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Copy of “Ignite Their Literacy—It’s Never Too Late!”

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Check out this Presentation designed by SMITA CHATLANI.

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When teaching reading to students with dyslexia, one useful tip is to incorporate multi-sensory techniques into your lessons. Dyslexia affects the way individuals process language, and engaging multiple senses can help reinforce learning and improve reading skills.

Download the free guide to learn 5 ways you can implement this approach:

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Free Trainings, PDHs & Resources for Illinois Educators

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We offer free in-person and virtual training, where Illinois teachers can earn PDHs, and resources for educators of students with specific learning disabilities in Illinois specific to dyslexia, dysgraphia, and dyscalculia.

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Brain Plasticity Research (Krafnick et al., 2011)

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Brain Plasticity Research (Krafnick et al., 2011)

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This research conducted using brain imagining, provides concrete evidence that the adolescent brain is not fixed and can be "rewired" with effective reading instruction.

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Gray matter volume changes following reading intervention in

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A resource that provides research-based strategies for teaching vocabulary and comprehension to middle school students in content-area subjects.

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Secondary Reading Instruction (Part 2): Deepening Middle School Content-Area Learning with Vocabulary and Comprehension Strategies

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Work through the sections of this module in the order presented in the STAR graphic above. Related to this module Copyright 2025 Vanderbilt University. All rights reserved.

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INTENSIVE INTERVENTIONS FOR STUDENTSSTRUGGLING IN READING AND MATHEMATICS (Vaughn et al.,2011)

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INTENSIVE INTERVENTIONS FOR STUDENTSSTRUGGLING IN READING AND MATHEMATICS (Vaughn et al.,2011)

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A practice guide on implementing intensive, individualized interventions in reading and mathematics for students who are struggling.

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A comprehensive guide for teachers, parents, and students on understanding and supporting dyslexia.

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The purpose of the Dyslexia Handbook is to provide information and guidance for educational professionals, school leaders, families, guardians, and students themselves on the subject of dyslexia.

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An invaluable, state-specific resource that provides a framework for effective literacy instruction.

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Brain Plasticity Research (Shaywitz et al.,2005)

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Brain Plasticity Research (Shaywitz et al.,2005)

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The brain's reading systems are flexible and can change. For children with dyslexia, this means that targeted, evidence-based reading programs can help rewire their brains to improve reading skills. This research offers a promising path forward, allowing us to identify dyslexia more accurately and develop more effective treatments for people of ALL ages.

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Edutopia Article: Collaboration (Ellison, 2024)

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Edutopia Article: Collaboration (Ellison, 2024)

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A practical guide for special education teachers on how to create systems for effective collaboration with a student's entire team.

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4 Strategies to Facilitate Collaboration Across Special Education Teams

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By creating effective systems, special education teachers can set themselves, general education teachers, and students up for success.

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6 Step Routine for Multisyllabic Word Reading (1)

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WWC | Providing Reading Interventions for Students in Grades 4–9

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This manual includes information about DIBELS 8, how DIBELS 8 differs from previous editions of DIBELS, how to administer and score DIBELS 8 subtests, and how to use DIBELS 8 data to inform instructional decision-making.

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This manual includes information about DIBELS 8, how DIBELS 8 differs from previous editions of DIBELS, how to administer and score DIBELS 8 subtests, and how to use DIBELS 8 data to inform instructional decision-making.

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The provided "Quick Guide For Reading Assessment" is a diagnostic tool for educators to assess and instruct students in reading, starting with broad skills and moving to foundational sub-skills.

For older students (third grade and beyond), the guide recommends starting at the top of the progression with reading comprehension and fluency measures, then moving down as needed.

For emerging readers, the process is reversed, beginning with foundational skills at the bottom of the progression and moving upward. The assessment flow covers key areas including comprehension, fluency, word recognition, decoding/phonics, and phonemic awareness, and provides specific instructional focuses for students who show weakness in each area.

