Presenters: Lexie Domaradzki and Shelby Skaanes
Dates: October 24, November 7, 14, 21 (Mondays)
For many children, learning to read is a challenging undertaking. This webinar series has been developed to support the Alaska Reads Act, which is designed to improve reading outcomes for Alaskan students. In this webinar series we will use the Science of Reading to guide our work focused on the lower strands of the Scarborough Rope Model. The Reading Rope, created by Dr. Hollis Scarborough, illustrates the development of skilled reading, and provides a window into understanding the complexity of reading. The lower strand, Word Recognition, consists of phonological awareness, decoding, and word recognition. Throughout each session we will focus on the acquisition of early literacy skills, best practices in reading instruction and strategies to support struggling readers receiving intervention.
Target Audience: Grade K-5 Educators.
Session 1 – The Science of Reading
Through 40 years of research findings from numerous fields of study, we have a thorough understanding of how the brain works when engaged in the reading process. In this session we will discuss why some students struggle with reading and what factors promote or interfere with children’s progress, we will deepen understanding of the research behind how individuals learn to read, the brain regions involved in reading and we will take a close look at models of skilled reading.
Session 2 – Phonological Awareness
Phonological Awareness includes several skills related to an individual’s understanding of how a spoken language works and the different ways a word can be broken down. Research has shown that students with good phonological awareness are in a great position to become good readers, while students with poor phonological awareness almost always struggle in reading (Kilpatrick, Equipped for Reading Success). In this session we will provide information and modeling of best practices to enhance core instruction and support struggling students in intervention. We will cover basic as well as advanced phonological awareness skills. Participants will have the opportunity to practice and engage in conversations with colleagues from around the state.
Session 3 – Phonics/Decoding
Decoding requires that a student knows that written letters correspond to speech sounds and that these speech sounds are combined together to make a word. In this session we will provide information about the phoneme-grapheme relationship, we will model explicit instructional routines for core instruction and intervention and introduce phoneme-grapheme mapping activities to support increased proficiency in decoding and encoding. Participants will have the opportunity to practice and engage in conversations with colleagues from around the state.
Session 4 – Word RecognitionSight Recognition is the ability of an individual to look at any word they come across and automatically know what it says. In this session we will clarify the difference between regular and irregular words and model instructional routines to enhance core instruction and support struggling students in intervention. We will also cover intensifications to use with students who struggle with sight word recognition and discuss the role of decodable text. Participants will have the opportunity to practice and engage in conversations with colleagues from around the state.