Last newsletter, we looked at what phonemes and graphemes are and how important blending and segmenting these phonemes were to assist in learning to read. We are going to take a step further and look at the important role that decodable texts play in supporting early reading instruction.
Decodable texts are small texts that can be decoded by the students, using the phonemes that they have been taught in class. They also contain simple high frequency sight words (For example: ‘the’, ‘and’) to assist them in making sense of the text.
Decodable readers start with simple, single letter sounds and follow a teaching sequence, which is taught in clusters of letter sounds. For example, the first cluster of sounds taught in kindergarten is s,a,t,p,i,n. The decodables start with simple words (tap, pit, Pat) and sentences (‘A pan spits’) , using the phonemes taught. They become more complex as additional phoneme clusters are taught.
Students should be able to read a large percentage of the decodable on their own (though still might be working on fluency). The primary purpose of decodable texts is to provide students with the opportunity to practise what has been taught during explicit, systematic phonics instruction while reading continuous meaningful texts.
This is only one component of the reading instruction provided daily in class. Students are exposed to a wide variety of texts in the classroom. Teachers read to students each day to build vocabulary, word knowledge and allow them opportunities to hear more sophisticated word structures being presented to them in more complex texts. The teacher reads a wide variety of different texts shifting the focus to other components of effective reading instruction.
If you would like more information on how Blaxland Public School is using decodables in the classroom or how you can assist your child using them for home reading, please feel free to see me.
Mrs Wacker
Assistant Principal, Curriculum & Instruction
