Smart Way Reading and Spelling

Smart Way Reading and Spelling is a commercial brand of reading instruction methodology and materials that was developed in 2001 by Bright Sky Learning.

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Smart Way Reading and Spelling

Over two years in development, Smart Way Reading and Spelling is designed to be simple to use yet it is extremely efficient in teaching students. The reading methodology ranges from teaching introductory sounds and how to learn American English through advanced reading strategies. The program has been used effectively in remedial reading programs [1][2] in states across the country with positive and consistent results and is based on the most complete scientific research on teaching reading which stresses systematic and explicit phonics coupled with reading comprehension and fluency.[3]

The Smart Way Reading and Spelling program is presented in a series of twenty-seven individual flip chart lessons. Each flip chart contains a complete lesson that includes both the student and coach materials within one bound booklet. The student sees an image or text on one side of the flip chart, while the reading coach has his scripted instructions on the other side with a mirror image of what the student sees. The completely scripted nature of the program allows even the most novice coach to work with a student immediately. Extensive training is not necessary. Over time, as the coach becomes more confident, he can add more creativity and interaction in working with students. Rather than stressing individual phonetic rules for the sake of teaching rules, the Smart Way methodology introduces words and word patterns in families, helping students grasp the key phonetic rules through a cognitive learning process. The program was designed as both a complete learning system for youngsters and as an intervention method for older students and adults. Though results will vary, most students will complete each lesson in one to two hours.

National Reading Panel Findings

The findings of the National Reading Panel were outlined in the National Institute for Literacy booklet Put Reading First: The Research Building Blocks for Teaching Children to Read.[4] The Smart Way Reading and Spelling program incorporates the following five elements, which were found to be present and work together in the most effective reading programs:
1. Phonemic awareness: the concept that words are made up of sounds that are represented by letters
2. Systematic phonics: linking individual letter(s) to the sounds they make to create words
3. Guided oral reading: repeated and monitored oral reading improves reading fluency and overall reading achievement
4. Vocabulary instruction: vocabulary is acquired by students both indirectly and directly
5. Text comprehension instruction: comprehension in students can be improved by instruction that helps readers use specific comprehension strategies

Additional Research Base of the Program

The delivery of the Smart Way Reading and Spelling program is based on the concept of self-efficacy and its application in instructional practices.[5] The gradual, systematic approach allows students to develop their skills and increase their confidence. Explicit, systematic instruction is recognized as having a direct impact on student success, especially in low-achieving students and supports its use in phonics instruction.[6][7] As well, research shows phonics instruction is useful to students of all ages [8][9] and other research validates intense instruction in decoding skills as a method of boosting the reading level for struggling readers in high school.[10]

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Smart Way Reading and Spelling

Scope and Sequence of the Program

The Scope and Sequence of the program is geared to educate a student through the reading gradients, from learning the consonant sounds and reading words with short vowel sounds, through all of the most common English phonetic patterns, up to advanced phonetic concepts such as silent letters and schwa.

Students are taught dictionary skills and learn to monitor their own comprehension throughout the lessons as they read phonetically controlled passages. Upon the completion of each lesson, the Student is then given a Smart Way Cumulative Review and awarded a Certificate of Achievement for each lesson.

Section 1
Lessons 1- 6: By the end of Lesson 6, the student can sound out and spell three-letter word using short vowel sounds. There are approximately 1500 of these in the English language. Lesson 1: Teaches basic definitions and reviews the most common sound of each consonant.
Lesson 2: Teaches the short A sound, breaking words into syllables, capitalization for people and places, the concept of past tense and the definition of punctuation mark, phrase and sentence.
Lesson 3: Teaches the short I sound and the second sound of the letter S i.e. his.
Lesson 4: Teaches the short U, similarities and differences in pairs of words, definitions and how commas are used.
Lesson 5: Teaches the short E, question marks, exclamation marks and how to use punctuation marks to change the meaning of a sentence.
Lesson 6: Teaches the short O, the apostrophe showing ownership and how to know if C or K should be used in words such as cat and kit.

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Lesson 9: The ING Lesson

Lessons 7-11: By the end of Lesson 11, the student has learned all beginning and ending blends, how to add ING and ED to words, and most consonant digraphs (letters representing units of sound) such as CH.
Lesson 7: Teaches 25 beginning blends such as SL and GR.
Lesson 8: Teaches ending blends such as ND and LT, and defines singular and plural words.
Lesson 9: Teaches how to add ING to words, introduces the concept of root words and suffixes and teaches the rule of doubling consonants when adding ING to words such at sitting.
Lesson 10: Teaches the consonant digraphs: CH, SH, TH and WH and reading with expression using punctuation marks.
Lesson 11: Teaches the additional consonant digraphs: CK, TCH, DGE, the past tense suffix ED and making plurals with ES.