Additionally, the document includes detailed flowcharts for various specific assessments, helping educators analyze data to identify problems with accuracy and automaticity and set appropriate instructional goals

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Many children can get through kindergarten, first, and second-grade using visual memory, picture clues, and compensation skills. Their reading skills appear fairly intact. Then, around third grade, the text gets more challenging, the words get longer, and the pictures go away. Suddenly, it is obvious that these children are not really competent readers! It is often a time of confusion and frustration for parents and teachers who thought that everything was okay.

The bottom line is that without thorough diagnostic testing, it is difficult to determine if a young child really has the foundational skills needed for reading, mastered or not. This testing should be happening in Kindergarten! In fact, many states have passed laws that require that it is. Early detection of reading and learning disabilities (like dyslexia) is crucial.

Whether it happens in primary grades or not, diagnostic assessments should be given to every person struggling with literacy, regardless of age! Without them, we can't determine the underlying problem. Time is precious when an intermediate child is struggling to read. We need to identify exactly what skills are missing and then quickly, and purposefully, intervene.

After reading about the assessments, pop into Reading Rev's VIP site where you'll find a bite-sized video lesson modeling how to analyze data and create a plan.

DIAGNOSTIC ASSESSMENTS SHOULD BE GIVEN TO EVERY PERSON STRUGGLING WITH LITERACY REGARDLESS OF AGE!

If you need a Benchmark Assessment to determine if a child is reading at grade level, we love Acadience Reading (formally Dibels Next). These are free grade-level assessments that will give you the indicator that further testing is needed.

Then, use Diagnostic Tests to identify the root cause of the reading problem. These are a few of our favorite, free, easily accessible, and quick diagnostic assessments.

The PAST Test

We know that our series is called BIG Kids Need Too, but the truth is that we cannot ignore phonological awareness (P.A.) when looking at reading problems. Phonological Awareness is the ability to hear and manipulate the sounds of a language. Phonics is matching those sounds to symbols or letters. Phonics is tied so closely with phonological awareness that we have to look at both to determine the root cause of the reading struggles. You can find out more about P.A. and Phonics in the links above.

Research shows that 80% of children with a significant reading disability (SRD) have a phonological processing deficit. The PAST Test ( Phonological Awareness Screening Test) is a comprehensive assessment that is individually administered to determine if a child is proficient in the core components of phonological awareness. The subskills assessed are sentence segmenting, on-set rime, syllables, and phoneme isolation and manipulation. There are two versions of this assessment. One is geared more for primary students and the other offers more advanced phonological awareness and phonemic awaress tasks.

We highly recommend David Kilpatrick's book Equipped for Reading Successthat dives deeply into the importance of phonological awareness. It includes the PAST assessment as well as resources to teach and practice P.A. with students.

PHONICS IS TIED SO CLOSELY WITH PHONOLOGICAL AWARENESS THAT WE HAVE TO LOOK AT BOTH TO DETERMINE THE ROOT CAUSE OF THE READING STRUGGLES.

Check out the advanced PAST test here. This test starts with syllables.

Check out the Primary PAST here. It tests skills at the very beginning like identifying words in a sentence and rhyme recognition. (If your student is not successful with syllables, go back to this!)

CORE Phonics Survey

The next diagnostic assessment is the CORE Phonics Survey. This test determines if a student is proficient in letter names, letter sounds, and decoding at the word level. Each section assesses one phonetic pattern (such as short vowels with digraphs). It concludes with multisyllabic words.

This test is great because it allows you to determine exactly where you need to begin your phonics instruction. It also offers both real and nonsense words. In intermediate grades, it is important to have students decode and spell nonsense words because they have memorized many common real words. For example, if a student reads the top row: tape, key, toe, paid, feet accurately, but struggles reading the bottom row: loe, hine, beap, faim, soat, you have insight that they are not phonetically secure with long vowels. This is where you begin your lessons.

The CORE Phonics Survey includes a place to document progress monitoring as well. After instruction, go back to the assessment to determine if the child is secure in that skill and ready to move on to the next one.

THIS TEST IS GREAT BECAUSE IT ALLOWS YOU TO DETERMINE EXACTLY WHERE YOU NEED TO BEGIN YOUR PHONICS INSTRUCTION.

