Like many of you, I grew up with the instruction from my parents (and teachers, for that matter) to sound out a word if I was stumped. After the past few weeks, I've realized how completely inaccurate this theory is. In most examples, if you sounded out every letter in every word, the sound you make with your mouth would be nothing like the way its supposed to sound. (dolphin becomes da-oh-l-pah-hah-ei-na) In
Catching Readers Before They Fall, authors Pat Johnson and Katie Keirer explain a much more reasonable- and effective- combination of strategies students use to to solve words on page 53.
- Meaning: "Does it make sense?"
- Structure: "Does it sound right?"
- Visual: "Does it look right?"
When students apply all three of these strategies, they are much more successful. Some students excel in one area, but are lacking in another.
Catching Readers Before They Fall has strategies for teachers to help improve the areas that need improvement. When students struggle with meaning, they may "substitute words that that may have some of the right letters as compared to the right words, but doesn't make much sense in the sentence"(55). For example, if the sentence was 'Tom likes to eat bananas' The student may read "Tom likes to eat balloons." Which looks kind of like bananas, but doesn't make sense at all. A different student may rely too heavily on meaning and need help using visual clues. They may use "pictures and what they know about the topic to predict what the text might say"( 55). For example, if the text still read 'Tom likes to eat bananas,' They may read, "Tom likes to eat pizza," Which looks nothing like bananas, but makes sense with the sentence. The tricky thing as a teacher will be understanding that every student thinks in
different ways and will need support in
different ways.
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