Effective Reading Strategies for Students with Learning and Behavior Disabilities

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Effective Reading Strategies for Students with
Learning and Behavior Disabilities

• Beth Anne Pruitt, Ed. D.
• Eastern Kentucky University

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Time is an Enemy

• Average Students
• At Risk Students

Achievement
Time
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INEFFECTIVE INSTRUCTION

• INEFFECTIVE MODELS
• INEFFECTIVE PRACTICE
• -
• TESTING OUTCOMES
• -

osh
osh
FAILURE
Osh ?
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EFFECTIVE INSTRUCTION

• EFFECTIVE MODELS
• EFFECTIVE PRACTICE
• -
• TESTING OUTCOMES
• -

osh
not osh
osh
SUCCESS
Osh
BLUE SIDED RECTANGLE
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Points to Ponder

• Research indicates the IQ, mental age, education
  of parents are ALL weak predictors of reading
  success
• About 20 of elementary students have significant
  reading problems (Moats, 1999)
• About 20 of elementary students are not fluent
  enough to enjoy independent reading
• Rate of reading failure for African-1/3 of poor
  readers nationwide are from college-educated
  families
• About 25 of adults in the US lack basic literacy
  skills required in a typical job
• American, Hispanic, LEP, and low SES children
  ranges from 60-70
• Poverty is the best predictor of reading failure
  (Lyon, 1998 Allington, 1999)

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National Reading Panel Findings

• Instruction in all components of reading are
  important to produce proficient readers
• Phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, and
  comprehension
• Strategies that were Explicit or Focused were
  more effective
• Small group instruction was more effective

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Designing or Choosing Reading Programs

• Consider
• 30 of students, learning to read is easy (5-10
  start school as readers) regardless of reading
  approach
• 40 of students, learning to read is challenging
  and reading approach is a function of the
  respective students needs
• 30 of students, learning to read is difficult, a
  systematic and structured approach that includes
  PA, phonics, fluency and comprehension strategies
  is essential for success in reading

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Two Major Instructional Approaches

• Explicit Teaching
• teacher delivers instruction in a very systematic
  and direct manner
• Implicit Teaching
• a philosophy that assumes learning occurs by
  linking prior knowledge to new knowledge

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Demands of Students in an Implicit Learning
Environment

• Students must be active participants in their own
  learning
• Students must engage in cooperative and group
  learning activities, as well as group discussions
• Students must recognize their own learning
  characteristics, develop their own metacognitive
  strategies, and maintain motivation for learning

• learners have sufficient prior knowledge to make
  connections to new knowledge
• learners must attend to teacher presentations,
  teacher-student interactions, and student-student
  interactions
• learners must use cognitive and metacognitive
  processes to acquire, remember, and construct new
  knowledge and apply that to their life

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Barriers to Success in an Implicit Teaching
Environment for Students with LD

• Often have inadequate prior knowledge to make
  needed connections to new knowledge
• Often demonstrate difficulty attending to visual
  and auditory stimuli
• Typically exhibit cognitive and metacognitive
  deficits that hinder information processing

• Typically have difficulty in areas of solving
  problems, organization of information, evaluation
  of information, generalizing information, and
  applying information
• Have history of academic failure
• Often have language deficits that involve
  receptive and/or expressive language
• Often lack appropriate social skills
• Often seen as a more passive learner (e.g., not
  intrinsically motivated)

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• Explicit Teaching
• Instruction is delivery in a very systematic
  format
• Implements planned antecedents and consequences
  to facilitate learning
• Uses informal assessments of student performance
  to make instructional decisions
• Continuous and/or Consistent Measurement
• Curriculum-based assessments
• Criterion-referenced assessments
• Direct observations of student performance
• Assessment of specific skills

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Explicit Teaching

• encompasses both the delivery of instruction and
  curriculum design.
• Curriculum design Sequenced, explicit, step by
  step lesson scripts.
• Delivery Error-correction procedures, gradual
  fading from teacher-directed instruction to
  independent practice.

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Phonics (NRP)

• Phonemic awareness is NECESSARY, but NOT
  SUFFICIENT for learning to read must be
  integrated into phonics instruction
• Systematic phonics makes a larger contribution to
  successful reading than unsystematic phonics or
  none at all
• Phonics taught early (K-1) gets best results
• Good readers attend to every word and letter
  unknowingly thus, the code must be taught
• Dispels idea that systematic phonics interferes
  with comprehension

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Fluency (NRP)

• Fluent reading is connected to improved
  comprehension
• Recommended practices
• Oral reading with teachers, peers, or parents
  providing feedback, repeated and timed readings
  of passages
• Independent silent reading was NOT supported by
  research to improve reading fluency

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Fluency

• Refers to speed, accuracy, and proper expression
• Average student needs 4 to 14 exposures to become
  automatic in the recognition of a new word
• Rates vary depending on age and ability level of
  students

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Fluency Strategies

• Timed readings
• Repeated readings
• Practice of high frequency words and phrases
• Models of fluent reading
• Incorporate many opportunities for reading aloud
  into reading program

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Vocabulary (NRP)

• Support for teaching directly and indirectly
• Example of direct preteaching new or difficult
  words before reading text (definitions, synonyms,
  etc.)
• Example of indirect adult reading aloud to
  students
• Repetition and multiple exposures
• Learning in rich contexts is valuable

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Comprehension (NRP)

• Defined as intentional thinking during which
  meaning is constructed through interactions
  between text and reader (Harris Hodges, 1995)
• Vocabulary development
• Explicit teaching of comprehension strategies
• Thorough explanation of the strategy
• Vivid and detailed models think alouds
• Interactive practice with feedback

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Comprehension Strategies

• Question/Answer Relationships (QARs)
• K-W-L
• Predictions
• Think Alouds
• Reading/writing connections
• Graphic organizers

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Organizing Strategies

• Graphic Organizers
• Isolate important information and omit extraneous
  information
• Calling on prior learning assists them to make
  connections
• Visual displays are easier to remember than
  textual
• Both visual and verbal facilitates attention to
  the information

• Six Common Types
• Hierarchical
• Conceptual maps
• Sequential diagrams
• Cyclical organizers
• Venn diagrams
• Matrices

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Venn Diagram
Conceptual
Cyclical
Hierarchical
Matrix
Sequential
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Handout

• Analysis of the Literacy Environment for students
  with learning barriers in reading

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Contact Information

• Beth Anne Pruitt
• Email bethanne.pruitt_at_eku.edu
• [phone]