 27 and consider the extent to which your first-grade teachers are able to coach word recognition.

Clark, K. F. (2004). What can I say besides “sound it out”? Coaching word recognition in beginning reading. Reading Teacher, 57, 440-449.

Instructional Strategies for Word Recognition

Read pages 28-37. Then we’ll try them.Teaching letter names and soundsTeaching sounding and blendingTeaching letter patternsTeaching high-frequency wordsTeaching decoding by analogy

Please keep the manipulatives together; we’ll post a set if you want to make them for your teachers.

Example of a Benchmark Word Wall

Child encounters:

shrill

Video Examples

Watch Sara work to build word recognition in needs-based

groups.

Step One: Gather your resources

Find and examine the scope and sequence of instruction in your core and supplementary materials for phonics skills, high-frequency words, oral vocabulary, and comprehension strategies.

Locate and organize any informal achievement or placement tests that are associated with your materials.

Locate and organize any informal assessments provided in the professional books that your grade level is reading.

Step Two: Consider your children’s needs

Review the most recent grade-level data and determine whether additional informal data are needed.Choose two areas to target for differentiation (e.g., phonemic awareness and phonics, phonics and fluency, fluency and comprehension, comprehension and vocabulary).Choose differentiation strategies in those areas.Gather or make materials for three weeks’ needs-based instruction.

Step Three: Try it out!

Pilot your plan for three weeks.Gather to evaluate and fine-tune, considering the changing needs of children and teachers.