Check out the CORE Phonics Survey here.

6 Syllable Types- Plus!

One of our favorite diagnostic tests for phonics is 6 Syllable Types- Plus! This test is similar to CORE Phonics as it gives real and nonsense words for each phonetic pattern. Included are real and nonsense words containing the six syllable types (closed, open, silent e, r-controlled, vowel team, consonant -le), plus these additional patterns: soft c and g, -dge/-tch, multisyllabic words, word endings, and phonetically irregular words.

We love that the scoring sheet breaks down the score for real versus nonsense words. It can be obvious at a glance if a child has memorized common words, but not mastered a phonetic pattern. Progress Monitoring can also be recorded.

Again, your students' results determine where you begin your phonics instruction.

WE LOVE THAT THE SCORING SHEET BREAKS DOWN THE SCORE FOR REAL VERSUS NONSENSE WORDS. IT CAN BE OBVIOUS AT A GLANCE IF. A CHILD HAS MEMORIZED COMMON WORDS, BUT NOT MASTERED A PATTERN.

*We do not find it necessary to administer both the CORE Phonics Survey and 6 Syllables Types Plus! We like CORE Phonics better for primary students because it includes letter and sound recognition. We recommend 6 Syllable Types Plus! for intermediate students because it has more multisyllabic words. Both are great and you can determine which is better for your students.

Check out 6 Syllable Types Plus! here and find the student assessment pages here.

Developmental Word Knowledge Inventory

Both the Core Phonics Survey and 6 Syllable Types Plus! assess a student's ability to decode or read words. The counter skill that also needs to be tested is a student's ability to encode or spell.

We find that older kids who have used compensation strategies for years can become fairly proficient readers. However, these kids often have awful spelling! This is one of the greatest indicators that something is wrong. It may be that they have either a phonological processing deficit or that they need phonics instruction!

The Developmental Word Inventory is a basic spelling test. It can be given whole group or one-on-one. This test has 30 words that incorporate all the basic phonetic patterns. It breaks the words into the spelling stages of Early-phonetic, Phonetic, Transitional, and Fluent.

Again, the results of this assessment should drive your literacy instruction. You can find out more about research-based spelling instruction here.

STRUGGLING WITH SPELLING IS AN INDICATOR THAT A STUDENT HAS A PHONOLOGICAL OR PHONETIC DEFICIT.

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BIG Kids Need Phonics Too Series! Step 1: Diagnostic Assessments - Reading Rev

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Many children can get through kindergarten, first, and second-grade using visual memory, picture clues, and compensation skills. Their reading skills appear fairly intact. Then, around third grade, the text gets more challenging, the words get longer, and the pictures go away. Suddenly, it is obviou

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Diagnostic Assessment Tools: Implementation Tools | NCII

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Examples of common diagnostic data sources that may assist educators in designing individualized instruction and intensifying intervention for students.

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Word Connections

Development, Testing, & Implementation of a Multisyllabic Word Reading Program

The program has been downloaded almost 30,000 times since we made it freely available in October 2022. We are interested in understanding how people are using it. The information collected through this survey will help our team continue to develop and test various aspects the program, as well as develop some of the trainings and implementation supports that are being requested. Click the image below for more information and to access the survey.

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Word Connections Development, Testing, & Implementation of a Multisyllabic Word Reading Program The program has been downloaded almost 30,000 times since we made it freely available in October 2022. We are interested in understanding how people are using it.

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Free Context Clues- Vocabulary Activities

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Unlocking the Power of Reading and Writing

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Unlocking the Power of Reading and Writing

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ReadWorks | Award-Winning, EdTech Nonprofit Organization

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ReadWorks is an edtech nonprofit organization that is committed to helping to solve America's reading comprehension crisis.

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Podcast, resources, more!

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A grant awarded to SERP by the Institute of Education Sciences (IES) as part of the Reading for Understanding Initiative allowed a SERP partnership team to develop measurement instruments and conduct research on the development of perspective taking, critical reasoning, and academic language for students in grades 4-8, and to study the independent contribution of each factor to reading comprehension. Working with practitioners in districts from Massachusetts, Maryland, and California, the team developed or extended instructional programs and programs of professional development.