Section 2
Lessons 12 - 17: By the end of Lesson 17, the student knows all of the sounds made by each letter of the alphabet including the third sound of A and U (ball, put). The student has learned the most common consonant digraphs including PH, how to read words with R controlled vowels, such as AR, ER and OR.
Lesson 12: Teaches long vowel sounds in words ending with silent E.
Lesson 13: Teaches how to add ING and ED to words ending in silent E, teaches the IND, ILD and OLD word families and the definition of compound words and compound sentences.
Lesson 14: Teaches the 4 sounds of Y and the soft sounds of C and G.
Lesson 15: Teaches the third sound of A (ball) and U (full), the digraph PH, and basic contractions.
Lesson 16: Teaches R controlled vowel sounds such as OR, AR, and ER.
Lesson 17: Teaches the third sound of I as in radio, how to change Y to I when adding a suffix (baby, babies) and reviews Lessons 1 through 16.

Lessons 18 - 21: By the end of Lesson 22, the student has learned the sounds made by all of the vowel teams as well as special vowel sounds. The student knows the majority of the graphemes (letters which represent sounds) in the English language and can decode nearly any word.
Lesson 18: Teaches the vowel teams AI, AY, OA, and EE, and about homonyms.
Lesson 19: Teaches the vowel teams EA, IE, OE, UE, UI and EY and more homonyms.
Lesson 20: Teaches special vowel sounds: OU, OW, AW and AU.
Lesson 21: Teaches more special vowel sounds: OY, OI, OO EW and more homonyms.

Section 3
Lessons 22 - 27: By the end of this section, the student has been introduced to over 200 spelling patterns in the English language and has greatly improved decoding and spelling capabilities.
Lesson 22: Teaches the schwa sound and the letter combinations LE, IGH, EIGH, GH, and WR.
Lesson 23: Teaches the three sounds of CH and silent letter combinations such as GN, KN, ALK, MB, H (hour), T (castle), GU, GUE and QUE.
Lesson 24: Teaches the complete lesson of contractions and more homonyms.
Lesson 25: Teaches spelling patters with TI (action), CI (magician), SI (mansion), TU (picture), DU (graduate), ION (million). Teaches reverse vowel combinations such as UA (graduate) IA (giant) EO (rodeo) IU (aquarium) and IO (violet) and OUGH words.
Lesson 26: Teaches the use of prefixes and the complete rules of syllabication.
Lesson 27: Reviews material from lessons 18 - 26, teaches the suffix OUS, and provides a summary of the most common exceptions to phonetic rules and how to add a suffix to words ending in LE (bubble, bubbling).

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The Sounds of English CD

The Sounds of English

This compact disc and flash card product helps people recognize and repeat the sounds unique to American English. It was created and designed specifically for early readers, ELL (English Language Learners) and EFL (English as a Foreign Language) students. The Sounds of English introduces forty-six phonemes (speech sounds) in isolation and in text.

References

  1. ↑ Overview of the Results of the Bright Sky Learning, Lancaster-Lebanon Intermediate Unit 13, School District of Lancaster Tutoring Research Project, by Lana Edwards Santoro, Ph.D., Education Associates; Angela Kirby-Wehr, M.Ed., Pennsylvania Training and Technical Assistance Network (PaTTAN); and, Edward S. Shapiro, Ph.D., Lehigh University, 2006.
  2. ↑ http://www.smartwayreading.com/Research_Study.pdf
  3. ↑ National Reading Panel report
  4. ↑ http://www.nationalreadingpanel.org/Publications/researchread.htm
  5. ↑ Bandura, A. (1986) Social Foundations of Thought and Action: A Social Cognitive Theory. Prentice Hall Professional Technical Reference
  6. ↑ Curtis, M.E. (2004), Adolescents who struggle with word identification: Research and practice, in Adolescent literacy research and practice, T.L. Jetton and J.A. Dole, Editors. The Guilford Press: New York. p. 119-134.
  7. ↑ Kamil, M., (Nov 2003), Adolescents and literacy: Reading in the 21st century. Alliance for Excellent Education.
  8. ↑ Curtis, M.E., & Longo, A.M. (1999). When adolescents can’t read: Methods and materials that work. Cambridge, MA: Brookline.
  9. ↑ Snow, C.E., Burns, M.S., & Griffin, P. (Eds.). (1998). Preventing reading difficulties in young children. Washington, DC: National Academy Press.
  10. ↑ Institute for Academic Access, 2002

External links

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