Co-investigators: Suzanne Donovan, SERP; Catherine Snow, James Kim, Stephanie Jones, Robert Selman, Paola Uccelli, Kurt Fischer, Harvard Graduate School of Education; Jonathan Osborne, Stanford University; Lowry Hemphill, Wheelock College

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A grant awarded to SERP by the Institute of Education Sciences (IES) as part of the Reading for Understanding Initiative allowed a SERP partnership team to develop measurement instruments and conduct research on the development of perspective taking, critical reasoning, and academic language for students in grades 4-8, and to study the independent contribution of each factor to reading comprehension.

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[Listen Again] Ep. 150: Science of Reading for ALL Students: Intervention for Secondary Students

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Listen to this episode from Melissa & Lori Love Literacy ® on Spotify. Secondary educators have students in their classrooms who weren't taught to read. Because of these reading deficits, students likely have a difficult time accessing secondary texts and tasks. Our guests today, Supt.

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Moving Towards A More Inclusive Model of Reading:

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Moving Towards A More Inclusive Model of Reading:

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There are many different models of reading in English. Each of these has been developed in an attempt to explain the very complex skill of reading.

Earlier this year I was introduced to a model of reading that I am very excited about - The Active View of Reading - and that I want to share with you. But before I do that, I want to talk about some of the different reading models out there, which will help to explain my excitement.

In English speaking countries, most of the models currently in use are based on the Simple View of Reading. The Simple View was developed by Gough and Tunmer (1986) with the aim of ending the "reading wars". The term "reading wars" is used to describe when educators have opposing points of view about one area of literacy development being more important than another. At the time that Gough and Tunmer published the Simple View of Reading, many literacy experts believed that either language or phonics was the most important area to target for a developing reader - and had heated debates about the topic. However, the truth is that for each reader both factors are equally important, and so the Simple View of Reading was born and is now widely accepted.

Since 1986, a number of other models have been developed, using Simple View of Reading as a basis. Each of these provides elaborations that we have greatly needed for literacy teaching and learning.

In 2000, I was first introduced to Cunningham's Whole-to-Part (1993) model by the amazing David Koppenhaver and Karen Erickson. In common with most of the other models based on the Simple View of Reading, Cunningham moved away from the term "decoding" and used the phrase "word identification" instead. This is important since fluent readers tend to recognise many words automatically without needing to decode them - although decoding does still occur when required. Cunningham recognises this and refers to both "automatic word identification" and "mediated word identification" in his model.

In 2001, Scarborough published the Reading Rope model which shows "the many strands that are woven into skilled reading". This is another model that I have used for some time and which I find extremely helpful as it breaks the two main areas of the Simple View of Reading down for us. The Reading Rope model connects early language and literacy to later reading ability and disability and helps us think about all the components that we need to address in our literacy intervention.

One of the important parts of this model is Scarborough's premise that all the components are interconnected and interdependent. She wants us to understand that if just one strand is weak, it affects the rope (and the reader) as a whole. And, of course, the visual presentation of this model showing all the subskills knitting together to lead to the goal of skilled reading, really helps us to understand this.

More recently, Tunmer & Hoover (2019) provided a model that they called the "Cognitive Foundations Framework". Once again, this breaks the two main areas from the Simple View of Reading down into a variety of sub-areas. As you can see, there are some similarities and differences between the Rope Model and the Cognitive Foundations of Reading model - and each of them gives us slightly different areas to consider for both our teaching and assessment.

One of the differences between the two models that I want to draw your attention to, is that in The Reading Rope, print concepts falls under Language Comprehension, but in the Cognitive Foundations Framework it falls under Word Recognition. I'll get back to this further on!

In developing the Cognitive Foundations Framework, the authors acknowledge that it doesn't deal with factors outside of cognitive ones. This means it doesn't include psychological and ecological factors. They also make it clear that this is a hierarchical structure. Despite this, they don't suggest that the "development of the higher-order cognitive elements cannot occur until all of the lower-order elements are fully developed - although it does assume that some level of mastery is needed." (Tunmer & Hoover (2019).

And then early this year my friend Nick Drover (hi Nick), pointed me towards the Active View of Reading. I got very excited as it offers us a strong progression, still based on the Simple View of Reading, but incorporating additional understandings about reading with comprehension.

There are so many things I am excited about with this model!

As you can see, it again has different skills listed under the two areas from the Simple View of Reading. Additionally, it has represented those two areas as circles that intersect. The authors have called that intersection "Bridging Processes". Bridging Processes has given the authors a place to position skills, like print concepts, that often jump from area to area across other models as I mentioned earlier. It also gives them a place to put fluency, which has a huge chunk of research devoted to it, but which often doesn't appear in other models for a range of reasons.

I am also really excited about the list of skills that fall under Language Comprehension. The authors give us a broad view of language that acknowledges factors like cultural knowledge that aren't mentioned in other models - but still includes language structure and background knowledge. And they bring in theory of mind - which has a massive impact on comprehension. Hooray!

The Word Recognition section consists of the expected range of skills in this area. But, most importantly, they begin their model by including an extra area that is a critical component for reading with comprehension - active self-regulation.

Active Self-Regulation impacts students I work with every week. Not just in reading, of course, but across their day. If you are reading this blog, you are probably working on literacy with one or more students who cannot rely on speech alone to be heard and understood and/or who are neurodivergent - and I know this means that you also realise the impact this area has. Having it acknowledged in this model is incredibly important for many students as well as for educators. It is something we need to consider at all times - and every day we need to support students to learn to actively self-regulate by starting with co-regulation strategies and moving towards self-regulation where possible.

And then the authors delighted me even more, by publishing an evaluation of the components of their model and then discussing the implications for social justice. Yay! The diagram below shows the model with the effect sizes for each area.

If you want to read the original article about the Active View of Reading, the article that introduces it is available here.

I hope this model is as exciting to you as it is to me. I'd love to hear what you think of it in the comments.

(And if you would like to read Hoover and Tunmer's discussion of the Active View, that is also freely available.)

References

Burns, M. K., Duke, N. K., & Cartwright, K. B. (2023). Evaluating components of the active view of reading as intervention targets: Implications for social justice, School Psychology, 38(1), 30-41. https://doi.org/10.1037/spq0000519

Cunningham, J.W. (1993). Whole‐To‐Part Reading Diagnosis, Reading & Writing Quarterly, 9(1), 31-49. DOI: 10.1080/1057356930090103

Duke, N.K., & Cartwright, K.B. (2021). The Science of Reading Progresses: Communicating Advances Beyond the Simple View of Reading. Reading Research Quarterly, 56(1), 25-44. https://doi.org/10.1002/rrq.411

Gough, P. B., & Tunmer, W. E. (1986). Decoding, Reading, and Reading Disability, Remedial and Special Education, 7(1), 6-10. https://doi.org/10.1177/074193258600700104

Hoover, W. A., & Tunmer, W. E. (2022). The Primacy of Science in Communicating Advances in the Science of Reading. Reading Research Quarterly, 57(2), 399-408. https://doi.org/10.1002/rrq.446

Scarborough, H. S. (2001).Connecting early language and literacy to later reading (dis)abilities: Evidence, theory, and practice. In S.B Neuman & D.K. Dickinson (Eds.), Handbook of early literacy research (pp. 97-110). New York: Guilford Press.

Tunmer, W.E. & Hoover, W.A. (2019). The cognitive foundations of learning to read: a framework for preventing and remediating reading difficulties, Australian Journal of Learning Difficulties, 24:1, 75-93, DOI: 10.1080/19404158.2019.1614081

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Moving Towards a More Inclusive Model of Reading: the Active View of Reading

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There are many different models of reading in English. Each of these has been developed in an attempt to explain the very complex skill of reading. Earlier this year I was introduced to a model of...